Hello, I am starting a new feature on this website, a blog post! I will try to add a new post when I encounter something interesting. To start off, the first question I run into is “What is that status of your book?” I have put in several years of research, and have compiled a lot of information — A LOT of information. My focus now is to narrow down that information into something that is interesting to read.

My intention was to just write about the Chaska brickyards. However, the first thing I found was that actual brickyard information was quite limited. If I wanted to find out more information, I had to look in other places than just the local Chaska newspaper. I found it amazing how little brick information there was in Chaska. Why is that?  Since Chaska was basically a brickyard town, everything hinged on the brickyards. When people went home at night, they didn’t want to read about them in the newspapers, and they didn’t care to see photographs of where they worked. So there is actually very little useable information for a book in Chaska.

I also thought that people may get bored even today reading about just brickyard related information. So I expanded the focus of the book to include more information about the state of Minnesota at that time. I have uncovered other stories of how Chaska came to be and how brickmaking became so successful. The material I have now will make a nice story. My focus is now on compiling this story, but I can’t determine when I will be done yet.

If you like brickyard history, you will enjoy my other website at www.mnbricks.com. I first became interested in bricks on a wider scale, which included the entire state of Minnesota. I want to keep both websites fresh, so I am going to add a newsletter about the material I am finding. I will also add a place where you can sign up to have this newsletter automatically sent to you. So I hope you check back often!