Down on the Farm with Art and UFOs

The last weekend in July we spent a few days at the family farm with Andy and Kristin. It was Kristin's first visit to this side of the state and we were hoping the eccentricities of Wisconsin's west coast wouldn't put her off. She is a grade school teacher however, so I suspect she's had her share of odd experiences. His Madness wanted to mark the occasion by taking an"American Gothic" type photo and found what he thought was an appropriated prop. I didn't tell them it was a manure fork though Andy may have guessed as much since he's holding it at arms length.

The adventure began in Minneapolis since we picked them up at the airport there. Our first stop was the Weisman Art Museum, designed by Frank Gehry and located on the University of Minnesota campus. I'd always wondered what was in that fabulous building, ha! It seems pretty obvious now.

Among lots of interesting artwork there was a fantastic exhibit of pottery found in the Mimbres river valley of New Mexico. Although the pieces date from around 1000 BCE, the chubby bat in the bowl and that poor dead rabbit look like they could pass for modern day Halloween decorations.

The next stop on the cultural tour was a visit to the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden because we appreciate great art, whether it's inside or out. The Spoonbridge and Cherry by Claes Oldenburg and Coosje Van Bruggen was the first piece of art commissioned for it and continues to be a family favorite. It was always a struggle to keep Andy from climbing on it when he was a child!

Sharing the spotlight is a recent addition to the garden, Katharina Fritsch's Hahn/Cock. It's hard to miss a 24 foot tall cobalt blue rooster. Although it is new to Minneapolis, it graced a famous square before coming to roost in the midwest. You can read about it's interesting history here.

All grand-scale public art is inherently political so why not poke a little fun at all that seriousness?

Eventually we left the twin cities and headed east across the Mississippi for the country. This part of the state is peppered with small villages that hold festivals all summer long. Each town has it's own theme and specific weekend - how else could their beauty queens be in all the other town's parades? There's a Cheese Curd Festival, Bacon Bash, Pepper Fest and June Bug Days, to name a few but the one happening during our visit was UFO Days! So we made our way over to Elmwood to catch the parade because we can never get enough of that synchronized waving! There's also beer.

    

The village of Elmwood is located about half hour's drive from the farm. As you can see from this photo I borrowed from their Facebook page, it's located in a beautiful valley surrounded by wooded hillsides. For a couple of years in the mid 1970's it gained national attention when one of it's police officers, a teacher and a few local farmers reported seeing what could only be described as an UFOs. Luckily the rest of the 600 plus residents were happy to embrace their new found fame and in 1978 they established UFO Days to celebrate the sightings. Coincidentally, the close encounters came to an abrupt end about the same time but the event continues and it's still a great excuse for a party.

There have been around thirty people who have admitted to seeing unusual objects in the night sky around Elmwood. Some of them described an orange glow, like a half moon but a few also reported odd occurrences such as their television sets shutting off and then coming back on and their dogs suddenly acting strangely and barking more than usual.  

The most famous of the close encounters involved George Wheeler, a 30-year veteran of the police force and former World War II combat pilot. According to an article in the Eau Claire Leader-Telegram, on April 22, 1976 he drove up to the local quarry near Tuttle Hill around 11:00 pm to investigate what looked like a fire. Soon after reaching the area he radioed back to the police department dispatcher saying, "My God, it's one of those UFOs again!" He described a glowing object hovering 100 feet off the ground. It had six bluish-white lights, windows on the sides and he could see moving shadows inside. He was in the midst of describing what he was witnessing when it suddenly it shot straight up into the sky making a whooshing sound. A ray of light shot down from the ship, striking him and then his radio transmission went dead. A local farmer, David Moots soon arrived on the scene to discover Wheeler dazed and the electrical system in his car burned out.  

 There was some speculation that the rock quarry could be attracting the extraterrestrial visitors. Other popular theories alleged that the sighting were most likely due to in part to the overactive imaginations of those individuals involved, the government conducting secret experiments, the second coming of Christ or excessive alcohol consumption. At some point there was talk of building a UFO landing site but sadly (or perhaps, fortunately) it failed due to a lack of funds. 

Here's Andy trying to figure out what these two little green men are looking at. One of the locals told us there used to be several space ships parked in this lot but they seem to have disappeared. Or did they fly away? We thoroughly enjoyed our visit to UFO Days and in keeping with the outer space theme HM and I are looking forward to the Manitowoc Sputnik Fest this coming weekend. 

Burt and Ivy wisely opted to stay home and limit their celestial observing to the eclipse, although it appears they've had this experience before. Hmmm . . .  unfortunately it was a very cloudy day so viewing was limited but they didn't seem to mind.

Happy Labor Day if you're celebrating, hope everyone had a great weekend!

Thanks for stopping by!