Longfellow, Minneapolis Longfellow, Minneapolis Longfellow is a defined community in Minneapolis, Minnesota which includes five smaller neighborhoods inside of it: Cooper, Hiawatha, Howe, Seward, and Longfellow. Grouped with South Minneapolis between the city's eastern border with the Mississippi River and the Metro Blue Line , Longfellow takes its name from Longfellow neighborhood which in turn is named after Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The renowned American poet incorporated elements into his poem "The Song of Hiawatha" from Henry Schoolcraft's accounts of native Dakota lore in Minnesota which included Minnehaha Falls in Longfellow's southern tip. The early reference of Highway 55 as Hiawatha Avenue, along
The Song of Hiawatha Epic and transferred them to the American Indians'—it is absurd". Longfellow also insisted in his letter to Sumner that, "I know the Kalevala very well, and that some of its legends resemble the Indian stories preserved by Schoolcraft is very true. But the idea of making me responsible for that is too ludicrous." Later scholars continued to debate the extent to which "The Song of Hiawatha" borrowed its themes, episodes, and outline from the "Kalevala." Despite the critics, the poem was immediately popular with readers and continued so for many decades. The Grolier Club named "The Song of Hiawatha" the