St. Paul’s Rondo neighborhood runs roughly between University Avenue to the north, Selby Avenue to the south, Rice Street to the east, and Lexington Avenue to the west.

From early on, Rondo had been a haven for people of color and immigrants. Its namesake, French-Canadian Joseph Rondeau, moved there in the late 1850s from a site close to Fort Snelling, MN, where he faced discrimination because of his wife’s indigenous heritage. Other French-Canadian immigrants followed Rondeau to the area in the late 19th century. Later, German, Russian, Irish, and Jewish immigrant families found homes in Rondo.

The origins of Rondo as an African American enclave of thriving community life and culture began with the Great Migration, the largest movement of people in US history. Beginning around 1910 and continuing until the 1970s, approximately six million Black people moved from southern to northern and midwestern states. The driving force behind this mass movement was to escape racial violence, pursue economic and educational opportunities, and obtain freedom from the oppression of Jim Crow. According to Isabel Wilkerson, who documents the Great Migration in her book The Warmth of Other Suns, this movement of people was an act of individual and collective agency — a “declaration of independence” that changed the course of American history. While Minnesota wasn't a primary focus for Black migrants like the cities of St. Louis or Chicago were, St. Paul was intrinsically a part of the Great Migration story, as Wilkerson’s work shows that families moved to places like Rondo from the states of Mississippi, Alabama, and Arkansas. ¹

With the Great Migration, Black people began to build a new place for themselves in public life, actively confronting racial prejudice as well as economic, political, and social challenges. They created a Black urban culture that would come to exert enormous influence in the decades to follow. Thus, it came to be in Rondo that African Americans set down roots in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, creating a strong and vibrant community. ²

Beginning in the 1920s, Rondo experienced a palpable social and cultural boom. Music and theater flourished. African American newspapers, such as The Appeal, The Northwestern Bulletin, and the St. Paul Recorder, ³ represented Rondo’s interests and needs. These papers offered a more sophisticated self-awareness to community members while also providing an opening to happenings in the larger world. During this time, St. Paul established a chapter of the NAACP, making it a center for civil rights activity. One member of the chapter, Rondo resident Roy Wilkins, later became president of the NAACP.

The burgeoning railroad industry in the latter part of the 19th century provided African Americans with very respectable occupations as porters, cooks, waiters, and “Red Caps.” Even though they were underpaid, overworked, and had to endure constant racism on the job, Black men flocked to railroad jobs as they were the best employment options available for African Americans. It enabled these men to travel a bit and gain a broader perspective on the world.

George Pullman, a Chicago businessman, pioneered the overnight sleeping car and the provision of food on cross-country trains. Shortly after the Civil War, he began hiring thousands of African American men, most of them formerly enslaved, to work as attendants, providing valet, baggage, and room service for white passengers of the Pullman Palace Car Company. Pullman thought that these men, being part of the chattel slavery system, would know “just how to take care of any whim that a white customer had.” He wanted men who were used to being humble servants, seeing to other people’s needs. While railroad jobs provided significant opportunities to these men, it also perpetuated the stereotype that Black people belonged to a servant class and were subject to abuse.

Many St. Paul families had relatives who got jobs as Pullman Porters, helping to bring family members to Rondo. Pullman Porters and other Black railway workers were a crucial part of the economic empowerment that fueled the Great Migration and shaped the growing Black middle class in northern towns. People arriving in St. Paul between 1900 and 1940 generally came by train via the Union Depot. In its heyday, this historic structure served 20,000 passengers daily. The depot is significant both as a point of entry for African Americans and as an opportunity for job-seekers. Black station employees were important ambassadors. Pullman Porters were often the first friendly face for migrating Blacks, and their network of information about where to find housing and a good meal was invaluable.

Furthermore, the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s can trace roots back to the political strength that Pullman Porters gained during this era. In Chicago in 1925, A. Philip Randolph organized the first Black-led labor union, the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, which essentially launched an early version of the Civil Rights Movement.

As Rondo’s Jews became more prosperous in the first decades of the 20th century, they began to move to more affluent areas of St. Paul, away from their immigrant roots. This left modest homes behind as affordable housing for African Americans. By the 1930s, over half of St. Paul’s Black population lived in Rondo.

