Great River Road along the Mississippi River

10 July 2020 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  5 minutes

Great River Road route marker © Thomas R Machnitzk/cc-by-3.0

Great River Road route marker © Thomas R Machnitzk/cc-by-3.0

The Great River Road is a collection of state and local roads that follow the course of the Mississippi River through ten states of the United States. They are Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi and Louisiana. It formerly extended north into Canada, serving the provinces of Ontario and Manitoba.   read more…

Mickey’s Diner in Saint Paul

9 October 2019 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Design & Products Reading Time:  5 minutes

© Tenzin Dongag/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Tenzin Dongag/cc-by-sa-3.0

Mickey’s Diner is a classic diner in downtown Saint Paul, Minnesota. It has been in continuous operation at the same location since 1939. Designed to resemble a railroad dining car, the prefabricated building was constructed in 1937 by the Jerry O’Mahony Diner Company of Elizabeth, New Jersey, then shipped to Saint Paul by rail. Its unusual architecture made it a local landmark. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983 for having local significance in the themes of architecture and commerce. It was nominated for being “a beloved, longstanding and unique social institution,” an unaltered example of railroad car-style diners, and one of the few surviving examples of its type in the American Midwest.   read more…

Mall of America

10 March 2017 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Shopping Reading Time:  7 minutes

© flickr.com - James Patterson/cc-by-2.0

© flickr.com – James Patterson/cc-by-2.0

Mall of America© (MOA™) is a shopping mall located in Bloomington, Minnesota (a suburb of the Twin Cities), southeast of the junction of Interstate 494 and Minnesota State Highway 77, north of the Minnesota River and across the interstate from the Minneapolis–St. Paul International Airport. Opened in 1992, it is the second largest malls in the United States, after the King of Prussia Mall in Philadelphia. The mall is managed by the Triple Five Group (which in turn is owned by Canada’s Ghermezian family, along with the West Edmonton Mall). 80 percent of visitors to the Mall of America are from Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, the Dakotas, Illinois, Ohio, and Canada.   read more…

The Hermann Monument in the Teutoburg Forest

17 March 2012 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  6 minutes

View from Bielstein towards Hermann Memorial © Max1235

View from Bielstein towards Hermann Memorial © Max1235

The Hermannsdenkmal (German for Hermann monument) is a monument located in Ostwestfalen-Lippe in Germany in the Southern part of the Teutoburg Forest, which is southwest of Detmold in the district of Lippe. It stands on the densely forested and 386 m tall Teutberg in the ring fortification located there, which is called Grotenburg.   read more…

The Great Lakes of North America

28 November 2011 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  6 minutes

Downtown Chicago from the lakefront © J. Crocker

Downtown Chicago from the lakefront © J. Crocker

The Great Lakes are a collection of freshwater lakes located in northeastern North America, on the Canada – United States border. Consisting of Lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario, they form the largest group of freshwater lakes on Earth by total surface, coming in second by volume behind Baikal in Russia. The total surface is 208,610 km2 (80,545 sq mi), and the total volume is 22,560 km3 (5,412 cu mi) The lakes are sometimes referred to as the North Coast or “Third Coast” by some citizens of the United States. The Great Lakes hold 21% of the world’s surface fresh water.   read more…

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