Historic Minnesota businesses live on at one-of-a-kind Dakota County property
South of Hastings, Minnesota, there's a town without a single resident and there are businesses that don't sell a single thing. Yet people can't wait to visit, and once here, they don't want to leave.
It all began decades ago when Steve Bauer came upon a little log house in the woods.
"They were going to actually burn that house for a practice fire and I just sort of thought, 'Why not save that house?'" Bauer said. "So, we picked it up and moved it over here and saved it, and that's where the name the Little Log House came from."
Since then, Bauer and his family have added 50 more buildings to their 160-acre site. Nearly all of them were rescued right before the wrecking ball was set to swing. That includes a century-old church they relocated to their main street.
"Basically, we took the whole church apart and put it back together again," Bauer said.
They did the same thing with an iconic St. Paul drive-in. In 2011, when Porky's was set to be destroyed to make way for light rail, Bauer went looking for those nostalgic drive-in signs. After some negotiation, he ended up coming home with the entire building — even the restaurant floor.
"We took the time to cut that out, save it, and bring it back and put it back in place," Bauer said.
Every July, Bauer, his daughter, Tiffany Lindbeck, and the rest of their family open up their village to visitors. That's when Porky's comes back to life.
"It gets opened up and people can go inside, and they can grab a beverage in there and they can sit and eat inside," Lindbeck said.
Across the street, you'll see old drive-in theater and gas station signs, windmills and town halls. When the weather warms up, car shows and weddings take over. That's when Bauer can show how serious he is about saving history. The rafters he used to build the reception hall were first used in 1892.
Saving old restaurants, old churches and even old bridges like this one — the future of Little Log House Pioneer Village is all about the past.
According to Bauer, there's still more to be done. The population may stay the same, but the town will grow — all thanks to a man on a mission.
"The grandkids will say, 'Grandpa, what's that for? Did you have one of them?' And then Grandpa's memory comes back," Bauer said. "We are going to keep it alive into the future."
Bauer says he gets calls every week from people asking him to save an old schoolhouse or historic building.
The Little Log House will hold its 34th annual show this July. For more information, click here.
