The SPAM Museum, 101 3rd Avenue, Austin, Minnesota ~ 2023

Driving near Austin made this museum a must-stop 😊

It first opened as Hormel Foods First Century Museum in January 1991 in Austin's Oak Park Mall. It was later rebranded as the Spam Museum and a larger one opened in September 2001-2014. In April of 2016, the museum opened in its current space in downtown Austin. 

It was a blast, especially the spam can train running at the ceiling level throughout the entire place.

The train runs through the gift shop as well.

On the 75th anniversary of the Hormel Company, Dwight Eisenhower wrote a letter to the company with his congratulations and his thanks for all of the spam he and the GIs in World War II ate.

This was 14,000 square feet of fun and we took some souvenirs home for ourselves and our friends.

There's a bronze statue in front of the museum of a farmer with two pigs, reflecting Hormel's history as a pork producer and the originations of SPAM. Cheers to SPAM!

Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington Virginia ~ 2015 & 2024

The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier contains the remains of a World War I veteran. Nearby are the bodies of a veteran from World War II and one from the Korean War (technically a "Police Action"). A fourth unidentified body from the Viet Nam War was entombed here but later reinterred elsewhere when his remains were identified. His crypt remains vacant.

After the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, the most visited grave here is that of John Fitzgerald Kennedy.

We walked to find the graves of NASA Astronauts. The offered tour will not take you anywhere near them.

The Space Shuttle Challenger

The Space Shuttle Columbia

Medgar Evers was a World War II veteran and a civil rights activist. He was murdered at his home in 1963 by a white supremacist.

The other U.S. President to be buried in Arlington is William Howard Taft. He is the only President to have also served as a Supreme Court Justice.

Joe Louis, the "Brown Bomber" responded when questioned why he enlisted with the racially segregated army: "Lots of things wrong with America but Hitler ain't going to fix them." He never saw combat but was awarded the Legion of Merit.

We randomly found these grave stones on our walk back and forth to the astronaut sites.

Arlington National Cemetery was established in 1864, consists of 639 acres, and has over 400,000 burials. The graves extend beyond any sight line. May we always remember and honor those who served our country.

Changing of the Guard, Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, 2014

A Visit to the Vietnam War Memorial