Rochester, Minnesota

Rochester is a city in the U.S. state of Minnesota and is the county seat of Olmsted County. Located on both banks of the Zumbro River, it is perhaps best known as the home of Mayo Clinic (giving rise to the city's nickname, "Med City") and is also home to a major IBM facility. The city has a population of 106,769 according to the 2010 United States Census, making it Minnesota's third-largest city and the largest outside of the Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington Metropolitan Statistical Area.

History
The area was home to nomadic Sioux, Ojibwa, and Winnebago tribes of Native Americans. In 1851, the Sioux ceded the land to Minnesota Territory in the treaties of Traverse des Sioux and Mendota, which opened the land for settlement.

Rochester itself was founded by George Head in 1854; his land claim is now part of the city's business district. Originally from Rochester, New York, Head had settled in Waukesha, Wisconsin before moving west to Minnesota. He named the village on the South Fork of the Zumbro River after his New York hometown, and built a log cabin his family operated as Head's Tavern. By 1856, the population had grown to 50; by 1858, it was 1,500. The territorial legislature created Olmsted County on February 20, 1855, with Rochester named county seat in 1857. Rochester developed as a stagecoach stop between Saint Paul, Minnesota, and Dubuque, Iowa. When the railroad arrived in the 1860s, it brought new residents and business opportunities. In 1863, Dr. William W. Mayo arrived as the examining surgeon for draftees in the Civil War.

On August 21, 1883, the Great Tornado demolished much of Rochester, leaving 37 dead and about 200 injured. There was no medical facility at the time, so Mayo and his two sons worked together to care for the wounded. Donations of $60,000 were collected and the Sisters of St. Francis, assisted by Mayo, opened a new facility named St. Marys Hospital in 1889. The Mayo practice grew and is today among the largest and most well-respected medical facilities in the world. Many famous people from around the world, including former Presidents George H.W. Bush, Gerald Ford, and Ronald Reagan, the Dalai Lama, and King Hussein of Jordan, have visited Rochester as patients of the Mayo Clinic.

A number of Rochester buildings are on the National Register of Historic Places, including the former Chateau Theatre, which now houses a Barnes & Noble bookstore, and Avalon Music, formerly a hotel important in the local civil rights movement.

Geography
Rochester lies alongside the South Fork of the Zumbro River. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 39.8 square miles (103.0 km²): 39.6 square miles (102.6 km²) of it is land and 0.1 square miles (0.4 km²) of it (0.35%) is water.

Rochester is in Olmsted County, one of only four counties in Minnesota without a natural lake. Artificial lakes exist in the area, including Silver Lake, a dammed portion of the South Fork Zumbro River just below the convergence with Silver Creek near the city center. The lake was used as a cooling pond for the nearby electrical power plant for many years, although the amount of water used for this purpose has been significantly reduced. Heated water in the lake generally prevents it from freezing over even during Minnesota winters, attracting large numbers of migrating Giant Canada Geese, which have become symbols of the city.

A major flood in 1978 led the city to embark on an expensive flood-control project that involved altering many nearby rivers and streams.

Demographics
As of the 2005–2007 American Community Survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau, there were 95,179 people, 39,203 households, and 23,831 families in the city. There were 42,049 housing units. There were 39,203 households out of which 49.8% were married couples. About 31.6% had children under the age of 18. About 2.5% were made up of a male householder with no wife present and about 8.5% were made up of a female householder with no husband present. In addition, 39.2% of all households were non-family households and 32.6% of households were made up of householders living alone. And 8.7% of households were made up of someone living alone who was 65 years of age and over. The average household size was 2.37 and the average family size was 3.04.

As of the 2005–2007 American Community Survey, the median household income was $57,957 and the median family income was $74,467. The per capita income was $30,977. About 5.9% of families and 8.4% of the population were below the poverty line, including 11.5% of those under age 18 and 5.1% of those aged 65 or over.

In terms of ancestry, the 2005–2007 American Community Survey found German Americans to be the largest single ethnic group in Rochester, making up 35.5% of the city's population. Norwegian Americans made up 15.9%, while Irish Americans contributed to 11.6% of the city's populace. English Americans made up 8.2% of the population and Swedish Americans were 5.0% of the city's population. As many patients of the Mayo Clinic are Muslim, Rochester's Abubakar Siddiq Mosque was recently built.

According to the 2010 US Census, non-Hispanic whites made up 81.9% of Rochester's population. Blacks made up 6.3% of the population while American Indians made up 0.2% of the populace. Asians were the largest minority group; representing 6.8% of Rochester's population. Hispanics and Latinos made up 5.2% of the city's population.

According to newly released 2010 census information Rochester has a population of 106,760 a 24.4 percent increase since 2000. Olmsted County has a population of 144,248 in 2010.

Economy
The Mayo Clinic forms the core of Rochester's economy, employing about 30,000 people and drawing over 2 million visitors to the city each year. The clinic's many facilities, along with hotels, restaurants and retail stores, comprise nearly all of the city's downtown. Other care providers, including the Rochester Federal Medical Center, are significant employers.

