From Where I Sit

By Pat Spilseth, Columnist

Fall’s leaves are dropping from our maples and tumbling across the lawn. I smell bonfires and can taste s’mores. A few docks are being dismantled and we’re thinking about when the boats need to come in to be winterized. Cooler, crisp temperatures, shorter days, earlier darkness and a full moon in the dark sky tell us our lazy summer days are coming to an end.

Once Labor Day appears on the calendar, I know summer is over. Temperatures are in the 90s; humidity is unbearable. Sticky dew points make me cranky and I have no energy. I’m a total waste. It happens every year. Whenever the State Fair is operating, attracting crowds of unparalleled size, the sweat faction ratchets up. People are eating exotic, strange concoctions at top prices and riding the Ferris wheel and twisting, twirling rides that cause our stomachs to rebel. 

Anything you can imagine that vaguely resembles food is stuck on a stick at the Minnesota State Fair. You can buy a hot dish meal and brats, corn on the cob and even s’mores on a stick. Freebies at the State Fair used to include St. Thomas purple and white tote bags, free glasses of milk and free yardsticks. I hope they’ll still be available. Of course, nobody can avoid hearing the chattering vendor of that miraculous food processor which cuts and slices everything, the lefse baker and the food hut offering everything edible from cinnamon rolls to lamb kabobs to bison bites.   

Better than food on a stick, to me, are the classic dining halls which have existed since the late 19th century. Today, it’s tough to find enough volunteers to work the arduous schedule of the food halls. In past years there were more than 50 church-run eateries on the fairgrounds. Today, we’re down to only two choices, the 116-year-old Hamline Methodist Church dining hall from St. Paul’s United Methodist Church and the smaller hall run by Salem Lutheran Church in Minneapolis.

Through our fair-going years, Dave and I have regularly feasted at the Salem site. Their tummy-satisfying meatballs, mashed potatoes and gravy meals remind us of the home-cooked meals our moms, Esther and Agnes, made daily. We come from “meat and potatoes” families. Like many, we grew up on farms and small towns in rural Minnesota, where agriculture was the primary livelihood. Today, fewer than two percent of the population is in agriculture.

Volunteers staff the dining halls cooking, serving and cleaning up at 50 daily shifts, always with a smile. Swedish coffee, with an egg mixed into the grounds, is a “must” for many Scandinavians. Naturally, a good cup of coffee needs a real china cup, none of those styrofoam cups for Norwegians. And coffee must be accompanied by a juicy piece of apple, pumpkin or cherry pie or a sugar cookie or slice of chocolate cake. After viewing the displays of angel food, chocolate, marble, carrot and lemon cakes next to sweet rolls, coffeecakes, stollen and kringle at the Creative Activities Building, we’re hungry. Mouths salivating, we head for the dining hall, dreaming of sweet, sugary, buttery pastries to munch on between sips of coffee.

Minnesota has been called “The Bread and Butter State.” Crusty slices of homemade bread spread with plenty of real butter and raspberry jam were a favorite after school snack for me. When I’d walk home, several blocks from the school on the hill, Mom would usually have either browning loaves of bread cooling or her favorite chocolate cake with fudge frosting sliding over the edges. My favorites were either a crusty end piece of cake or of bread, as that held the most frosting or butter. To this day, we always manage to take time to survey the carving of the butter head of Princess Kay of the Milky Way from an 85 to 90-pound block of butter. This popular site began in the 1950s.

The Fine Arts Building, which opened in 1911, used to feature art loaned from galleries all over the world, even some Picasso, O’Keefe and Rubens works were on display. Eventually, the artwork was shifted from the collection of master painters to showcase paintings, ceramics, photographs and sculptures of Minnesota artists.

No State Fair experience would be complete without visits to the milking parlor, birthing barn, nursing piglets, sheep shearing, the huge horses parading around the Grandstand and the giant, expensive work machines on Machinery Hill. 

Being empty nesters, one area of the fair we don’t hit anymore is the rides. Our stomachs can’t take the lurching and tossing of the roller coaster, the tilt-a-whirl, even the topsy-turvy Ferris wheel. Now we prefer to listen to the music at the beer or wine gardens and watch the various musical acts and talent shows throughout the grounds. Once you get in, there’s so much free entertainment.

The show both of us miss is Garrison Keillor’s “Prairie Home Companion” show at the Grandstand. Nothing is more inspirational than the huge crowd rising and singing “American the Beautiful” under starry skies exploding with spectacular fireworks…what a patriotic evening!

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To contact Pat, email: pat.spilseth@gmail.com.