Jackson Street Shops (1882 - 1959)

The Jackson Street shops were built in 1882 for the Saint Paul, Minneapolis, and Manitoba Railroad, which eventually became the Great Northern Railway. These shops provided spaces and services that supported the freight, passenger, and livestock trains that came through the area. Three of the original buildings still stand and have now been converted for modern use. The three remaining buildings are under the control of the Saint Paul Heritage Preservation Commission, which has made the shops a local historic district.

In the late 1880s, the first big railway came through Minnesota, The Saint Paul, Minneapolis, and Manitoba Railroad. The trains coming through needed skilled workers to keep the trains and railways maintained and to provide repairs. As such, 25 buildings sprung up on Jackson Street to meet the railway's needs. The buildings were very large, made with two-foot thick walls and hefty wooden columns. Mechanics, machinists, welders, seamstresses, blacksmiths, and electricians all flocked to shops to work for the railway. They fixed train cars, sewed and dyed cloth, created light fixtures for the train cars, and began to make cattle, passenger, and freight cars for the railway. Thousands of residents came to the shops over the decades to work on the rail line. The railway became stronger, becoming the Great Northern Railway (now BNSF), and added the Jackson Street Roundhouse to the rail line. 

Over time production of train cars began to shift to the Dale Street shops on the northeast corner of Dale Street and Minnehaha Avenue. These shops were created in the early 1900s to employ more people in the area as at the time railroad industries employed one of every four workers in Saint Paul. In 1959, the Great Northern Railway moved its repair and maintenance out of the Jackson Street Roundhouse to another location, as roundhouses were becoming obsolete by the mid-century. The closing of the Roundhouse signaled the end of the Jackson Street Shops, which by 1970 had all become storage warehouses. 

In 1985 the area was redeveloped into the Empire Builder Business Park by the Saint Paul Port Authority. Only eight buildings still stood during this time and five had to be torn down due to the poor condition of the buildings. The three remaining buildings were the old pattern shop, the machine shop, and the storage building. The three shops continue to be maintained by the Saint Paul Heritage Preservation Commission, with restoration projects on the pattern shop being completed in 2015. Today the three buildings are used for social services programs, the American Indian Family and Children's Services and the St. Paul Federation of Educators. 

McClure, Jane. Jackson Street Shops , Saint Paul Historical . Accessed March 20th, 2025. https://saintpaulhistorical.com/items/show/241.

McClure, Jane. The Dale Street Shops , Saint Paul Historical . Accessed March 20th, 2025. https://saintpaulhistorical.com/items/show/242.

McClure, Jane. Minnesota Transportation Museum, Saint Paul Historical . Accessed March 20th, 2025. https://saintpaulhistorical.com/items/show/61.

attern Shop-Saint Paul, Minneapolis & Manitoba Railway Company Structural Repair, Minnesota's Legacy . Accessed March 20th, 2025. https://www.legacy.mn.gov/projects/pattern-shop-saint-paul-minneapolis-manitoba-railway-company-structural-repair.