Minnesota Town Unveils 66-Foot Nutcracker With a Working Jaw

A small Minnesota town with more nutcrackers than residents has taken its obsession to a completely reasonable conclusion: it built a nearly 66-foot-tall nutcracker dressed like Uncle Sam.

The patriotic wooden giant was recently unveiled in Luverne, Minnesota, where hundreds of residents gathered to learn its official name and measurements.

“Verne the Patriot” stands 65 feet, 7½ inches tall—and that does not include the nine-foot pedestal beneath him. From the ground, Verne towers more than 74 feet over the surrounding prairie.

And yes, his enormous jaw actually works.

The town believes Verne is now the world’s tallest nutcracker. The current Guinness World Records holder is a 33-foot nutcracker in Neuhausen, Germany, meaning the Minnesota challenger is nearly twice its size.

Verne stands outside a family-owned rock shop called Those Blasted Things, where owners say business has quadrupled since the giant figure was completed in June. Other businesses around Luverne have also reported increased traffic from visitors who apparently cannot resist pulling off the highway to investigate the colossal bearded head rising above the cornfields.

The project cost approximately $600,000, financed through donations and grants. Its components were manufactured in Utah and assembled in Luverne, with a crane required to install the massive head and red-striped top hat.

The town’s nutcracker fixation began with resident Betty Mann, now 96.

Mann purchased her first wooden nutcracker in 2001 following a particularly difficult Christmas in which she had recently lost both her husband and daughter. What began as a small source of comfort eventually grew into a collection of more than 2,500 figures.

In 2016, Mann donated the entire collection to Luverne’s historical society, hoping it might attract additional visitors. Other collectors subsequently began contributing their own figures.

Today, Luverne possesses 7,554 different nutcrackers, officially giving the town more nutcrackers than its approximately 5,000 human residents. No two are reportedly alike.

When Luverne later hired a tourism consultant, his assessment was simple: the town would be crazy not to capitalize on its unusual collection.

Local officials accepted the challenge enthusiastically—and evidently interpreted “capitalize” to mean “construct a nutcracker large enough to menace neighboring counties.”

The town now holds an annual summer Nutcracker Fest, because waiting until Christmas would be an unacceptable limitation on Luverne’s year-round nutcracker economy.

The unveiling also produced a touching moment for John and Francine Hawkinson, who traveled nearly 200 miles to see Verne after a house fire destroyed Francine’s collection of almost 300 nutcrackers. Many represented important moments from the couple’s life, including a sailor honoring John’s Navy service and matching bride-and-groom figures commemorating their marriage.

John noted that Mann began collecting after experiencing personal loss—and that he and his wife had arrived in Luverne under similar circumstances.

The patriotic design was chosen partly to coincide with America’s 250th-anniversary celebrations. Verne wears an Uncle Sam-style outfit, sports a white beard and mustache and stares magnificently across southwestern Minnesota as though prepared to personally crack every walnut between Sioux Falls and Minneapolis.

Luverne is also known as one of the settings featured in the second season of the television series Fargo. But if the town’s plan succeeds, it may soon be better known as the place where a 74-foot mechanical patriot watches motorists from across the prairie.

Whatever one thinks of the $600,000 price tag, Luverne has unquestionably created something visitors will remember.

There are plenty of towns with museums, historic buildings and quaint shopping districts.

Only one has Verne. Associated Press