Farmers Markets are very common along the banks of the Mississippi. Tradition has it that farms on top of the bluffs would find trails and latter roads down the bluffs to houl their crops to market in communities along the banks of the river. Here the crops could be loaded onto boats and transported to the big cities in the east where farm land was becomming scares. Later the railroads would use the river banks as a flat surface where trains could travel fairly easy. The trains along with the boats could then be used to transport crops to the large shipping ports along the Gulf of Mexico.

Today small farmers us the same routes and communities to connect their crops with new generations of consumers. The large trucks still come to port and the rail cars move more grain than anyone could have imagined, even 20 years ago, but the farmers markets, like this one in Winona, MN, still provide that all important connection between farmer and customer.

Taken in the summer of 2024.