I was visiting relatives with my mother in law last week in northern Minnesota. She showed me around the town where she grew up. Here's the entrance sign of her elementary school in Virginia, MN which was constructed in 1922:

On the was back to Lake Vermilion, we passed through the town of Tower (pop 500). The town was established in 1889 shortly after the Soudan iron mine was established as the first iron mine in the state of Minnesota.

We pulled over to visit a friend, and I took this photograph:

As I was taking the picture, a lady walking by told me she loved this old building with its old faded letters, and that a great many of the buildings in Tower used to be painted with advertisements like this.

After I took that picture, I turned to the right and found this cute little bench nestled under a tree:

Which my one year old son really enjoyed: