LOON STATE ADVISORY

            It happened shortly after Minnesota became the thirty-second state in 1858 -- the state’s first professional politician arrived, traveling by steamboat up the Mississippi river from St. Louis to St. Paul.  He quickly filed a homestead claim on a quarter section of land near Minnehaha Falls to establish residence and then began his quest to reap the spoils of government office.  He saddled his horse and hit the campaign trail, shaking thousands of hands and kissing every baby between Minneapolis and Stillwater.  During his travels he became aware of a curious summer-long ritual, where whole families would hurry to finish their chores on Friday afternoon and then disappear for the weekend, returning home late Sunday evening.  He devised the first statewide political poll to discover what these people were up to, questioning farmers, lumberjacks and riverboat captains regarding their personal affairs.  His snooping allowed him to determine that most of the missing families had a cabin near the shore of a pristine Minnesota lake, where they would spend summer weekends fishing and making cabin repairs.  He decided he could use this information to gain an advantage over his political rivals by telling the voters he was in favor of sandy lake beaches, clean water and a fish in every pot.  To help make his politicking seem factual, he set out to tally the number of lakes in the state, counting big lakes and small ponds, even including the mud-hole in the pigpen behind the barn of his neighbor, Ole Johnson.  He counted until he reached 10,000, which was as high as he could count using his sixth-grade education.  His campaign slogan became:  “No Fishy Politics in Minnesota, This Land of 10,000 Lakes is Your Land.”  He would have won the election too, but he made a serious political blunder by coming out in favor of the mosquito for state bird.

            As things turned out, “Land of 10,000 Lakes” became the slogan used on the Minnesota license plate; and the Loon, a fish-eating, diving creature that inhabits sub-arctic regions like Minnesota lakes, was elected state bird.  And although it lost the nomination for state bird, the mosquito remains the majority pest in the state with more than 10,000 huge watery nesting areas to hatch ten-bazillion baby mosquitoes every summer.  That’s enough of the nasty creatures to adequately torment the millions of Minnesotans who still go to the lake after work every Friday between Memorial Day and Labor Day, to spend the weekend fishing, sun-burning, working on their cabins, and scratching bug bites.

            As for the would-be politician, he opened up a chain of hardware stores, lumber yards and garden centers in resort areas and became rich selling supplies for cabin repairs and landscaping.

 “Loon State Advisory” is infrequently published by John Meyers.

I should try to avoid rewriting things from memory.  I found a copy of "Minnesota Summer" and I think this copy is close to a final version.