Minneapolis Park History

I received this question from a reader. Does anyone have an answer? I don’t.

Do you know anything about the hermit “Old Andrew” who lived in a cave/dugout in a hillside adjacent to the Wildflower Garden, before Eloise’s time? The hill was called “Old Andrew’s Mount”. Volunteers with the Friends of the Wildflower Garden are clearing buckthorn there and re-establishing the name. Eloise tells a story of his ghost chopping wood. I’m looking for any information about him outside of Eloise’s stories. She says a decayed body was found that may have been him, but I found newspaper references to a body found around that time, but don’t sound anything like an old hermit. He disappeared right around the time the area was platted for development, so I suspect he was chased off or left due to too much attention. Keegan’s Lake was getting more rowdy then, much reported on in the papers.

David Carpentier Smith