Location
Mankato is in Blue Earth County The Dakota name is retained, with slight change, by the township and city of Mankato. On the earliest map of Minnesota Territory, in 1850, it appeared as Mahkahta for one of its original nine counties, reaching from the Mississippi above the Crow Wing west to the Missouri. MANKATO Township was established April 6, 1858, and was organized in connection with the present city of Mankato, May 11, 1858. The city charter was adopted March 24, 1868, and the first election of the township, separate from the city, was held April 7, 1868. The first settlement of Mankato and of this county was in February 1852 by Parsons King Johnson, and on the 14th of that month the Blue Earth Settlement Claim Association was organized in St. Paul by Henry Jackson, P. K. Johnson, Col. D. A. Robertson, Justus C. Ramsey, brother of the governor of the territory, and others. Hughes writes of their choice of the name for the settlement to be founded, as follows: "The honor of christening the new city was accorded to Mrs. P. K. Johnson and Mrs. Henry Jackson, who selected the name 'Mankato,' upon the suggestion of Col. Robertson. He had taken the name from Nicollet's book, in which the French explorer compared the 'Mahkato' or Blue Earth River, with all its tributaries, to the water nymphs and their uncle in the German legend of 'Undine.' . . . No more appropriate name could be given the new city, than that of the noble river at whose mouth it is located."Growth of the community was attributed to transportation, as four railroads met in Mankato. In 1880 the city was fourth in size in the state, with a population of 5,500, and supported a number of industries: machine shops, flour, feed, and planing mills, a woolen mill, linseed oil works, several carriage and wagon factories, four breweries, a pottery and brick yards, three newspapers, and fourteen churches. The community is the site of Bethany Lutheran College, founded in 1927; and Minnesota State University--Mankato, which began as a normal school, 1867-1921, teachers college, 1921-57, state college, 1957-75, and state university since 1975.Hear Mankato spoken as Makato From: Upham, Warren. Minnesota Place Names: A Geographical Encyclopedia. St. Paul, MN: Minnesota Historical Society Press, First edition 1920. Third Edition 2001. Print.
