St. Paul's historic Alexander Ramsey House to reopen to the public

The Alexander Ramsey House in St. Paul is reopening its doors to visitors.

After halting tours in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ramsey House is hosting a reopening ceremony July 1 and will relaunch regular monthly tours beginning Aug. 5, with a greater focus on namesake Alexander Ramsey, Minnesota's first territorial governor.

While Ramsey — who also served as the second state governor, St. Paul mayor, U.S. senator and Secretary of War — contributed to the growth of the state of Minnesota, he also played a significant role in removing Dakota and Ojibwe people from their homelands.

Betsy Faber, site manager of the Ramsey House, said it's important to recognize all impacts of Ramsey's political career — even controversial actions that caused harm to some people.

"He made a wide variety of policies, and those hurt some people and helped others," Faber said. "And it's important to just talk truthfully about the things that he did during his long career."

Tours will feature stories about the Ramsey family and domestic workers in the home, and will cover all three floors of the mansion, including the bedrooms, parlors and kitchen.

Reopening the house has taken more than three years because the Minnesota Historical Society, like the rest of the nonprofit sector, was hit hard by the pandemic, Faber said. The organization finally has enough staff to open the doors again, she said.

Three generations of the Ramsey family lived in the house, and it first opened for tours in 1965. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1969.

Faber said about 90% of furnishings on display in the house are original to the family.

"It's really just like a treasure box of the Victorian time period," she said. "We have everything from the books that they read to the cups that they drank out of."

The reopening ceremony July 1 will take place from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the house, at 265 Exchange St. in St. Paul, and will include self-guided tours of the first floor, Victorian yard games and bluegrass music from The Gritpickers Old-Time String Band.

Faber said she hopes tours will be offered more frequently in the future. In the winter, she said, the house will resume its "Ramsey After Dark" program series that focuses on different themes, including Victorian superstitions.

Advance reservations for tours are recommended. General admission is $12 for adults, with discounts for seniors, veterans and active military members, college students and children. Minnesota Historical Society members get in for free.