Where to find the Minnesota State Fair’s secret collection of ancient rocks
Go Deeper.
Create an account or log in to save stories.
Like this?
Thanks for liking this story! We have added it to a list of your favorite stories.
The International Bazaar at the Minnesota State Fair wasn't always a bazaar and it wasn't always international.
When construction finished on the area in 1970, it was originally called the Mexican Village. The area was much smaller than it is today and featured primarily Latin and Spanish art, according to Keri Huber, the State Fair’s archivist.
“It was very centered to things that you would find in Mexico,” she said. “You would see pottery being thrown by hand. There was some glass blowing.”
In 1984, the Mexican Village became the bazaar to include more cultures. It went through one more remodel in 2008, becoming the International Bazaar and adding another feature that made it even more international that most fairgoers miss: rocks from around the world.
Turn Up Your Support
MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all.
A granite paperweight
After the fair in 1979, Jerry Hammer, the fair’s then publicity superintendent, went on vacation to the Crazy Horse Memorial in the Black Hills in western South Dakota.
“If you left $1, you got to take a a piece of granite that they had blasted off the mountain,” he recalled. “I brought this this hunk of granite, which I still have, and had it for a paperweight on my desk.”
When other employees, mostly college students, at the fair saw the rock on Hammer’s desk, it sparked a competition.
“A lot of them were doing study abroad. And they saw the piece of granite on my desk, and said, ‘Oh, Jerry collects rocks.’ I didn't, but I guess I did now,” he recalled.
Month after month and trip after trip, rocks slowly began to pile up in Hammer’s impromptu collection. Rocks from the Parthenon in Athens to Hadrian’s Wall in the United Kingdom.
For years, the rocks sat. When Hammer became CEO of the fair in early 1997, much of the collection had moved to his new office. And yet he still didn’t know what to do with them.
That would change in 2008.
“We built the new bazaar, and I thought, ‘Oh, all this is perfect. We’ll just thrown them in the concrete,’” Hammer said.
Hammer gave the rocks to the cement finishers, hoping they would be crushed and used to cover the grounds as a nod to their international origins. But that didn’t happen.
“Instead of just tossing them in the concrete, he set them in front of the bazaar at the entrance,” Hammer recalled.
The rocks ended up embedded in a semi-permanent display in front of the globe nestled between the entrances to the International Bazaar.
The ‘secret’ rock collection
While the fair is ongoing, the rocks are mostly covered by benches. They’re still visible, but not immediately obvious. Over the years, some of the 22 rocks have been kicked loose from wear and tear.
Huber said that the stones largely go unnoticed, except by a few staff members who know Hammer’s story. “There are so many things that are happening during the State Fair. It's really hard to see those little tidbits.”
Carol Rydell has been attending the fair for 50 years. She was sitting on a bench right above the stones. In the years since the International Bizarre has been remodeled, she said she never noticed them.
“They're very inconspicuous. The size is pretty small,” she noted.
But Hammer’s rock collection, doesn’t stop there. In 2003, Just five years before Hammer’s collection would end up at the Bazaar, he went to visit his daughter, who was studying abroad in Rome.
It was at the same time the fair was renovating the Grandstand.
“I brought back a rock from the Colosseum in Rome, and gave that to the contractors,” he said. “So that's in the Grandstand.”
But it didn’t stop there. When the History and Heritage center was being built in 2013, Hammer was abroad in England and visiting the 5000-year-old site of Stonehenge. He saw another opportunity.
Right outside the museum are concentric circles with a concrete square in the middle. Hammer’s way of paying homage to where Heritage Square used to be.
“Dead center under that square is the Stonehenge rock, and I know it's there because I put it there the night before they poured the concrete,” he admitted.
Hammer said it was his way of creating a legacy for his time as CEO. With structures and rocks that have survived centuries.
“I just thought it was something that was kind of cool to do,” he said. “And I'm really glad this happy accident of collecting rocks became a thing.”
Do you have a “Hand-Me-Down?” An artifact of your own with a compelling origin story? Let us know at MorningEdition@mpr.org and a producer will reach out to you.
