Current Time in Saint Paul, United States

Saint Paul is the capital of Minnesota in the northern United States, built on bluffs above the Mississippi River at the point that marked the practical head of steamboat navigation. With Minneapolis on the opposite bank it forms the Twin Cities, a metropolitan area of more than three and a half million people. The continental climate is one of the most extreme of any major American city, with long cold winters, warm humid summers and brilliant autumns along the river valley.

About three hundred and ten thousand people live in Saint Paul. It is the seat of state government and a centre of insurance, finance, healthcare, education and publishing, with several large corporations headquartered in the city and its immediate suburbs.

The settlement began as a rough river landing in the 1830s and took its present name in 1841 from a log chapel dedicated to Saint Paul by the missionary priest Lucien Galtier. It became the territorial capital in 1849 and grew rapidly as steamboats and then railways arrived. The railway builder James J Hill created his Great Northern empire from here, and his enormous stone mansion on Summit Avenue is preserved as a museum. Summit Avenue itself is celebrated as the longest continuous stretch of Victorian residential architecture in the country, and F Scott Fitzgerald, who was born in Saint Paul, wrote his first novel in a house on the street.

The Minnesota State Capitol, completed in 1905 to a design by Cass Gilbert and crowned by one of the largest self supporting marble domes in the world, dominates the skyline together with the great copper dome of the Cathedral of Saint Paul. Nearby stand the Landmark Center, a splendid Romanesque revival former courthouse, the Minnesota History Center and the Ordway concert hall.

Attractions include the Science Museum of Minnesota on the riverbank, Como Park with its free zoo and Victorian glass conservatory, the Japanese garden, and Fort Snelling, an 1820s military post at the meeting of the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers. The Saint Paul Winter Carnival, running since 1886, celebrates the cold with ice sculptures, parades and occasional monumental ice palaces, while the Minnesota State Fair, held just beyond the city limits, is one of the largest in the United States.

Saint Paul is notably diverse. It is home to the largest urban Hmong community in the country, along with substantial Karen, Somali, Latino and East African populations, and their restaurants, markets and festivals are a defining part of the city's life.

Public transport includes the Green Line light rail linking the two downtowns, an extensive bus network and the restored Union Depot. Minneapolis Saint Paul International Airport lies between the cities.

Education is a major strength, with Macalester College, the University of St Thomas, Hamline, Concordia, St Catherine University and the agricultural campus of the University of Minnesota all within the city.

Saint Paul is important as a capital of government and culture, and it is loved for its river bluffs, its historic streets and its refusal to be defeated by winter.