48 Fun Facts About Minnesota State Fair

What is the fair's famous slogan?

The Great Minnesota Get-Together fits: no US state fair draws more visitors per day, though one rival that runs twice as long beats its total.

The fairgrounds sit in which small city between Saint Paul and Minneapolis?

Falcon Heights gave the fair neutral ground: Saint Paul and Minneapolis each fought to be its permanent home, and the poster for the first fair there diplomatically promised a show 'between' the two.

The fair runs for twelve days each year and always ends on which holiday?

Labor Day closes the fair, the day before most Minnesota children go back to school; it opens twelve days earlier partly to stay clear of the county fairs that feed it.

Roughly how many people attended the 2019 fair, a record that still stood in 2026?

2.1 million (2,126,551) came through the gates in 2019; the next fair was cancelled outright, and the fairs of 2024 to 2026 each stopped short of two million.

The first fair was held in 1859, a year after which Minnesota milestone?

Statehood was granted in 1858, but fairs had already been held in Minnesota Territory, staged to show off its farms and lure new settlers.

Before its 1885 permanent site, the fair had been held in which of these Greater Minnesota cities?

Rochester took several turns, and Red Wing, Winona and Owatonna hosted too: the early fair changed towns almost yearly, and the roaming shows proved hard to organise and often thinly attended.

What had the fair's permanent fairgrounds been before the fair moved in for good?

The Ramsey County Poor Farm was a gift: the county donated its 210-acre farm, ending decades in which the fair wandered from town to town.

Which vice president told a Minnesota State Fair crowd in 1901 to 'speak softly and carry a big stick'?

Theodore Roosevelt, then vice president, delivered the "big stick" line at the fair on 2 September 1901; twelve days later McKinley died and Roosevelt became president.

Dan Patch Avenue on the fairgrounds is named for what?

A champion pacer horse, Dan Patch never lost a race; rivals so often refused to face him that he mostly ran against the clock, pacing an unofficial record 1:55 mile at the fair in 1906.

Why was the fair cancelled in 1945 and then again in 1946?

Fuel shortage, then polio: wartime shortages and travel limits scrapped 1945 and a polio epidemic 1946, so the 1947 comeback fair doubled as the Pronto Pup's debut.

What title goes to the winner of Minnesota's statewide dairy ambassador competition, crowned at the fair?

Princess Kay of the Milky Way is crowned the night before the fair opens, when the outgoing princess hands her crown to one of ten county dairy princesses.

Each dairy finalist has her likeness carved from a 90-pound block of what?

Butter: each finalist sits for about six hours in a glass-walled cooler kept near 40 degrees while her likeness is carved, and the princesses take the finished heads home.

One long-running fair booth sells unlimited refills of which drink for a single price?

Milk, white or chocolate, pours without limit at the All-You-Can-Drink Milk stand: Minnesota's dairy farmers back it to promote what they produce, and most of the people filling the cups are volunteers.

Sweet Martha's, the fair's biggest vendor, sells its chocolate chip cookies in what?

Buckets heaped as high as the cookies will stack are Sweet Martha's signature; so many topple off that the pavement nearby is soon dotted with trampled cookies.

Which Twin Cities landmark hosted the state fair in 1860 and again in 1863?

Fort Snelling was out of the army's hands when the fair came in 1860, sold off as surplus to a private buyer; by the fair's return in 1863 it was back in service, training Civil War recruits.

The fair's Pronto Pup was invented in the 1930s at rainy Rockaway Beach, a seaside town in which state?

Oregon: the story goes that a downpour ruined vendor George Boyington's hot dog buns, so he devised a batter 'bun' that could be cooked on the spot around a dog on a stick.

What are fresh cheese curds nicknamed because of how they feel against the teeth?

Squeaky cheese earns the name from the springy protein structure of fresh curds, which rubs against the teeth; the squeak fades within about a day, so it doubles as a freshness test.

Which Minnesota comfort food went on a stick as a new fair food in 2006?

Hotdish, the Upper Midwest's church-supper casserole, went on a stick in 2006 and has stayed: it is one of about 80 fair foods now sold skewered.

Which insects were blamed for thinning the fair's exhibits and crowds in the mid-1870s?

Grasshoppers devoured Minnesota's crops from 1874 to 1876, leaving farmers with little to exhibit, and were blamed for keeping crowds away from the 1875 fair.

The fair's oldest existing ride, opened in 1915, is a 'tunnel of love' style boat ride called what?

Ye Old Mill has drifted boats through its dark tunnel since 1915, and four generations of the Keenan family worked it, helping riders in and out of the boats.

On the Giant Slide, riders slide down the fibreglass hill sitting on what?

Burlap sacks are the only vehicle: riders climb 100 steps to the top of the five-storey Giant Slide, a fixture since 1969, sit on one and let gravity do the rest.

Which sport ended a run of nearly a century at the fair's Grandstand in 2002?

Auto racing circled the Grandstand track from 1907 until 2002, when the bleachers came down in a remodel that left the venue to concerts.

Which Walker Art Center event did the Grandstand host in 2013?

The Internet Cat Video Festival, begun by the Walker Art Center in 2012, moved to the Grandstand in 2013 with Grumpy Cat among the guests and a Golden Kitty as top prize.

For decades Machinery Hill, now the fair's North End, was given over to displays of what?

Farm equipment once covered 80 acres of Machinery Hill, shown by 100 manufacturers, until implement dealers left for specialist farm shows and the area was reborn as the North End.

