Oldest fire pole

he same brass poles that firefighters slid down in 1898 are in use today in Rochester. They’ve been trimmed down over the years to fit each new station, but you can find the same ones from the original Central Fire Station now in use at Fire Station No. 1 in the 500 block of South Broadway. It’s the only station left in Rochester that uses fire poles, although only about half of the fire fighters at the station use the poles. The rest of them take the stairs.

Best secret garden

It once was mostly garden, but it’s mostly parking lot now on the north side of Fourth Street between Fifth and Sixth avenues southwest. Nestled into the Mayo Clinic parking lot are the steps and patio that once joined the two gardens of Mary Kahler. Mary, the daughter of Henry Kahler, married Nobel Peace Prize winner Dr. Philip Hench in these gardens in 1927. Much of the vinery and trees that were originally at the site—including two northern white pines, the terra cotta benches and the limestone steps—remain in the little park. Merging, we’ve decided, is a lot like that first steamy date. There are nervous glances. And horn honking. Then you accidentally turn on the windshield wipers when you meant to activate the turn signal. Merging from West Frontage Road (at 19th Street NW) onto Hwy. 52 is a virtual orgy of confusion. If you head north, it’ll be a mile and a winding drive through IBM’s private Woodside Park into Big Blue’s parking lot before you realize you can’t get there (Hwy. 52) from here. South from 19th Street NW, you’ll face stopsigned northbound cars itching to head straight through your merge lane. If you do make it to 52, you have about 500 feet of merge lane to jockey around vehicles angling for the 14th Street exit.

Worst place to merge

Best all-brick road

Odds are you don’t ride a horse and buggy like early Rochester residents (if you do, we want to hear about it). But, you can get the same bumpy feeling old-timers got by traveling the road at Seventh Street and 11th Avenue S.W. on Rochester’s “Pill Hill.” Not asphalt or concrete, but real, beautiful bouncy brick. A written history of the decision to leave the road raw isn’t evident, but the librarians at Olmsted County History Center suspect that the influence of the residents in that neighborhood had the pull to keep it authentic.

Along the Zumbro River Trail, directly behind the Government Center and under the footbridge that crosses the river, might seem the kind of spot where local kids would congregate for lessons of a more dubious nature, but it is, in fact, the best place for a quick lesson on our fair city’s history. The Rochester Riverfront Mural, created in 1994 by artist Anne Scott Plummer, renders a complete chronological depiction of this town, starting in the Paleo/Indian age and moving through modern medical and technological advances. A plaque at the site explains the various symbols Plummer chose to memorialize in limestone. In front of the mural, a small waterfall pays tribute to our city founder, George Head. It was Head, after all, who named this city Rochester after his hometown of Rochester, New York, a place with an abundance of waterfalls.

Best church exterior

he First Presbyterian Church (512 Third St. SW), with its rugged stone facade, imposing twin towers, massive oak doors, and serene rose window has beautifully graced the corner of Third Street and Fifth Avenue SW for the past 77 years. “No ambiguity here,” the (now- retired) Rev. Neal Lloyd told us previously, “it looks like what a church ought to look like. More importantly, however, we like to think that the space contributes to the sense of God’s presence. I look at it this way: a beautiful hospital might make the stay more pleasant, but the beauty alone won’t heal anyone.” ou might not have noticed it unless you were trying to find that garage sale down in River Court. The direction behind your address (NW, NE, SW, SE) in Rochester is almost always determined by your location either north or south of Center Street and east or west of Broadway. Rules, though, are made to be broken. And you can throw the city’s directional rules out the car window when Broadway curves to the east as it crosses over the spillway at Silver Lake and the Zumbro River. It’s there that the Zumbro becomes the east-west divider, meaning the land between Broadway and the Zumbro becomes northeast in addresses.

Best church interior

The small pews in the front of the the 400-seat chapel at St. Marys Hospital (see above) were designed to accommodate the then large numbers of the Sisters of St. Francis who served as nurses at the hospital. Individual pews allowed them to leave the service to attend to their patients without disturbing the other worshippers. The public is now encouraged to use these pews.