Mendota held a strategic place in Minnesota transportation history at the confluence of the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers, becoming a central meeting place for river boats on those waterways and later an important rail junction with the coming of the railroads in the late 1850s. Its location on the south bank of the Minnesota River, with St. Paul to the northeast and Minneapolis to the northwest, made it a logical link for rail lines entering the Twin Cities. Two of the state's earliest railroads, the Minnesota Central Railway and the Minnesota Valley Railroad, built lines through Mendota between 1857 and 1865. The Minnesota Central later connected with other railroads to Chicago and eastern cities, and by 1870 the railroad had reached the South Dakota border, linking St. Paul with growing western cities. Sections of both the Minnesota Central main line between Minneapolis and the Iowa border and a line connecting St. Paul and Mendota follow this route. The two railroads shared a single track until 1888, when a second, parallel route was built on a lower track bed and later became part of the Union Pacific Railroad.