Brooklyn Park Tutors Tutors Come To You

On September 26, 1976, at the dedication ceremony of the Brooklyn Park Library, a time capsule was sealed, to be opened forty years later. When opened in 2016, the time capsule was found to contain photos, a 1976 Tater Daze pin, city statistics, and predictions for the year 2000—some a bit amusing, because no one in 1976 could have imagined Brooklyn Park’s rapid growth or its winding down of potato farming. Since 1976, the city’s population has more than doubled to 79,149, making it the sixth largest city in Minnesota. And its commercial potato acreage nosedived from nearly 8,000 acres in 1970 to zero in 1992.

City officials in 1976 were clearly determined to preserve Brooklyn Park’s history: that year they also purchased the historical Eidem Homestead with a $40,000 grant from the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The Eidem home can be traced all the way back to 1856, when the United States deeded forty acres to John D. and Mary Berry. They sold it a year later to Silas Merrill, owner of the adjacent forty acres. Records show that by 1879 there was a house on the property. After several more owners, John J. Eidem, Jr., and his wife, Electa, bought the property for roughly $80 per acre. The couple began growing potatoes and other crops, and their sons, Arthur and Leland, grew up on the farm. In 1918, records show that Archie and Leland Eidem purchased the portion of the property called the East Farm. After John and Electa passed away, the Eidem grandchildren rented out the house.

After the city took ownership, the home was renovated to the period 1890-1910 and opened to the public as a working farm. Visitors to the homestead are transported back to the time when Brooklyn Park was a top area for growing potatoes. Since there was no running water or electricity then, guests get to turn the handle on the washing machine wringer, make apple cider in fall, polish silver, feed farm animals, pick peas in the garden, pump water for the potato plants, and push whole cloves into oranges to make pomander balls.

Because of declining numbers of visitors at the Eidem Homestead, volunteers in 2011 sought state funding for a new way to share Brooklyn Park’s history: a traveling trunk. School groups, churches, and community groups can check out at no cost a steamer trunk full of artifacts, period clothing, and books and maps relating to 1900 farm life. The trunk is a great opportunity for Brooklyn Park tutors and teachers to help children of lower-elementary-school age make comparisons with life today.

Digital records of the time capsule’s contents are displayed permanently in the library. The efforts of city officials and Eidem Homestead volunteers have certainly provided current and future residents with a lasting snapshot of city history. With these city resources, and the assistance of Brooklyn Park tutors and teachers, students can get an up-close look at Brooklyn Park’s farming past.