Ayd Mill Road
In 2024, the Minnesota Department of Transportation was a little embarrassed when they were notified they had misspelled a road sign in Saint Paul. Drivers were confused by signs with two different spellings. Ady? Ayd? Which one was right? Where did the name even come from?
Ayd Mill
Ayd Mill Road is (You guessed it!) named for a family that owned a mill in the area.
John Ayd was a German immigrant who bought the land bordered by present-day Randolph, St. Claire, Victoria and Lexington Avenues. He was first in line to buy when the land came up for sale as the Fort Snelling Reserve was reduced and portions were put up for public sale in 1854. The Ayds took the gamble and it paid off when they were first in line to buy it.
John’s brother, Edward Ayd, built a store and hall on West Seventh that still stands today. A small decorative medallion displays the family name.
The Ayds built a small grist mill on their land in 1860, taking advantage of the natural spring that ran through but didn’t stay long after that. In 1864, the land was passed on to the second generation and John retired. Rudolf was given the Mill and House but he also didn’t stay long. Just two years later, he sold out to Charles and Maria Kramerath..
Ayd Mill Park?
The Kramaraths invested in the Mill and surrounding grounds. They even stocked the mill pond with trout so local fishermen would come enjoy the spot as a summer resort. No matter what they did to improve the grounds, the natural springs that seeped out of the surrounding hills made the lawns a muddy swamp. Their attempts to turn the land into a park failed.
Times got tough for Maria when Charles died and the property went into foreclosure. She somehow raised the money to get it back, but the final blow to the business came in 1879 when a railroad line, the Short Line Road, was built right through her land destroying the stream and mill pond and any prospect of making it a peaceful retreat.
More financial struggles and the depression of 1893 brought down the Mill building. In the 1950s, an odyssey of road construction, renaming, plans and politics left the parkway built parallel to the Short Line Road a road to nowhere. City leaders and surrounding residents fought over whether to continue to invest in the road or demolish it completely.
The Ayd house survived until 1966 when the 106 year-old house with 18-inch thick stone walls was demolished without any fanfare to make way for the future extension of I-35E.
So, an odd four-lane highway connects between I-35E and Selby Avenue to relieve traffic backups - if you know that it’s there to use it. A new bike lane was added in 2023. Still, the city can’t decide if it wants to keep investing in roadway or not.
The problem of what to do with the parkway hasn’t necessarily been solved, but at least the sign has been fixed.
SPECIAL NOTE
Upon sharing this story on social media in a video wherein I pronounced Ayd - “Eyed” (as in one-eyed monster) a surprising amount of people shared the feedback that it is pronounced “Aid” (as in First Aid).
There are still many living descendants of the Ayd family living in St. Paul and the surrounding area and they have assured me that it is, in fact, pronounced “Eyed”.
But you know what? If you grew up in St. Paul and everyone you knew read the sign phonetically and you all agreed that it’s pronounced “Aid”, then who am I to correct you? Sometimes you can’t deny the collective history of the people who live in the area where the history occurred.