Rondo was a friendly place with a welcoming, neighborly atmosphere. Black migrants came with the intent of building totally new lives in a community that welcomed the establishment of businesses, schools, and churches. Rondo became a vibrant cultural center and an emerging hub for Black music and entrepreneurship in St. Paul. Even in this time of Jim Crow restrictions, Blacks and whites mixed relatively freely, and interracial friendships, dating, and marriage sometimes occurred.

Supported by the booming railway industry and local African American businesses, Rondo’s Black families were a mix of working, middle, and upper-middle class people. Integrated schools, such as Central High School, Maxfield Elementary School, and the parochial schools, created a comparatively high level of education and literacy among Rondo residents. ⁴

The openness and attractiveness of the Rondo community continued to attract southern Blacks who were facing, among other things, stark racial prejudice under Jim Crow, servitude and poverty under the sharecropping system, and the threat of everyday violence from the KKK. To help Black migrants become established and comfortably settled in their new lives, social service organizations arose to meet the community’s growing needs. The Hallie Q. Brown Community Center, founded in the early part of the 1900s, provided human services and gave African Americans a place to meet and socialize. In 1928, the Credjafawn Social Club began to offer social and recreational space for young people. And the Sterling Club, founded in 1919, was a networking association for African American professionals who were often excluded from other professional associations. ⁵

As early as the 1930s, when both the cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis were growing in overall population, white commuters and city planners began to call for a highway that linked the business districts of downtown St. Paul with downtown Minneapolis. However, it was not until after World War II that city engineers began to discuss seriously the route that such a link would take. St. Anthony Avenue in St. Paul was at the top of the list. St. Anthony Avenue was located between University and Marshall Avenues, which was through the center of the Rondo neighborhood. When the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956 promised funding, this set into motion plans to build a freeway through the heart of the Rondo community.

Resistance to the freeway plan came quickly. In early 1956, Reverend Floyd Massey, Jr. and Timothy Howard started the Rondo-St. Anthony Improvement Association. This group spoke for threatened property owners by protesting the proposed route as well as pushing for compensation for those forced to move.

However, the St. Paul City Council rebuffed attempts to pass local open occupancy laws that prohibit discrimination in housing based on race and other protected categories. Enacting open occupancy laws would have helped Rondo residents acquire replacement housing in other parts of St. Paul and the wider Twin Cities area, but these areas were largely inaccessible due to widespread racial discrimination.

In the end, the Rondo-St. Anthony Improvement Association did succeed in changing the Interstate’s design from an elevated to a depressed highway with bridges joining the bisected sides. This, it was thought, would destroy the community in a less pronounced way.

In the wake of the Great Depression, the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) was established in 1934 as a way to stimulate the economy through home buying and construction. During this period, home ownership for white households was directly facilitated and subsidized by the federal government.

These policies were designed to enrich white households while clearly excluding households of color. The FHA’s explicitly racist policy, later adopted by the Veterans Affairs Department, refused to insure mortgages in and near Black neighborhoods — a policy called “redlining.” ⁶

Additionally, racial covenants made it impossible for African Americans to secure affordable housing.⁷ The FHA Underwriting Manual stated that “incompatible racial groups should not be permitted to live in the same communities” and went on to recommend that barriers, including “highways and cement walls,” be used to separate Black neighborhoods from white neighborhoods.

Black households, unable to relocate, were often stuck in central cities as affluent white households moved away and the tax base hollowed out. This led to a long-standing disinvestment in public goods, such as schools, health care facilities, and shopping opportunities.

In September of 1956, when Interstate 94 construction began, some residents continued to resist. Police had to forcibly remove Reverend George Davis from his home when he refused to evacuate and make way for wrecking crews. Construction proceeded, however, and I-94 opened in 1968. After being paid pennies on the dollar as they were being displaced from their homes and businesses, Black people’s oppression didn’t end here. Because of redlining and other discriminatory practices, it was almost impossible for families to buy homes elsewhere. Business owners couldn’t find space for their businesses, and most didn’t survive. There were no comprehensive plans or services to help folks relocate. The built-in social safety net of the Rondo community had been scattered. ⁸

Once racist housing policies became imbedded in federal, state, and local statutes, their legacy continued with ongoing disparities in home values, wealth, education, and health outcomes. By the time these policies were made illegal years later, the generational and community damage was already done. Although discrimination in housing was made illegal with the 1968 Fair Housing Act, the ongoing discrimination and segregation continued as a practice that expanded the disparities between Black and white families into the future.

