Minnesota History Center

This massive 427,000 square foot museum was built around the time we were in the process of moving to Las Vegas, so we had not managed to visit it before we left the state. With over a million artifacts available to display, we decided now was the time to pay a visit.

Anyone would enjoy touring this very interactive museum. If you never lived in Minnesota, the Center will give you an idea what it would be like if you had. It also would provide you with some time perspectives that you can use to think back to the days when you were a kid or a young adult and see how it might have been had you lived here. For those who grew up here, it also offers a time capsule trip down memory lane. Famous TV local faces and voices you know describe events that you remember.

The experiential exhibits were our favorites. One has you in a basement of a typical home, experiencing what it actually might have been like to have your community swept by a tornado – the sounds, the shaking of the entire foundation, the loud thuds as trees and other debris collide with the walls and roof of the home hopefully still standing above you. Or imagine sitting in the fuselage of a WWII B-29 as a paratrooper awaiting orders to drop behind enemy lines during the Invasion of Normandy, the plane lurching with each explosion of the anti-aircraft shells being volleyed all around you. There really is something for everyone here.

At first we thought we made a poor choice – we apparently were here on the last day of school, and there were field trips galore. The noise level was deafening and you really had to watch where you walked. But about an hour or so after we arrived, all the school kids disappeared and we almost had the place to ourselves – nice!

Did I happen to mention the snow here in June? Oh, I guess that isn’t snow – just the inches thick cover of residue fall from the Cottonwood Trees. Allergies are running on steroids now – oh boy!

Talk to you soon!