IBM's Rochester campus is one of the company's most important manufacturing centers, having produced the System i series, been home to the first Blue Gene prototype, and contributed the servers for Roadrunner. Seven employees at the Rochester IBM campus created IBM Employees Credit Union, which is now Think Mutual Bank, a chain of banks in the Rochester and Twin Cities metropolitan area.

The economy of Rochester is also influenced by the agricultural nature of the region. Seneca Foods has a processing plant in Rochester, and multiple dairy producers such as Kemps are active in the area. In addition, Kerry Flavours and Ingredients, a subsidiary of the global Irish company called Kerry Group, maintains a production plant in Rochester that specializies in fermented ingredients, found in breads, meats and other manufactured foods.

Transportation
Rochester is served by three U.S. highways (U.S. 14, U.S. 52, and U.S. 63), and the southern edge of Rochester is skirted by Interstate Highway 90 and State Highway 30. Olmsted County Highway 22 is also a main highway in the city because it circles most of Rochester. A combination of skyways and subterranean walkways (the "subway") link most downtown buildings. Public transit is run by Rochester City Lines. Rochester International Airport, located about seven miles south of downtown, is the second busiest commercial airport in Minnesota.

A proposed Twin Cities-Rochester rail link has been subject to a series of studies since the late 1980s, either as an independent route to the Twin Cities or as part of a high-speed link to Chicago. Rochester previously had service to Chicago until the Chicago and North Western Railway's Rochester 400 ended service in 1963.

Government


Rochester is located in Minnesota's 1st congressional district, represented by Mankato educator Tim Walz, a member of the Democratic Farmer Labor Party| (DFL]. The city includes parts of Minnesota state legislative districts 29 and 30.

The mayor of Rochester is Ardell Brede. The city has an early defibrillation program; all marked city police cars carry defibrillators.

Education
Rochester Public Schools enroll 16,300 students in 23 public primary and secondary schools. The city is divided into three public high school districts: John Marshall, Mayo and Century. Private schools in the city include Lourdes and Schaeffer Academy, and Studio Academy, a fine arts-focused charter school.

Higher education in Rochester has been concentrated at University Center Rochester in the city's southeast outskirts, where Rochester Community and Technical College shares a campus with a branch of Winona State University. The University of Minnesota offered degrees through UCR until 2007, when the University of Minnesota Rochester was established downtown. Rochester is also home to Crossroads College, along with branches of Cardinal Stritch University and the Minnesota School of Business. Branches of Augsburg College and College of St. Scholastica are also in Rochester as are banches of Winona State University and St. Mary's University. The Mayo Clinic offers graduate medical education and research programs through the Mayo Medical School.

Climate
Rochester features a humid continental climate, with very warm summers and very cold winters. The city features four distinct seasons. Rochester sees on average 30 inches of rainfall per year, as well as 48 inches of snowfall. Significant snow accumulation is common during the winter months, with average temperatures well below the freezing point. Spring and fall are transitional seasons, with a general warming trend during the spring and a general cooling trend during the fall. However, it’s not uncommon to see some snowfall during the early months of spring and the later months of fall.

Parks and recreation
Rochester's park system is large, with more than 100 sites covering 5 square miles (13 km²). The city maintains 85 mi of paved trails. In addition, the Root River and Douglas State Trails, developed on historic rail passages, combine for nearly 55 mi of scenic recreation paths in the Rochester area.

Media
The city newspaper is the Post-Bulletin, an afternoon paper which publishes Monday through Saturday. The Post-Bulletin company also publishes Rochester Magazine, a monthly features periodical, as well as an Austin, Minnesota edition of their main paper. A newspaper for all of Olmsted County, the Olmsted County Journal, is a weekly newspaper in the area.

There are two television stations based in Rochester: KTTC channel 10 (NBC), KTTC-(CW) channel 10.2, and KXLT-TV channel 47 (Fox). The stations share studios as part of a special agreement between Quincy Newspapers and Segamorehill Broadcasting. KIMT channel 3 (CBS) in Mason City, Iowa, KAAL channel 6 (ABC) in Austin, channel 15 KSMQ (PBS) in Austin and channel 24 KYIN (PBS) in Mason City are among the stations that serve the market. KAAL is licensed to Austin, but has a studio in Rochester.

The Rochester area is served by cable company Charter Communications.

Awards
The city had long been a fixture on Money magazine's "Best Places to Live" index, and was ranked number 67 on the 2006 list,  and in the top 3, including number one multiple times, from 1993-1997.

Rochester ranked second in Quality of Life by American City Business Journal.

Rochester ranked sixth in Kiplinger's Personal Finance Magazine's 10 Best Cities for the Next Decade.

Golf Digest and Golf for Women both ranked Rochester as the fifth best golf market in the midwest in 2006.

In 2009, US News and World Report ranked Rochester in the Top Ten Best Places to Grow Up and ninth for Best Cities for job seeking retirees.