Trips Places Foods Stories Newsletters

Take your next trip with Atlas Obscura!

Our small-group adventures are inspired by our Atlas of the world's most fascinating places, the stories behind them, and the people who bring them to life.

Visit Adventures
Trips Highlight
Taktsang Lhakhang, also known as the “Tiger’s Nest”.
Bhutan • 11 days, 10 nights
Festivals & Temples of Bhutan
from
Macchu Picchu
Peru • 10 days, 9 nights
Peru: Machu Picchu & the Last Incan Bridges
from
View all trips
Top Destinations
Latest Places
Most Popular Places Random Place Lists Itineraries
Add a Place
Download the App
Top Destinations
View All Destinations »

Countries

  • Australia
  • Canada
  • China
  • France
  • Germany
  • India
  • Italy
  • Japan

Cities

  • Amsterdam
  • Barcelona
  • Beijing
  • Berlin
  • Boston
  • Budapest
  • Chicago
  • London
  • Los Angeles
  • Mexico City
  • Montreal
  • Moscow
  • New Orleans
  • New York City
  • Paris
  • Philadelphia
  • Rome
  • San Francisco
  • Seattle
  • Stockholm
  • Tokyo
  • Toronto
  • Vienna
  • Washington, D.C.
Latest Places
View All Places »
The ‘Old Secretariat’ government building in New Delhi.
The 'Old Secretariat'
This set is inspired by a Roman arena.
Bozdağ Film Platolari
The Sea Water Distilling Plant.
Sea Water Distilling Plant
Contemplative paths.
Ayo Rock Formations
Latest Places to Eat & Drink
View All Places to Eat »
The sign declares this the number-one gumbo shop in town.
Gumbo Hut Shioya
The pavlova comes crowned with jewel-like fruit.
Central Park Boathouse
The Village Tavern of Long Grove - exterior.
The Village Tavern
Hunter House Hamburgers
L’Escamoteur
Recent Stories
All Stories Video Podcast
Most Recent Stories
View All Stories »
The truth is out there—somewhere.
The Truth Is Out There at the Dreamland Resort (or Should We Say ‘Area 51?’)
19 days ago
Edward Payson Weston
How the 6-Day Race Became an American Spectator Obsession
20 days ago
Alresford Spy Toilet
This Public Bathroom in a Sleepy English Village Was an Epicenter for Cold War Espionage
22 days ago
Manhattan Well
The Manhattan Well: How Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton United to Solve a Murder Mystery
23 days ago

No search results found for
“”

Make sure words are spelled correctly.

Try searching for a travel destination.

Places near me Random place

Popular Destinations

  • Paris
  • London
  • New York
  • Berlin
  • Rome
  • Los Angeles
Trips Places Foods Stories Newsletters
Sign In Join
Places near me Random place
All the United States Minnesota Minneapolis Mill City Museum and site of "The Great Mill Disaster"
AO Edited Gastro Obscura

Mill City Museum and site of "The Great Mill Disaster"

When flour explodes, it's not a pretty sight.

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Added By
Dylan Thuras
Email
Been Here
Want to go
Added to list
Gold Medal Flour Mill   Ken Lund/CC BY-SA 2.0
Gold Medal Flour Mill   Ken Lund/CC BY-SA 2.0
  Paul VanDerWerf/CC BY-SA 2.0
  Ken Lund/CC BY-SA 2.0
  Ken Lund/CC BY-SA 2.0
  Eric Kilby/CC BY-SA 2.0
  paigeelizabeth3660 / Atlas Obscura User
  paigeelizabeth3660 / Atlas Obscura User
  paigeelizabeth3660 / Atlas Obscura User
Mill City Museum from the Riverfront   gingerstash / Atlas Obscura User
  Michael Reinhardt / Atlas Obscura User
  Cartographer / Atlas Obscura User
  Cartographer / Atlas Obscura User
  Cartographer / Atlas Obscura User
  Dr Alan P Newman / Atlas Obscura User
  Tony Webster/CC BY-SA 2.0
  Ken Lund/CC BY-SA 2.0
  Ken Lund/CC BY-SA 2.0
  Ken Lund/CC BY-SA 2.0
  Ken Lund/CC BY-SA 2.0
  Ben Tesch/CC BY-SA 2.0
  jlord7 / Atlas Obscura User
Been Here
Want to go
Added to list

About

The men who worked at the Washburn A Mill processing flour knew they had a dangerous job. A conveyor belt could break, whip around, and cut you deep across the face. You could get your fingers caught in any one of the many pieces of grinding, chopping, whirling bits of exposed machinery and lose your hand and your ability to make a living. Of course, there were longer-term dangers as well. After breathing in floating flour particles day after day, you started waking in the night, finding yourself coughing up what looked like little bits of dough, mixed inside your lungs. Known as Baker's Disease, it was slow, foul, and deadly.

But none of these dangers came close to the greatest threat the workers faced. With millions of flammable particulates floating in the air, flour mills were powder kegs of a sort. All it took was a single spark. On May 2, 1878, the nightmare came true.

In a single instant, the largest flour mill in the world was a crumpled ruin, and all 14 men who worked in the mill had died. Huge chunks of granite landed as far as eight blocks away, windows broke for miles, and the explosion was felt across the city. People flooded out of their houses convinced that Minneapolis had been struck by an earthquake. Four more died fighting the ensuing blaze, and then five more mills were burned. Known as the Great Mill Disaster, and a national news sensation, it was this explosion that led to the first reforms in mill safety.

