Dayton’s Bluff

This once-wealthy neighborhood sits on a large, high bluff overlooking the Mississippi. The bluff and the neighborhood are both named after Lyman Dayton (no relation to the department store Daytons), the land speculator who bought the 5,000-acre site in 1849. He designed it as a neighborhood of wealthy homeowners to rival Summit Hill, though it never quite reached that height. Most of the stone mansions built at the time have since been demolished, replaced by Victorian-era homes that are still there today.

Humans have occupied the site for thousands of years. Ancient burial mounds dot the bluff. From the 1600s to the mid-1800s it was home to a large Dakota village, Kaposia. The Dakota also used the bluff as a burial ground. At the base of it was Carver’s Cave, a huge cavern containing rock paintings and an underground lake. It was largely destroyed by railroad construction in the late 1880s.

The first European to stake a land claim on the bluff was William Evans, a discharged soldier from Fort Snelling who established a farm there in the 1830s. He had served with, and was friends of, John Hays and Edward Phalen, both of whom settled nearby. Hays later became St. Paul’s first murder victim, with Phalen (for whom Phalen Park is named) charged with the killing; Evans testified at the trial.

The Adolf and Anna Muench house, 653 E. Fifth St. Built in 1884. Photo by Joe Hoover.