Scenes in the commercial cores of St. Cloud and Fargo typify the changes during the steel rail era: St. Germain Street in St. Cloud about 1870 and 1920 (1st set) and Broadway in Fargo, looking north across the Northern Pacific railway tracks in 1881 and the 1920s (2nd set). 

Top photo: St. Cloud, 1870: N. J. Trenham, Alexandria,  MN, photo, Minnesota Historical Society (9193); 

Bottom photo: St. Cloud, 1920: Guy's, photo, Minnesota Historical Society