![]() I’m sure it will do what they propose, pull traffic off I-90. A Facebook group named Say No to the Nutcracker has 950 members, and a Reddit poster wrote: “Truth be told, if the jaws don’t crack nuts, it’s just a $350,000 selfie stop. ![]() Not everyone is enthused about the giant nutcracker. ![]() Since the giant nutcracker was conceived five or six years ago, prices have risen astronomically, Walgrave said. The Walgraves prefer not to share the fiberglass figure’s cost but said the fundraising efforts are about halfway there. It will be transported in pieces and assembled at the site. “When spring rolls around and we have nice weather, hopefully they should be done with it and ready to bring it out,” Walgrave said. The work should be done by the time winter is over. That firm was chosen after several others hesitated to tackle a project of this size, Walgrave said. The nutcracker is being fabricated by a company in Utah. Just for Nuts has a board of directors and several backers helping guide the project. The Walgraves said the giant nutcracker has good support. While they may be seen as the main force behind the giant nutcracker, it has a wider base. The nutcracker will be built around a stanchion that once displayed a Mobil gas station sign the Walgraves donated the land on which the nutcracker will stand. “He’s going to look like a traditional nutcracker, but he is going to be dressed in stars and stripes with his hand over his breast, very patriotic,” Walgrave said.Ī nonprofit 501(c)3, Just for Nuts Inc., has been created to help raise money for the venture. ![]() The Walgraves’ businesses - they operate the rock shop Those Blasted Things and also sell cemetery memorials - are only about a block away from the interstate exchange, and that’s where Luverne’s giant nutcracker will stand. “We’re pushing the limits on him for a reason - it would be really painful to have someone build something bigger.”Īt 65 feet on an 8-foot platform, the Luverne nutcracker will be easily visible from Interstate 90. “Right now, the largest nutcracker with a working jaw is 33 feet tall and in Luxembourg,” Vance Walgrave said. Vance and Becky Walgrave, who have operated businesses in Luverne for more than 30 years, last week watched as construction workers poured an 8-foot-tall concrete platform that next year will hold the world’s largest nutcracker - complete with the signature working jaw. The southwest Minnesota community of 4,900 residents doesn’t mind admitting that there are more nutcrackers than people in town.Īnd to capitalize on being the home of the United States’ third-largest nutcracker collection, some Luverne residents are thinking big. Now, in the seven years since Mann donated her nutcracker collection to another one of her passions - the Rock County Historical Society - it has expanded and become a theme for her hometown of Luverne. Instead, it became a passion for Mann, who soon had two nutcrackers, then 20, then 200, then 2,000. The $6 nutcracker, marked down to half-price at the Cracker Barrel restaurant in Sioux Falls, originally was meant to be nothing more than a way to lift her spirits after months of grieving. Betty Mann gave herself a belated Christmas present more than 20 years ago.
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