Elwyn Tinklenberg

Who is Elwyn Tinklenberg?

Elwyn "El" Tinklenberg is an American politician, and was the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party nominee and Independence Party of Minnesota endorsee for U.S. Congress in Minnesota's 6th District elections in 2008. He announced his candidacy again in 2009 but dropped out almost immediately after candidate Maureen Reed raised nearly $250,000 in the first quarter of her campaign. He was also Commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Transportation from 1998 to 2002.

Tinklenberg was born in Princeton and grew up on a farm in Pease, a small, Dutch farming community in central Minnesota. He earned his undergraduate degree at the University of Minnesota Duluth in 1973. Afterward, he enrolled at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois. He completed his Master of Divinity at United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities in 1977. He served as a United Methodist minister in Blaine, Minnesota, from 1977 to 1986 before being elected to the Blaine City Council and then Mayor of Blaine. He was appointed Minnesota Transportation Commissioner by then Governor Jesse Ventura in 1998.