I’VE SHOPPED ENOUGH FLEA MARKETS, garage sales and thrift shops through the decades to understand that all three hold nostalgia and memories along with some bargain prices.
Take the recent Rice County Historical Society Fall Flea Market in Faribault. Browsing through tables of merchandise and talking to vendors elicited many memories with second-hand goods prompting stories.
For example, when I spotted a Dekalb seedcorn sign, I initiated a conversation with merchant Rex Kern about detasseling corn for Dekalb. Worst job, ever, I declared. Kern listened and then agreed that pulling tassels from corn stalks in the heat and humidity of July, dew running down my arms, corn leaves slicing my skin for $1.25 hour sounded awful. But then he shared his story about catching and stuffing turkeys into cages. That, I said, sounded far worse than pulling tassels. Kern didn’t last long at that job. In my mind, I was seeing, too, the many loaded turkey trucks that pass through Faribault en route to the turkey plant only blocks from the flea market.
At Kern’s booth I also found assorted dolls standing in cardboard boxes, their heads peeking above the edges as if watching shoppers. I found the scene a bit creepy although the dolls were not creepy. Among those dolls was a bride, which sent me back to a childhood Christmas. I received a bridal doll enclosed in a red suitcase. She was beautiful. Until she wasn’t. My older brother took her and smashed in her boobs. Why? Because, sometimes brothers can be mean.
If Donny Osmond, who performed with his older brothers in the Osmonds band and then solo, was ever mean to his only sister, Marie, I don’t know. But I do know that I considered him a heart throb. A flea market album, “Donny Osmond—Alone Together,” was enough to temporarily take me back in time to my teen years of swooning over the likes of Osmond, David Cassidy, Bobby Sherman and many other teen idols.
But I wasn’t exactly embracing the clown I saw sandwiched between Winnie the Pooh and a bunny. I remember, as a kid, fearing clowns in parades. Not any more. Still, I wouldn’t intentionally buy a clown to display in my home.
It’s interesting how memories that have long been tucked away can suddenly resurface when triggered by a sight, a smell, a sound, a conversation. In a brief conversation with members of A Fun Lil’ Band, playing at the flea market, I shared that I never had the opportunity to play an instrument and can’t even read a musical note. The closest I came to playing music was on a toy accordion I received for Christmas one year. And, no, none of my three brothers wrecked that.
My maternal grandfather salvaged wrecked bikes from the junkyard, repairing and repainting them for me and my siblings. So when I saw several vintage bikes for sale at the flea market, I thought of Grandpa. I only wish I had realized then what a gift of love this was to us, his grandchildren. Without Grandpa fixing up those bikes, I wouldn’t have had “Sky Blue,” (yes, I named my bike) the recycled bike he painted sky blue and gave to me. My very own bike, no sharing with siblings required.
I expect other flea market shoppers found memories among the tables and tables and tables of merchandise. I also found a 13-year-old selling her homemade bracelets and earrings via her business, DazzleberryBeads. Avery started the company because she wants to buy a dog. She’s almost there. I failed to ask her what kind of dog.
But I did see, and photograph, a dog at the flea market.
I appreciate the stories shared at flea markets, the memories recalled, the art discovered, the history displayed. A flea market is about so much more than getting rid of “junk,” which really isn’t junk at all. It’s about all of us, collectively, sharing our lives.
TELL ME: Do any of the items in the photos featured here prompt memories for you? Please share your stories.
© Copyright 2025 Audrey Kletscher Helbling
Minnesota Prairie Roots 
Politics, passionate voices & peach pie at a potluck September 9, 2025
Tags: America, Ben Schierer, commentary, democracy, DFL, DFL Garden Party, freedom, Martha Brown, Matt Little, Minnesota, Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon, Minnesota Senator Erin Murphy, opinion, political candidates, politics, potluck, Rice County, southern Minnesota
MONDAY EVENING I GATHERED in rural Rice County with a crowd concerned about issues ranging from healthcare to immigration, agriculture, education, the environment, diversity, gun violence, the SNAP program, tariffs, voting rights, veterans’ benefits, the economy and much more. All current-day topics worrying many of us, including me.
I’ve never been politically active. Until this year. To stay silent now feels complicit. I care enough about this country, about freedom, about democracy, to let my voice be heard. I’ve participated in three pro-democracy rallies, including the NO KINGS Day Rally in Northfield and two on Labor Day in Owatonna. I’ve volunteered at a DFL Sweetcorn Feed in Faribault. I’ve donated to the DFL, called and emailed my legislators in Washington, DC. And Monday evening I attended a potluck, billed as a DFL Working Families Garden Party. This all from someone who previously voted primarily Republican. But no more, not in the past four Presidential elections or in some other past elections. I’ve always looked at candidates, their character and their stances on issues before voting. I still do, but party affiliation now matters to me, too.
DEEP CONCERN
At all of these recent events, I’ve heard—whether from politicians, candidates for office or ordinary people like me—a deep concern for our country under the current administration and those who go along with whatever our President says and does. This concern comes from good, decent people. Farmers, teachers, business owners, lawyers, blue collar workers, college students. People who carry crockpots of pulled pork and baked beans, bowls of creamy garden-fresh cucumber salad, peach pie and bars to a political party on a rural acreage.
As I sat in this bucolic setting Monday evening listening to short speeches from candidates like Martha Brown of Faribault, running for Minnesota House District 19A on the slogan of “Common-Sense Leadership for Working People,” or fiery Matt Little from Elko New Market who embraces the label of “radical” and who is running for Congress in the Second Congressional District or Ben Schierer of Fergus Falls, campaigning for state auditor and vowing to represent both urban and rural communities, I felt hope.
COMPASSION & HOPE
I felt hope, too, when I heard Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon talk about protecting voter information, voting rights and more. I felt hope when I heard Minnesota Senate Majority Leader Erin Murphy speak. As a nurse, her care and compassion for others threads through her speeches, shines in her political life.
Most notable in Murphy’s talk, at least for me, is the deep grief she feels over the politically-motivated assassination of her friend and colleague, Minnesota Speaker of the House Emerita Melissa Hortman and Hortman’s husband, Mark. The Hortmans were shot to death on June 14, the day I protested in Northfield, despite warnings not to do so. I refuse to be silenced.
Murphy spoke on Monday evening against a backdrop of American and Minnesota state flags and a banner of the Hortmans and their dog with this message: STAND UP FOR JUSTICE AND PEACE. She talked, too, about attending the funeral on Sunday of Fletcher Merkel, 8, among two students killed in a mass shooting that injured 21 others at Annunciation Catholic Church in south Minneapolis on August 27. Justice. Peace. No more gun violence.
UNPRECEDENTED
I’ve lived enough years to observe that what’s happening in this country right now is unprecedented. I’ve never felt more fearful of losing our freedoms under authoritarian rule. It’s happening already with snatching people off the streets, imprisonment and deportations without due process. It’s happening in intimidation and retribution; mass firings; suppression of free speech; funding cuts that are undermining research, healthcare, education and more; gathering of private information by the government; sending armed military into cities; and in countless other ways that affect all of us no matter our political affiliations.
This isn’t about rural vs urban. This isn’t about us vs them. This is, rather, about preserving and protecting our very freedoms as Americans. This is about caring and feeling hopeful. This is about speaking up. About doing something. And sometimes this is also about eating pulled pork, baked beans, cucumber salad and homemade peach pie at a potluck on a beautiful September evening in southern Minnesota.
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© Copyright 2025 Audrey Kletscher Helbling