Photograph of St. Peter State Hospital Museum — Photograph by Myotus, CC BY-SA 4.0. Via Wikimedia Commons.

Center Building-Minnesota Hospital for The Insane

Built in 1867 (Neoclassical architecture). Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1986.

From the record

“Peter State Hospital Museum, located in St. Peter, Minnesota, United States, offers a glimpse into the history of Minnesota's first and oldest public psychiatric hospital.”
Wikipedia article St. Peter State Hospital Museum, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 24 National Register listings published here for Nicollet County · listed in 1986 · category: Building · built in 1867, Neoclassical architecture.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
Listed as. Center Building--Minnesota Hospital for The Insane - the National Register files a house under its owner's surname.
Address. Freeman Dr., St. Peter, 56082
When was it listed? July 1986
Category. building
City. St. Peter city
When was it built? 1867
Architectural style. Neoclassical architecture
National Register reference number. 86002117 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

1 since 1996

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 1 fire within 5 miles of Center Building-Minnesota Hospital for The Insane in 1996, burning about 290 acres in total. None started naturally. 1 was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Arson/incendiarism	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
3 November 1996	Arson/incendiarism	290 acres	Minnesota Department of Natural Resources	not named

Every fire recorded in Nicollet County

Mines and quarries near this property

10 of 17 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 17 workings within 5 miles of Center Building-Minnesota Hospital for The Insane: 17 producers. All of them still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Stone, Crushed/Broken, Limestone, Dimension, Silica. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
Caroline & Moses Qsuarry	Limestone, Dimension	Producer
Gopher State Sandstone Mill	Silica	Producer
Gopher State Silica Pit	Silica	Producer	Sandstone
North Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken, Limestone, Dimension	Producer
Blue Earth Co Sand & Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Producer
Brown Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Producer
Ed Swarthout Inc	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer
Ed Swarthout Inc	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer
Gopher State Sandstone Quarry No 2	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer
Gopher State Sandstone Quarry No1	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer

Every working recorded in Nicollet County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

6 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Property	Distance	Listed
Old Main-Gustavus Adolphus College	1.2 miles	1976
Henry A. Swift House	1.2 miles	1983
Union Presbyterian Church	1.3 miles	1983
Frederick A. Donahower House	1.3 miles	1983
Nicollet County Courthouse and Jail	1.5 miles	2002
St. Peter Carnegie Library	1.5 miles	1983

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 86002117 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Nicollet County	All 24 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.