Triangle Followup: Prospect Park, Laurel and Sibley Triangles
Summer gardens are gone and I never got a good picture of another beautiful park triangle: Sibley Triangle located in northeast Minneapolis where Washington Street NE and Fifth Street NE meet. (For earlier posts on park triangles see this one on small triangles and this one on triangles in Prospect Park.) Every time I was in the neighborhood I was without camera, so if any readers have photos I’d like to post them. The garden is planted and maintained by volunteer Robin Russell, who has done a fantastic job. Sibley Triangle is another of Minneapolis’s six triangles that are listed as 0.01 acre. The park board acquired the little triangle from the city in 1920.
Like Sibley Field in south Minneapolis, it was named for Henry Hastings Sibley, but the triangle was named first. Apparently having a little street triangle named for Sibley did not sufficiently honor Minnesota’s first governor, so the larger neighborhood park was named for him too — three years later. (The larger park had previously been referred to as Cedar Avenue Heights Park. See more here.)
I was also informed by Michelle Kellogg of the park board that the volunteer who deserves the credit for maintaining the tranquil gem of Laurel Triangle in Bryn Mawr is Patty Wycoff. Thanks Patty!
Laurel Triangle 2011
Finally, I spent an enjoyable evening in July with the Prospect Park Garden Club at the home of Mary Alice Kopf talking about triangles and other parks in the neighborhood. Thanks to Julie Wallace who dug up the info from neighborhood association documents that Bedford Triangle and Clarence Triangle were altered in 1979. Bedford Triangle was obliterated and the street on one side of Clarence Triangle was removed so it now appears to be part of the yard on the northwest corner of the Bedford and Clarence intersection. The only thing that suggests it is not private property is a boulder on the corner — as in the other Prospect Park triangle parks. I learned that night that the boulders were unearthed during the construction of I-94 through the neighborhood.
David C. Smith
Minneapolis Park History 
don’t forget the MPRB owned triangle just south of minnehaha creek at 50th and columbus ave south. what a great example of a neighborhood taking over a space and beautifying it after a large elm was removed due to disease. need pics of that!
Thanks for the tip. I haven’t seen that. Anybody in the neighborhood know the story? Have pictures?
I just looked it up on Google maps. Nearest triangle south of Minnehaha Creek is at 51st and Park. Looks lovely from Google Maps street view. If no one can send me a photo, I’ll try to get over there.
[…] I apologized to Robin Russell, the volunteer park steward who maintains the lovely Sibley Triangle in Northeast Minneapolis, for […]