The name comes from the high volume of teenage Midwestern prostitutes that populated the area from the 1960s to the 1990s[1][2][3][4] and the term only began to disappear as public prostitution became the target of New York City's massive crackdown on prostitution and street crime under then-mayor Rudolph Giuliani.
The phrase was used in the title of the 1980 film, Off the Minnesota Strip, starring Hal Holbrook and featuring Mare Winningham as a teenage runaway who returns to her home in Minnesota after months of working as a prostitute in New York.
[5] The made-for-TV film won the 1980 Emmy for 'Outstanding Writing in a Limited Series or Special' for writer David Chase.
[6] The Minnesota Strip is referenced in the 1978 Broadway Musical Runaways.
[7] The Dictators' song "Minnesota Strip" from their 1978 album Bloodbrothers is about the area.