Construction of I-94 between 1956 and 1968 cut the Rondo neighborhood in half and fractured its identity. The highway construction, driven by funds from the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956 and the use of eminent domain, caused significant, uncompensated financial hardship for Rondo residents.

▶ Property Loss: Around 700 homes were demolished and 300 businesses, which formed the main social, cultural, and business artery of St. Paul’s Black community, were closed or torn down.

▶ Lost Home Equity: A 2020 study commissioned by ReConnect Rondo estimated the direct loss of home equity value at $157.5 million.

▶ Unequal Compensation: Homeowners often felt they were compensated poorly, receiving pennies on the dollar for their property’s estimated fair value. Renters, who made up a portion of the thousands displaced, received no help.

▶ Loss of Intergenerational Wealth: The destruction inflicted lasting economic and social damage. The inability to build home equity, combined with discriminatory housing practices like redlining, meant families could not pass down wealth through property, a major factor in the current wealth gap.

▶ Business Failure: Displaced business owners struggled to find new locations and most did not survive the relocation, further impacting the community economic base.

Although the African American neighborhood in Rondo was injured economically and divided geographically, the community managed to maintain a unique sense of cultural and intellectual identity. A few of the notable people, initiatives, and organizations are worthy of highlight. Playwright August Wilson lived in Rondo in the 1970s and 80s and wrote many plays while living there. The Penumbra Theatre, founded in 1976 by Lou Bellamy, remains a cultural arts center in the Rondo neighborhood, providing a platform for Black artists and storytellers. In 1983, the first Rondo Days Festival ⁹ was held, and this annual event continues to this day. In 1988, the contemporary Walker West Music Academy began as a teaching and learning center rooted in the African American musical experience. The Rondo Community Land Trust, founded in 1993, was dedicated to creating permanently affordable housing and commercial space to address the displacement caused by the construction of the Interstate. (Further information about the CLT is in the section titled: Contemporary Reparative Initiatives.) In 2006, the Rondo Community Library opened with a mission to support community development with its Small Business Resource. In 2018, In Black Ink was founded to elevate, celebrate, and link Black writers, history, and storytelling in the publishing arts industry.

The legacy of mid-20th century discriminatory housing policies remains clear today. In 2019, the Twin Cities had the lowest African American homeownership rate in the country. Since most families amass wealth through property ownership, this homeownership gap feeds the contemporary racial wealth gap. The wealth gap undergirds a host of other racial disparities, which are particularly acute in Minnesota. (For detailed information on the depth of racial disparities in Minnesota, see our Evidence of Systemic Racism page.)

As the following data show, the fracturing of Rondo (and other areas inhabited by people of color) by racist policies and the careless plans of local and state governments created negative ripple effects for generations of Black people to come.

▶ In 2015, 87 percent of white students graduated from Minnesota public high schools in four years, while only 62 percent of Black students did. In 2019, those numbers were 88.4 and 67.4 percent, respectively.

▶ A 2019 Federal Reserve report also showed 68.9 percent of white high school students graduate ready for college, but only 24.7 percent of Black students do. 

▶ In August 2020, an analysis by NBC News found that roughly 76 percent of white Twin Cities households own their homes, compared to about 25 percent of Black households — the largest gap in the nation.

▶ US Census figures show that the median income for a Black Minnesota household is about $38,000 a year, compared with white families’ $84,500. 

▶ Homeownership missed opportunity: The inheritance of the Rondo homes that were lost would have resulted in $34,580,000 for their kids. That inheritance could have paid for 48,000 4-year college degrees. At the time, one house was worth seven college degrees. (Source: The Economic Catastrophe of the Rondo Community)

▶ According to a June 2022 NPR report, Minnesota, as a whole, has the second-largest income inequality gap between Blacks and whites in the entire nation; only the District of Columbia is worse.

