More than 3,000 people (two-thirds of them children) escape death or serious injury when they rush out of the Amphitheatre in Duluth seconds before the steel-and-wood roof of the expansive sports arena collapses under the weight of snow during an intermission in the annual Duluth police department and Virginia (Minn.) fire department hockey game.

Cartoonist Charles M. Schulz dies in California. That summer, in St. Paul, his childhood home, 101 individually decorated, five-foot-tall statues of Snoopy are displayed in a celebration of Schulz's life. Later in the year, two auctions of Snoopy statues (including some from the celebration and some made specially for auction) are held with the announcement that the money raised will be used as memorial funds to create a bronze sculpture of Schulz characters for downtown St. Paul, as well as to benefit the College of Visual Arts in St.

William Williams is hanged in a bungled execution in the Ramsey County jail for the murders of a teenaged boy, with whom he was sexually involved, and the boy's mother. Williams is the twenty-fifth man and the last person of twenty-six legally executed in the state, as capital punishment was abolished in Minnesota in 1911 following public revulsion and outcry caused by vivid newspaper accounts of his protracted sufferings, due to a too-long rope.

Patty Berg is born in Minneapolis. A consummate golfer and member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, she won the US Women's Open in 1946 and claimed victory in seven Western Open Tournaments and four Titleholders Championships.

More than 400 bookbinders in the Twin Cities area go on strike against the Quality Park, Minnesota, Heinrich, Mackay, and Tension envelope companies after a bargaining session fails to resolve differences about a new contract, including a disagreement about a cost-of-living clause. The striking members of the Graphic Arts International Union would settle with all their employers two months later.

The Fort Snelling post band travels to Stillwater to play for a Valentine's Day dance.

Henry B. Whipple is born in Adams, New York. As Minnesota's first Episcopalian bishop, Whipple worked tirelessly to promote his church in the state. After moving to Faribault in 1852, he built the first Episcopal cathedral in the country, as well as the Shattuck School, Seabury Divinity School, and St. Mary's Hall.

Faribault is platted (surveyed and mapped). Trader Alexander Faribault, a son of Jean-Baptiste and Pelagie Faribault, had settled there in 1826.

The Waseca County Horse Thief Detectives are organized in Wilton. One of several such settler-colonist groups, it continued to hold social meetings after 1880 and, when horse-thieving became a thing of the past, it focused its energies on tracing stolen cars.

Norman County is established. Although the name was believed to honor influential settler-colonist Norman W. Kittson, it is now understood that Norwegian immigrants selected the name in remembrance of their homeland.

The US Department of Justice files a pollution suit against Reserve Mining Company, which operated a taconite plant on Lake Superior and dumped tailings contaminated with asbestos-like fibers into the lake. Lasting five years, the proceedings would be the nation's longest and most expensive environmental legal battle to that date.

The Minnesota legislature reorganizes the University of Minnesota into a central college of science, literature, and the arts, with various associated colleges. Although the university had been incorporated on February 25, 1851, no classes had been held. In 1869, the board of regents elected William W. Folwell as the institution's first president, and classes began soon afterward.