Today on the site of the great mill disaster the ruins of a later mill, which was abandoned and partially burned down in the 1990s, still stand. They have been braced with steel, and along with the Mill Ruins Park and the Mill City Museum they form both a remembrance of those lost to the dangers of flour milling and a monument to the progress that the flour industry brought to Minneapolis, once known by its nickname, Flour City.

The Mill City Museum itself is a wonderfully designed modern museum that explores the history and impact of milling on Minneapolis. The museum does a wonderful job of incorporating the old mill into its design and includes, besides the braced ruins, an educational elevator ride that recreates the experience of working in the mill.

An aside: Its years as a large abandoned building in industrial Minneapolis turned the Gold Medal Flour building (the final incarnation of the flour mill) into one of the city's most prominent graffiti-writing locations, with people creating elaborate works and paintings that spanned all nine floors. Though half of the building is now a condominium and the other half is the excellent Mill City Museum, presumably somewhere under the new sheet rock, a generation of Minneapolis graffiti artists' work still remains.

It is also known that an extensive series of tunnels run underneath the complex, leading out to the river. Currently there is no access to those tunnels, but they may be opened up in the future. It is not suggested you attempt to explore them yourself. In 2012, a man was rescued after becoming stuck in the nearby Pillsbury Mill tunnels.

Related Tags

Museums Food Food Museums Collections Monuments Disaster Areas

Community Contributors

Added By

Dylan

Edited By

shelbystu, Dr Alan P Newman, paigeelizabeth3660, Michelle Cassidy...

  • shelbystu
  • Dr Alan P Newman
  • paigeelizabeth3660
  • Michelle Cassidy
  • gingerstash
  • jlord7
  • Michael Reinhardt
  • Cartographer

Published

January 14, 2013

Updated

March 31, 2021

Edit this listing

Make an Edit
Add Photos
Sources
  • https://www.mnhs.org/millcity/learn/history/building
Mill City Museum and site of "The Great Mill Disaster"
704 South 2nd Street
Minneapolis, Minnesota, 55401
United States
44.97867, -93.256987
Visit Website
Get Directions

Nearby Places

Owamni

Minneapolis, Minnesota

miles away

Saint Anthony Falls Laboratory

Minneapolis, Minnesota

miles away

Pillsbury A-Mill

Minneapolis, Minnesota

miles away

Explore the Destination Guide

Photo of Minneapolis

Minneapolis

Minnesota

Places 61
Stories 17

Nearby Places

Owamni

Minneapolis, Minnesota

miles away

Saint Anthony Falls Laboratory

Minneapolis, Minnesota

miles away

Pillsbury A-Mill

Minneapolis, Minnesota

miles away

Explore the Destination Guide

Photo of Minneapolis

Minneapolis

Minnesota

Places 61
Stories 17

Related Stories and Lists

Gold Medal Flour

Podcast

By The Podcast Team

Gold Medal Flour

Podcast

By The Podcast Team

Death By Food: An anthology of remarkable food disasters

By Laetitia Barbier

Related Places

  • The National Cookie Cutter Museum.

    Joplin, Missouri

    National Cookie Cutter Historical Museum

    A small museum dedicated to the whimsical tool that turns sugar cookies into works of art.

  • The “pet ham” is 119 years old.

    Smithfield, Virginia

    World’s Oldest Edible Ham

    The nearly 120-year-old piece of pork wears a brass collar and was once a man's "pet ham."

  • The Gurkenmuseum.

    Lübbenau/Spreewald, Germany

    Gurkenmuseum (Cucumber Museum)

    A museum honoring Germany’s cucumber mecca offers a great dill of gherkin history.

  • Auvers-sur-Oise, France

    Musée de l'Absinthe

    One woman's decades-long obsession with the "La Fée Verte."

  • O'Leary, Prince Edward Island

    Canadian Potato Museum

    This sprawling collection hides many charms.

  • That’s a lot of mustard.

    Middleton, Wisconsin

    National Mustard Museum

    More than 5,000 contemporary and "historic" mustards from around the world.

  • Raeren, Belgium

    Museum of Carrots

    This small window display is dedicated to the noble carrot.

  • Some rights reserved by Kai Hendry

    Santos, Brazil

    Brazil's Coffee Palace

    This majestic building, where Brazil's coffee brokers once bought and sold beans, now houses a coffee museum.

Aerial image of Vietnam, displaying the picturesque rice terraces, characterized by their layered, verdant fields.
Atlas Obscura Membership

Become an Atlas Obscura Member


Join our community of curious explorers.

Become a Member

Get Our Email Newsletter

Follow Us

Facebook YouTube TikTok Instagram Pinterest RSS Feed

Get the app

Download the App
Download on the Apple App Store Get it on Google Play
  • All Places
  • Latest Places
  • Most Popular
  • Places to Eat
  • Random
  • Nearby
  • Add a Place
  • Stories
  • Food & Drink
  • Itineraries
  • Lists
  • Video
  • Podcast
  • Newsletters
  • All Trips
  • Family Trip
  • Food & Drink
  • History & Culture
  • Wildlife & Nature
  • FAQ
  • Membership
  • Feedback & Ideas
  • Community Guidelines
  • Product Blog
  • Unique Gifts
  • Work With Us
  • About
  • FAQ
  • Advertise With Us
  • Advertising Guidelines
  • Privacy Policy
  • Cookie Policy
  • Terms of Use
Atlas Obscura

© 2025 Atlas Obscura. All Rights Reserved.