▶ The wealth gap between white and Black increased gradually beginning in the 1970s. In 1950, median incomes in Rondo were 20 percent lower than those in St. Paul. Today, incomes in Rondo are 50 percent lower than in St. Paul.

▶ Minnesota is also one of the worst states in the country for education achievement gaps when measured by race and socioeconomic status, according to a 2019 report from the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. 

Many people believe that Minnesota offers an unparalleled quality of life, but is that true only if you are white? Although the murder of George Floyd was a wake-up call to many Minnesotans, researchers have realized that entrenched inequalities have long been a part of this state. Numerous studies show the fact that there are two Minnesotas — one for white residents and the other for people of color. What underlies this seeming paradox?

“We in Minnesota want to believe that we are so progressive and liberal that it is hard for us to acknowledge and then really take responsibility for the racial injustices in society,” says Douglas Hartmann, sociology professor at the U of M. “We allowed ourselves to believe ... that Black folks and other folks of color didn’t have it that much worse [here] — and maybe even had it better than folks of color in the rest of the country,” he says. “And that belief absolved us of having to worry about the opportunity and privilege that was clearly tilted towards white Minnesotans. This, to me, is the essence of white privilege, white complicity,” Hartmann continues. “We can easily live with the big gaps and inequities in our midst because we don’t think we’re racist, we don’t think folks of color have it that bad, and we don’t want to give up any of the privileges that we have that are part of the system creating the gaps and inequities in the first place.”

It appears that there is a great deal of work for white Minnesotans to undertake to repair their own misperceptions about themselves, their inherent privilege, and the causes of the disparities between themselves and their neighbors of color.

Several projects currently taking place in the city of St. Paul not only acknowledge and pay tribute to the history of Rondo, but also, in various ways, seek to repair the societal and generational damage that the story of Rondo clearly reveals. Below are some of the contemporary reparative initiatives underway, each following its own path toward reconciliation and repair.

▶ ReConnect Rondo

ReConnect Rondo is a non-profit organization focused on bringing prosperity to the Rondo neighborhood. A citizen group worked for years to right the wrongs of the devastation caused by the original I-94 construction. Although the desire to reconnect the Rondo neighborhood was not new, the initiative gained momentum in the early 2020s with the federal Reconnecting Communities Pilot program that enabled ReConnect Rondo to receive major planning grants. The ReConnect Rondo project today is leading the effort to “revitalize the Rondo community with a land bridge that reconnects Rondo and reignites a vibrant African American cultural enterprise district in St. Paul.”

A recent newsletter (January 2026) from the office of US Representative Betty McCollum states: “Public Comment Period Open for I-94 Improvements: Now open …, MnDOT’s public comment period on Rethinking I-94 is a critical opportunity for community voices to help shape a more just future. I am proud to have secured federal funding to support the work of ReConnect Rondo, a community-led effort to reunite the Rondo neighborhood after decades of harm caused by the construction of I-94. Public participation is essential to ensure this re-imagining reconnects the neighborhood and supports housing, businesses, parks, cultural spaces, and long-term economic growth. Comments can be submitted through MnDOT’s project webpage, by mail, or at an upcoming in-person or virtual public meeting.”

▶ The St. Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission

In 2023, the St. Paul City Council undertook initiatives to address the discrimination that African Americans living in St. Paul have faced, including, redlining, racial covenants, restricting the sale of real estate, and the destruction of the Rondo residential neighborhood and business district to make way for I-94. The city wanted to acknowledge the long-term disparities in homeownership, economic prosperity, education, and healthcare that resulted from its past racist policies. Prior to establishing the St. Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission, the St. Paul City Council apologized, on behalf of the City of St. Paul, to African American citizens for the harm done to them by the city’s previous racist policies.

Prominent African Americans were appointed to the Reparations Commission that has met monthly since its inception to formulate plans for reparative justice. A current Commission project is seeking proposals from qualified research organizations to produce a comprehensive Reparations Harm Report which will document historic and ongoing harms against American Descendants of Chattel Slavery caused by government policies and practices. This report will guide and inform future reparative initiatives by the city.

