Abram Elfelt, one of the first Jewish people to make a permanent home in Minnesota, dies.

The former Greyhound bus station in Minneapolis opens its doors as a music club, the Depot. Twelve years later it would be renamed First Avenue by Steve McClellan, the booking agent of the club, and Jack Meyers, the club's financial manager. A cornerstone of the city's music scene, First Avenue hosted local and national acts and was featured in Prince's movie Purple Rain.

St. Paul's Union Station opens.

In Wright County, Oscar F. Jackson is found not guilty of the murder of his neighbor Henry A. Wallace. Although there was a good deal of evidence against Jackson, a forensic examination of Wallace's body did not offer sufficient proof of his guilt. After his acquittal, on April 25, an angry mob lynched Jackson in Wallace's house. Because the authorities in Wright County cooperated with the lynching, Governor Henry H. Sibley offered a $500 reward for their capture. These events marked the beginning of the "Wright County War."

Alexander Ramsey is appointed the first governor of Minnesota Territory. The third choice of President Zachary Taylor, Ramsey is selected after the first, Edward W. McGaughey, is rejected by the Senate, and the second, William S. Pennington, declines the post. Appointed while Congress is out of session, Ramsey is already in Minnesota before the Senate approves his nomination in January 1850.

Roald Amundsen, the famed Norwegian polar explorer who had discovered the South Pole in 1911, addresses a large audience in Duluth about the on-going battle of World War I and appeals to the people of the United States, especially American labor, to "stand behind the President to the last ditch, and to work with 100 per cent efficiency to the end of the war." After remarking that "Norwegians in this country will be pleased to know after the war that they, too, have had a share in the liberation of mankind," Amundsen would continue on a speaking tour of Minnesota and later leave for Norway t

A shoot-out between outlaw John Dillinger and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) occurs at the Lincoln Court Apartments in St. Paul. Dillinger escapes but a few months later is shot to death by FBI agents in Chicago.

The US Army officially occupies Fort Gaines, later renamed Fort Ripley. The post had been built to monitor the Ho-Chunk people (Winnebago) at Long Prairie, and to negotiate with nearby Ojibwe and Dakota bands.

St. Paul's founder, Pierre Parrant, builds the city's first structure, known as the whiskey seller's cabin, in Fountain Cave. Nicknamed "Pig's Eye" because one of his eyes was surrounded by a "white-ish ring," Parrant had been expelled from the Fort Snelling grounds for selling liquor. The name is also applied to the community when people begin having their mail sent to "Pig's Eye." At Father Lucien Galtier's suggestion, the town's name was changed to St. Paul on November 1, 1849.

The St. Paul Academy of Natural Sciences is formed. The group suspended activities after the state capitol fire of 1881 destroyed its collection, reorganized in 1890, and handed over its new collection to the St. Paul Institute of Science and Letters in 1907. The institute evolved into the Science Museum of Minnesota.