Last Glance

Burton Hanson photographs the sign in all seasons and light conditions. Read more about Local Photographer Shoots Unique Look at Iconic Edina Cinema Sign

Braemar figure skating instructors Eleanor Fischer and Jean Pastor created Edina’s first ice show in 1966.

Braemar Arena had been open only a few months when it hosted its first ice show in the spring of 1966. Even with inexperienced skaters, the Ice Follies managed to entertain with costuming, music and staging similar to popular professional ice shows of the day. Read more about The Big Show on Ice

Local newspapers announced the opening of the innovative Country Club District with great fanfare. “It looks as though Edina will be having growing pains before long,” predicted the Hennepin County Review on May 29, 1924.

Sales, in fact, were “perfectly lousy,” revealed developer Samuel Thorpe’s son, Sam, years later in a 1971 Edina Sun article, “It took a while to sell [homebuyers] on the idea of moving such a long way from established Minneapolis neighborhoods.” Read more about A Field of Dreams

Just months after Prohibition ended on December 5, 1933, the Edina Village Council approved Liquor License No. 1 for the first liquor store within city limits. Hay & Stenson opened at 50th and France in March 1934 as the village’s only off-sale liquor establishment.

The partners were prominent Country Club District residents Charles T. Hay, a former colleague of the neighborhood’s developer Samuel Thorpe, and A.R Stenson, owner of a twine business in St. Louis Park. Read more about Liquor License No. 1

The wrecking ball may have tumbled Wooddale School into a pile of bricks in 1985, but the building lives on in many former students’ memories. “Every school I draw in my books is Wooddale School,” says former student Nancy Carlson, a children’s book author and illustrator. Read more about Gone But Not Forgotten