MANY YEARS HAVE PASSED since I toured the nondescript wood-frame house built by Alexander Faribault in 1853. Multiple times a week I pass by this house which sits along busy Minnesota State Highway 60 in downtown Faribault. It’s become so much a part of the local landscape that I don’t even notice the building which was briefly home to Faribault and his family. But it’s an important part of local history given Alexander Faribault founded the town in 1855.
On Monday, June 22, Alexander Faribault will be celebrated at a free birthday open house from 5-6:30 p.m. in his former home at 12 First Avenue Northeast. Born 220 years ago in 1806, Faribault died at age 76 in November 1882.
Attendees at the upcoming birthday celebration can learn a whole lot more about Faribault, the town and the house from staff and volunteers with the Rice County Historical Society. I’m always up to learning more about the city I’ve called home since 1984.
I know the basics about Alexander Faribault, a licensed fur trader who first established a trading post along the Cannon River in 1826 or 1827, depending on your information source. He was only twenty years old. He grew his business throughout the region, trading with the Wahpekute, a band of the Dakota, and moving his trading post to the confluence of the Cannon and Straight Rivers, current-day Faribault.
I imagine for Faribault, who was French Canadian and Dakota, developing trading partnerships with the Dakota proved easy given his understanding of the people, their language and culture. But later that same relationship proved challenging for him. Some locals, after the U.S.-Dakota War of 1862, no longer appreciated his friendship with the Dakota and his willingness to shelter some of them on his farm.
Back then, just like today, this community has not always been accepting of others. In the 1860s, the Dakota were targeted. Today it is the Somali community. It’s disheartening when history repeats itself, when differences in skin color, food, culture and language separate us. Alexander Faribault, as a mixed blood who embraced the Dakota, surely witnessed and felt the challenges of injustices and discrimination.
My community has certainly made progress in welcoming all to our city. Yet, we could do better. I still hear derogatory comments about our Somali neighbors, worsened by the current political climate. I still hear derogatory comments about our Hispanic neighbors, made worse by current immigration policies. We are all, unless Indigenous or descendants of slaves, of immigrant roots, something people often forget.
Alexander Faribault wasn’t “from” here. He was born in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin. But he came here, established a fur trading business and eventually founded the city of Faribault. By all accounts, he was kind, generous and compassionate and served in many capacities from interpreter to territorial legislator to school board member to postmaster. I’m sure he had his flaws. We all do. But it seems Alexander Faribault did his best to build a strong and inclusive community that has grown into the diverse city of today. I think he’d appreciate a legacy of diversity.
On a 1958 marker at the entrance to Calvary Cemetery where Alexander Faribault is buried, these words are written about him: Race or creed did not color his judgments. He saw in every man the image of God and thereby the possibility of making this a better place in which to live.
Those seem necessary and profound words for all of us to read. Especially today.
© Copyright 2026 Audrey Kletscher Helbling
Minnesota Prairie Roots 
Juneteenth: You “shall be free” June 19, 2026
Tags: Abraham Lincoln, African Americans, Blacks, celebration, commentary, Emancipation Proclamation, freedom, history, holiday, June 19, Juneteenth, slavery
CONSIDER FOR A MOMENT the significance of Juneteenth. On this date in 1865, news of the Emancipation Proclamation finally reached enslaved African Americans in Galveston, Texas.
Imagine the jubilation of learning that you might really and truly be free. I expect that may have been difficult for many to believe. But two years earlier, President Abraham Lincoln signed the document ending slavery in states that had seceded from the Union. Not all states. Only those that had been part of the Confederacy.
The proclamation reads in part: I do order and declare that all persons held as slaves within said designated States, and parts of States, are, and henceforward shall be free… What powerful words—shall be free.
While slavery ended long ago, the struggle continues for anyone whose skin is other than white. Injustices and racial discrimination remain. To think otherwise is to be in denial. Look what’s happening with gerrymandering and voting rights. Consider cases of police brutality and incarcerated Black men who were later cleared of crimes they did not commit. Consider poverty.
And remember the Civil Rights movement, the fight for equality that happened long after slaves were declared free. But not equal.
Juneteenth marks a day to reflect on how far we have come and how far we have yet to go. I care about this personally. My 18-month-old grandson is bi-racial. And although he looks decidedly White with light skin and a head of blonde curls, the blood of slavery runs through his ancestral veins. Some day he will learn about the Emancipation Proclamation and the struggles that preceded and followed.
And I hope that when he understands, he will celebrate Juneteenth in a big way. He already loves music, bopping his head and swaying his body to the beat of songs thrumming from his toys.
Juneteenth holds the same joyfulness. The spirit of freedom and celebration encompassed in the words of the Emancipation Proclamation. You shall be free.
© Copyright 2026 Audrey Kletscher Helbling