The fair's crop art competition requires artwork made from what?

Plant matter that grows in Minnesota is the only medium allowed, so artists glue seeds, stems and petals to a board, grain by grain, to build up their mosaic pictures.

The fair's mascot Fairchild is what kind of animal?

A gopher suits the Gopher State and nods to the University of Minnesota's Goldy; Fairchild has worn a barker's straw hat and striped jacket since his 1966 debut.

Which body governs the fair and has care and control of its fairgrounds?

The Minnesota State Agricultural Society runs the fair: delegates from county fairs and statewide farm groups meet each January to elect its board of managers.

For decades the fair's livestock arena, the Coliseum, spent its winters as a venue for which sport?

Ice hockey took over the Coliseum each winter from the mid-1970s, when a rink went in, until falling demand and worn-out ice-making gear ended it in 2014 and left the arena to its livestock shows.

The Hippodrome, replaced by the Lee & Rose Warner Coliseum, was damaged in World War II while used as what?

A propeller plant run by the A.O. Smith Corporation filled the Hippodrome for two years of the war; afterwards the building was judged not worth restoring and torn down.

In June 1910 the fairgrounds hosted Minnesota's first what?

Airplane flight reached Minnesota at the Twin City Aviation Meet on the fairgrounds, and flying exhibitions stayed on the fair's bill for years afterwards.

In a popular fair costume contest, young exhibitors dress up which animals?

Llamas and alpacas, latecomers that got their first show at the fair only in 1988, now headline one of its most popular contests, parading in costume beside their young handlers.

The fair's old hand-carved carousel was saved from auction in 1988 and now turns where?

Como Park is its home now; rescuers closed the purchase ten minutes after the New York auction began, moments before the first horse would have been sold.

The fair's carnival area of rides for small children is called what?

Kidway has been a permanent corner of the grounds since 1995, when the fair stopped hiring a travelling carnival company and began running its own rides.

Which World War II general told a 1947 Grandstand crowd it was the first state fair he had ever attended?

Dwight D. Eisenhower added that he hoped he had 'made a good beginning by visiting the greatest first'; the 1947 fair was the first held after two cancelled years.

After the pandemic cancellation, the fair launched which scaled-down spring event in 2021?

Kickoff to Summer began as a five-day stand-in with crowds capped at 10,000 at a time; it went down so well that it came back the next year and was still running on Memorial Day weekend in 2026.

When the fair settled on its permanent grounds in 1885, the surrounding area was known by which name?

Hamline was the name on the map in 1885, and it lingers at the fair: the Hamline Church Dining Hall, opened in 1897, is its longest-running food concession.

The West End Market, opened in 2014, replaced which earlier corner of the fairgrounds?

Heritage Square opened in 1975 on the site of the old Teen Fair and housed the fair's history museum, which is why its successor has a History & Heritage Center at its heart.

Which state's fair, at 24 days, runs twice as long as Minnesota's and bills itself the nation's longest?

Texas: the State Fair of Texas fills 24 autumn days in Dallas, which is how it can out-draw Minnesota in total even though Minnesota pulls in more people per day.

Why was the 1893 Minnesota State Fair cancelled?

A clash with Chicago's Columbian Exposition settled it: the world's fair was only a train ride away, and Minnesota's organisers chose not to compete with it for crowds.

A blue ribbon means first place, but which colour marks a best-of-show winner at the fair?

Purple also pays: young exhibitors whose prize-winning livestock earn it go on to a purple-ribbon auction at the fair, where sponsors' bids raised over $1.3 million in 2025 for premiums and scholarships.

Which youth organisation has had its own building on the fairgrounds since 1939?

4-H, still called the Boys and Girls Clubs when it first exhibited here in 1913, sends members who must compete at their county fairs before they reach the state fair.

Which composer premiered a piece written for the University of Minnesota at the 1927 fair?

John Philip Sousa wrote the 'Minnesota March' at the university's request, but its president refused to take part in a premiere held off campus, so the fair's own president accepted the manuscript instead.

Alongside the Civil War, which conflict kept the fair from being held in 1862?

The U.S.–Dakota War erupted in Minnesota in 1862 and, coming on top of the Civil War that had already stopped the 1861 fair, left the young fair dark two years running.

The Pronto Pup, the fair's battered hot dog on a stick, is named for what?

The speed of the cooking gave the Pronto Pup its name — "pronto" because each dog is batter-dipped and fried to order in moments; the Karnis family brought them to the fair in 1947.

In 1898 Minnesota's volunteer regiments mustered at Camp Ramsey on the fairgrounds for which war?

The Spanish–American War: within weeks the Thirteenth Minnesota had left the fairgrounds by train for San Francisco, and that August it led the American advance on Manila.

Which spinning carnival ride, invented in Faribault, Minnesota, made an early public appearance at the fair in the 1920s?

The Tilt-A-Whirl was patented by Faribault woodworker Herbert Sellner, who wanted to give riders 'pleasurable and unexpected sensations'; his factory there built it for carnivals everywhere.

The fair's single-day attendance record, 270,426 in 2018, was set on which day of its twelve-day run?

Second Saturday crowds are the biggest of all: that day in 2018 drew 270,426, nearly double the best Tuesday on record, and the mark still stood after the 2026 fair.

Which Owatonna seed-portrait artist won so often at the fair's crop art competition that she retired from it?

Lillian Colton won nine best-of-show ribbons in eleven years, then stopped competing so others could have a chance, and spent later fairs demonstrating her seed portraits instead.