A collection that began decades ago now has more than 600 dairy items. Just east of Fargo, North Dakota, is the town of Vergas. You’ll know you’re there when you see the giant loon. In fact, the town celebration is called “Loony Days.”
Julie Bruhn is the mayor and she’ll tell you that what happens in Vergas stays in Vergas. That includes a museum stuffed full of dairy artifacts.
“We probably don’t even know what’s all in here,” said Mayor Julie Bruhn. “It just kept expanding and expanding.”
Julie’s dad Gordon Dahlgren started this collection in the 1950s. He was the bank president back then but had grown up on a farm and missed the cows. So, he started collecting oddities that reminded him of his childhood.
“This is the one he bought at an auction sale that got him going.”
It began with butter churns, then cream separators, then butter boxes that represent Minnesota creameries of the past. When Gordon ran out of room at home, he moved his collection to the bank basement.
“Anything Delaval. He loved DeLaval,” Julie recalls.
His collection has churned out some doozies- including a seated milker that’s well over a century old- and probably made for a good cardio workout back in the day.
“Just over the years he started collecting a few things here and a few things there.”
Lee Dahlgren is Julie’s brother, and he remembers going with his dad to auctions to pick up butter and milk memorabilia. Sometimes they would take road trips cross-country and treasure hunt along the way.
– Lee Dahlgren, Gordon’s Butter and Dairy Musuem (9 SECONDS)
“We would ride with him and you’d never take the interstate to Arizona and back. It was through small towns, finding antique shops,” said Lee Dahlgreen of Gordon’s Butter and Dairy Museum.
And they’d haul back whatever novelties caught their father’s eye- including a 90-year-old wash machine. Just before Gordon passed away in 2007, he made a cow to be used in Vergas parades- and it’s still used to this day. It’s a sense of pride for his family and they’re happy to spread the word about a time that was.
“People come in here and are like- I remember that when I was on the farm. You get the younger generations who are like- really? Did that do that back in the day?”
Julie says the one thing her dad never found while collecting was a Number 10 Dazey butter churner. Gordon’s Butter and Dairy Museum is free and open to the public.
