Thursday, September 7, 2017

State Fair 2017 - Corn Palaces and Butter Queens by Pamela H. Simpson

I found this book a few weeks back at Garrison Keillor's bookstore in St. Paul. Being that I'm such a fan of the crop art and and the butter heads at the Minnesota State Fair, I had to pick up the book. It was an interesting read.  I never knew how far back in time food art actually goes and that many mid-western fairs in places such as South Dakota and Kansas had palaces decorated in corn, potatoes and more. The Minnesota State Fair has been  long been notable for its butter sculptures especially, since 1965, the butter heads of Princess Kay and the Milky  Way and her court. Along with providing advertising for the products of these industries, the corn palaces and butter sculptures spoke to the food overabundance  of the midwest promoting it as a prosperous place for people to move to and work. In other words, food was so plentiful that there was enough to "waste."

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