Another contemporary Commission project proposes to use a substantial donation from a prominent St. Paul church to expand public outreach and education, including work to develop a historic archive devoted to the lives of descendants of chattel slavery in St. Paul. Detailing these stories is essential to illustrating the ways in which institutionalized racism has impacted every area of life — housing, education, healthcare, land use, economic prosperity — through today.

▶ The Rondo Community Land Trust

When Interstate 94 cut through the heart of Rondo in the 1950s and 1960s, it did more than separate more than 700 Black families from their homes and local businesses. It dismantled an entire ecosystem of culture, stability, and belonging. Generations of Black families lost the wealth they had built and the community that had sustained them.

The Rondo Community Land Trust (CLT) seeks to rebuild unity through land ownership and repair. Under the CLT model, residents purchase their homes while the land trust retains ownership of the land through a 99-year renewable ground lease. The approach stabilizes housing costs and preserves affordability for future generations. Much of the organization’s work focuses on repairing multigenerational wounds by creating low-barrier pathways to homeownership. One of its key programs, the Right to Return to Rondo, creates opportunities for people displaced by I-94 or their descendants. The goal is to repair economic, social, and cultural harm that continues to shape the neighborhood.

▶ The Rondo Center of Diverse Expressions (RCODE)

The goal of the Rondo Center of Diverse Expressions is to preserve the spirit of Rondo by inspiring “diverse people to find common ground in the Rondo corridor.” RCODE oversees the adjacent Rondo Commemorative Plaza, which was developed in 2016 as the first public memorial to all the Black neighborhoods destroyed by interstate highways. Funds were provided by the City of St. Paul Community Development Block Grant and other local donations. This is a public space to honor the past and celebrate the future of St. Paul’s first African American neighborhood — Rondo.

The plaza is open to the public from sunrise to sunset and features brick pavers, built-in benches, and a 26-panel exhibit that tells the story of Rondo. The panels memorialize how much the City of St. Paul and the State of Minnesota have been improved, changed, challenged, and made better by the African American experience of Rondo. Eighteen chimes with attached hammers are located on the south side of the plaza, designed by local artist Seitu Jones. Each chime is a dedication to the eighteen north-south streets that ran through Rondo, with written homages to notable families or residents of Rondo. A lighted tower stands at the northeast corner of the plaza, visible to anyone driving by on I-94.

RCODE and the Rondo Commemorative Plaza are Rondo’s own artistic expression of community self-repair.

The story of Rondo presented herein is not definitive, nor is it written by those who have experienced life in the Rondo neighborhood directly. The information contained is drawn from numerous sources. Many of the organizations and community projects mentioned in this narration hold their own pieces of Rondo’s history. Additionally, each of the reparative initiatives mentioned above have significant parts of the Rondo story on their websites and entwined with their current activities in the community.

Additional sites for further information about Rondo include:

▶ Macalester College: The History Harvest Model is a student digital archive that seeks Rondo community contributions to stake a claim over their own digital identity, memories, and history. (see also Link)

▶ Minnesota Digital Library (MDL): Offers curated primary source sets, including photographs of businesses, churches, and community life. (Link)

▶ Minnesota Historical Society (MNHS) Collections Online: Holds extensive manuscripts, government records, and maps detailing the neighborhood before, during, and after the construction of I-94. (Link)

▶ Oral Histories: Voices of Rondo from University of Minnesota Press and various oral history projects at MNHS offer firsthand accounts of life in the community. (Link)

▶ Rondo Avenue, Inc.: Dedicated to preserving, conserving, and accurately interpreting the contributions of the African American community of Rondo to the City of St. Paul. (Link)

▶ Rondo Center of Diverse Expressions (RCODE): Provides a research collection, including ArcGIS StoryMaps, photos, and historical records of local organizations. RCODE oversees the Rondo Commemorative Plaza that features numerous exhibit panels documenting the history and impact of the freeway. (Link)

▶ Saint Paul Historical: An online resource featuring interactive maps and stories about Rondo landmarks. (Link)