December’s History Friday: Hope Breakfast Bar

By Matt Goff, Kraus-Anderson Historian/Archivist

In 1949, Kraus-Anderson, the construction company responsible for countless Minneapolis landmarks, opened an office in St. Paul.

It is somewhat difficult to imagine today, but in the middle of the twentieth century, a general contractor from Minneapolis could not work on large projects in St. Paul. Long-time Kraus-Anderson employee Wally Brenner put it succinctly: “At the time, the unions of St. Paul and Minneapolis really guarded their territory.”

An opening to expand into St. Paul came, sadly, with the loss of a venerable St. Paul building company. When Frederick H. Romer died in 1948, with him passed a multigenerational family firm, responsible for the Hamm Brewery and the St. Paul Auditorium, among other landmarks.

To bid on St. Paul projects, Kraus-Anderson purchased the assets of Romer’s Construction and operated a St. Paul office out of the facility captured in the below picture with a horse and carriage.

On the far left edge of this image, you can see the back of Hope Engine Company No. 3, which eventually became part of Kraus-Anderson’s St. Paul office.

When the original reasons for operating a separate office in St. Paul no longer existed, Kraus-Anderson consolidated their offices into the Minneapolis Headquarters building. The company sold the fire station, as well as the surrounding real estate, to a developer who originally planned to tear the fire station down to make way for a hotel.

However, a movement to preserve the Hope Engine Company building was successful, and now, the oldest municipal building in St. Paul charmingly houses an eating establishment, optimistically named Hope Breakfast Bar.