“ Faribault is served by the Chicago Great Western, the Chicago, Milwaukee & St Paul, and the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific railways. The city is attractively situated near a lake region widely known for its summer resorts. Faribault is the seat of the Minnesota institute for defectives, embracing the state school for the deaf (1863) , the state school for the blind (1874) , and the state school for the feeble-minded (1879) ”

“ A French millwright, N. La Croix, introduced here, about 1860, a new process of making flour, which revolutionized the industry in the United States, but his mill was soon destroyed by flood and he removed to Minneapolis, where the process was first successful on a large scale. ”

“ There is a good water power, and among the city’s manufactures are flour, beer, shoes, furniture, rattan-ware, warehouse trucks, canned goods, cane syrup, waggons and carriages, gasolene engines, wind-mills, pianos and woollen goods. Faribault, named in honour of Jean Baptiste Faribault, a French fur-trader and pioneer who made his headquarters in the region in the latter part of the 18th century, was permanently settled about 1848, and was chartered as a city in 1872. ”