Brick – W. H. Hinds & Co., brick manufacturers, Coon Creek, Minn., newly established; are ready to furnish brick in any quantity and quality at market prices; warranted as good as Chaska No. 1. Office 620 Temple Court, Minneapolis. (The Saint Paul Daily Globe, Friday Morning, July 13, 1888, Volume X, Number 195, Page 7)
Up in Anoka county, on Coon creek, is a brick yard which does business under the name of W. H. Hinds & Co. E. M. Johnson is the real owner of that yard. W. H. Hinds is merely a figurehead. He is a practical brickmaker and furnishes the experience. E. M. Johnson puts up the money and pockets the major portion of the profits. In the summer of 1888 the city of Minneapolis needed 500,000 sewer brick. W. H. Hinds & Co., that is to say, E. M. Johnson, was given the contract at $10.90 per 1,000. More than that, there was another bid 90 cents lower than Johnson’s, but, since "we aldermans must together," Johnson secured the contract. (The Saint Paul Daily Globe, Thursday Morning, October 30, 1890, Volume XII, Number 303, Page 3)