LUVERNE, Minn. (AP) 鈥� Crossing the open farmland of southwestern Minnesota, you’ll encounter an otherworldly sight: a massive head with a beard, mustache and red-striped top hat looming over the horizon.
Pull into the small town of Luverne and the figure 鈥� a nearly 66-foot (20-meter) tall nutcracker, decked out like Uncle Sam 鈥� comes into full view.
Luverne, which thanks to a local collector claims to have more of the decorative figurines than people, now boasts the world’s tallest nutcracker too. And yes, the star-spangled behemoth has a working jaw.
Outside a quirky rock shop in the town’s center, hundreds of people gathered for a weekend ribbon cutting where the nutcracker’s name and exact height were revealed to a crowd that was later served red, white and blue cookies and slushies.
鈥淧lease welcome our newest Luverne resident, Verne the Patriot,鈥� Katie Walgrave announced to cheers.
It stands 65 feet and 7 1/2 inches tall, with the pedestal pushing Verne an additional 9 feet (2.7 meters) over the surrounding prairie, according to Walgrave. That’s almost twice the height of a 33-foot (10-meter) tall nutcracker in Neuhausen, Germany, that Guinness World Records currently has ranked as the largest.
Walgrave, who runs the rock shop called Those Blasted Things with her family, said that since the nutcracker was completed in mid-June, customers have quadrupled. Other local businesses have reported more traffic too.
鈥淥ur goal is to have something that鈥檚 different and that you won鈥檛 see anywhere else. And so that鈥檚 what we have here,鈥� she said.
Given the association between nutcrackers and Tchaikovsky’s namesake holiday ballet, the July unveiling seemed a bit out of season. But nutcrackers are a year-round obsession in Luverne, which also hosts a 鈥淣utcracker Fest鈥� every summer.
It all traces back to Betty Mann, 96, and a trip that she made to a Cracker Barrel in January 2001 after her daughter and husband had recently died.
鈥淚 said to my daughter-in-law, 鈥業 had a hard Christmas and I鈥檝e always wanted a wooden nutcracker. I鈥檓 buying myself a belated Christmas present,鈥欌�� she recalled.
She got her first in the Cracker Barrel鈥檚 gift shop. She kept buying them, and Mann’s collection eventually ballooned to more than 2,500 nutcrackers. In 2016, she donated them to the town鈥檚 historical society, where she was president, hoping to draw more visitors to its museum.
Others also started donating and today, Luverne鈥檚 7,554 nutcrackers outnumber its roughly 5,000 residents. No two are the same.
A few years ago, when the city brought in a tourism expert to figure out how to lure more visitors, he concluded 鈥渨e鈥檙e crazy if we don鈥檛 utilize the nutcracker collection,鈥� Mayor Patrick Baustian said.
A city committee came up with the idea of building the world’s tallest nutcracker, and so Verne was conceived. It was timed perfectly to arrive as the nation celebrates its 250th anniversary.
The nutcracker was several years in the making, with the pieces crafted in Utah and assembled in Luverne. The head and hat had to be lifted on with a crane three weeks ago, completing the structure.
It cost around $600,000, and was funded by donations and grants, Walgrave said.
John Hawkinson of Lakeville, Minnesota, surprised his wife, Francine, with a trip to Luverne (nearly 200 miles, or 321 kilometers, away) after a house fire last month destroyed her collection of nearly 300 nutcrackers. Many represented times from their life together 鈥� a nutcracker resembling a sailor for John鈥檚 time in the Navy, and matching bride and groom nutcrackers for their marriage.
鈥淏etty started her collection as a way of dealing with grief,鈥� John Hawkinson said Saturday. 鈥淲e came down here out of loss as well. 鈥� I thought that was kind of a full circle moment.鈥�
Luverne is about 30 miles (48 kilometers) from Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and about 200 miles (322 kilometers) from Minneapolis. One of its other claims to fame is being a setting for the second season of the TV show 鈥淔argo.鈥�
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