Set in the Twin Cities' outer suburbs, Eden Prairie is part of the southwest portion of Minneapolis–Saint Paul, the 16th-largest metropolitan area in the United States, with approximately 3.7 million residents.

The community was designed as a mixed-income city model, and is home to 7,213 commercial firms,[9] including the headquarters of SuperValu, C.H.

Robinson Worldwide, Winnebago Industries, Starkey Hearing Technologies, Lifetouch Inc., SABIS, and MTS Systems Corporation.

It contains the Eden Prairie Center mall and is the hub of SouthWest Transit, providing public transportation to three adjacent suburbs.

[12] For most of its existence, Eden Prairie was a slow-growing, pastoral village on the far southwest fringes of the Twin Cities.

The Ojibwe were armed with knives and guns traded to them by white settlers and fur traders, and after years of bloody warfare the Ojibwe had forced the Dakota to give up all their land east of the Mississippi River, and north of the Crow Wing River, land that did not include what is now Eden Prairie.

On May 25, 1858, a battle was fought between the Dakota and the Ojibwe in the southern part of Eden Prairie, just north of the Minnesota River, an area known as Murphy's Ferry.

[13] In 1851, a treaty opened land west of the Mississippi River to settlement allowing pioneers to settle in what is now Eden Prairie.

One of these early settlers was John Cummins, an Irish-born immigrant who built what is now known as the "Cummins-Phipps-Grill House" with his wife Mattie in 1880.

[15] Manuscripts indicate that Cummins was an avid and respected horticulturist, scientist, and farmer; he used his farmland to experiment with different strains of apples and grapes to try to find one that could withstand the harsh climate in Minnesota.

[13] Eden Prairie's town board held its first meeting in a log schoolhouse on May 11, 1858, the same day Minnesota became a state.

In the mid-1970s, the community gained a higher profile with the addition of Interstate Highway 494 and the Eden Prairie Center mall.

[17] Eden Prairie is about 11 miles (18 km) southwest of Minneapolis along the northern side of the Minnesota River.

Eden Prairie is home to more than 2,800 businesses,[21] including many that specialize in logistics/distribution, retail and wholesale trade, health care, industrial equipment, communications, and information technology.

According to the city's 2016 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report,[22] its top employers were: Video game retailer FuncoLand, which operated in over 400 locations nationwide before its acquisition and merger, was headquartered in Eden Prairie.

The world-peace sculpture depicts a woman service member touching a globe, honoring women who have served.

Community members could purchase a place on the memorial for the names of loved ones who served in any branch of the U.S. service in any war or conflict.

The Eden Prairie Police Department has a chief, a captain, three lieutenants,[27] about 66 sworn law-enforcement officers, and 30 civilian staff.

Hennepin Technical College (whose main campus is in Brooklyn Park, Minnesota) has an enrollment of roughly 7,000 full- and part-time students.

[39] The railroad overpass that lent its name to the 1990 Prince album Graffiti Bridge passed over Valley View Road in the city's northwestern quadrant.

It was torn down in 1991 to make way for an expansion of the road[40] and has since been replaced with a bridge carrying the Minnesota River Bluffs LRT rail-to-trail recreational path.

Prince also owned a warehouse on Flying Cloud Drive to rehearse and record music; today, the site is occupied by TGK Automotive.

[41] The cult television show Mystery Science Theater 3000 was filmed out of an industrial park in Eden Prairie for much of its original run.