Main Street History: Nicollet Park, Home Of The Minneapolis Millers

KINGFIELD, MN — If you drive down Nicollet Avenue past 31st Street in south Minneapolis, you would never there used to be a baseball stadium at the spot where an empty parking lot now sits.

But for nearly 60 years, those four acres played host to hundreds of summer baseball nights. The field saw baseball legends including Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, and Willie Mays.

Nicollet Park was the home of the Minneapolis Millers from 1896 through 1955. The club won nine pennants at the small, inner-city stadium before their eventual move to Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington.

The Millers played teams from other major Midwestern cities in the American Association. The Millers fostered a fierce rivalry with the neighboring St. Paul Saints, who played at their own Lexington Park.

On summer holidays the two teams held scheduled doubleheaders, with the morning game played in one city and the afternoon game in the other city, according to the Society for American Baseball Research.

Nicollet Park was located right across from the Nicollet streetcar garage. The citywide rapid transit line made it a breeze for residents to get to games, but the transit line was later torn down to make way for automobiles and highways.

On Sept. 28, 1955, the Minneapolis Millers played their final game at Nicollet Park. It happened to be their clinching game for the Junior World Series.

By the middle of the century, baseball was getting too big for the neighborhood ballparks. Nicollet Park was torn down at the conclusion of the 1955 season.

In 1956, the Minneapolis Millers moved into Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington.

"The Met" was located at the current site of the Minneapolis-St. Paul Airport.

While Nicollet Park could only host a couple of thousand people, the Met opened with a max capacity of 18,200, according to BallparksOfBaseball.com.

But the Met wasn't built for the Minneapolis Millers. It was designed and financed to lure a Major League Baseball team to the Twin Cities, and metro area baseball fans soon got their wish.

Washington Senators owner Calvin Griffith decided to move his franchise to Bloomington in 1960, renaming them the Minnesota Twins.

The Minneapolis Millers ceased operations in 1961.

Between the 1960s and 2020, different banks called the former site of Nicollet Park home. The Wells Fargo bank at the site was burned down in the George Floyd riots, as well as the plaque commemorating the stadium.

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