My Visit to The World's Only Corn Palace
The post you’ve all been waiting for has finally been written and is here for your reading pleasure. I’m talking about my thoughts on dum dum dummmm The World’s Only Corn Palace! For those who follow along regularly, you’ve probably noticed that I’ve brought up this freaking palace made out of corn on multiple occasions, none of them in particularly good light.
I decided the time has come to finally sit down and explain what this Corn Palace is, why anyone visits it, and honestly why I would (probably) never go back.
The World’s Only Corn Palace is a spectacle for pretty much anyone driving along I-90 in South Dakota. It’s a short 10 minute trip off the highway, there are guaranteed to be bathrooms, there is a Tesla supercharging station (huzzah!), and it’s been written about and documented enough that you know its an actual legit place and not some place where serial killers wait out for the lone tourist to arrive.
This place is a scene.
There was actually traffic getting to this place; which should’ve honestly been my first clue that this was a too-good-to-be-true tourist trap but alas, I persevered. I finally found parking next to a truly skeevy-looking taco truck (and you know I love my taco trucks) across the street from the Bible Land play park (which, if you ever needed a sign that you are firmly in the Midwest, this is it).
I stood across the street to take in this majestic(?) place. I’m not sure that I would call it a palace per say, but it certainly was a gigantic building with some cool onion domes and minarets whose outside walls were completely adorned by dried corn cobs.
My expectations were high as I entered the inside. A lukewarm mask-less 60-year old tour guide in the atrium handed me some brochures upon my entrance and took about eight minutes trying to explain to me where the nearest bathroom was - one of the many times I almost peed my pants along this road trip adventure.
No chance in hell these popcorn bags were freshly made.
Finally I made it inside… and was mostly confused. The entire place smelled of popcorn, there was a sub-par looking concession stand tucked away in a corner serving only bags of popcorn in various sizes, some plaques and signage to give the place some historical context (which I even attempted to read), and old-looking setups where families and kids (or 30-something year olds on a road trip adventure) can take selfies with a cartoon corn on the cob. The biggest source of my confusion though - there were no actual corn pieces adorning anything as far as I could see, so it just kind of reminded me of a grade school cafeteria but only significantly more unfriendly-looking.
I figured I didn’t make it to the good part yet. So many people online and in road trip forums had written about this place… there had to be more to it!
So I wandered, like I do. Up several flights of stairs, down long carpeted hallways, found some of the creepiest corn husk dolls that I admittedly stared at for a good amount of time, and saw old black and white photos of what the Corn Palace used to look like back in the day. Finally I came to a door, “Arena Entrance,” and I walked in.
Honestly, my jaw dropped. I found myself at the back of an actual arena surrounded by stadium seating, staring down at a giant (relatively speaking, of course) gift shop of corn-related trinkets which was setup in a way that book fairs were in the gym of my elementary school. The only actual corn to be found - tacked up into murals surrounding the gift shop.
The arena, the heart of the World’s Only Corn Palace, was clearly not busy in the slightest.
At this point I had so many questions. Do they actually use this arena for games or events? Who on Earth decided to make the World’s Only Corn Palace into an arena? Or was it an arena first that someone just decided to adorn with corn? Do people actually buy these super tacky corn-related gifts from this lame gift shop? Note - the only edible corn-related things they offered were, you guessed it, popcorn popcorn and more popcorn. And most importantly, how do the people who work here ever get the smell of buttered popcorn out of their hair?!
So I did some research when I left (as the car was charging, not as I was driving… this time). First let me clarify - this arena has a maximum capacity of 3,200 people versus the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, for example, that can hold about 15,000 more patrons.
Apparently “crop palaces” with “crop art” (I swear I didn’t just make these words up) are legit things in the Midwest of the US and was used as an advertisement for farmers and their products back in pre-billboard days. This particular Corn Palace was finished in 1921 (and took 30 years to build!) and is now the world’s only version of itself - the other 34 corn palaces and grain palaces are no longer intact. Besides being a tourist trap that convinces almost half a million people to explore its hallowed halls every year, it is actually a working arena that hosts small concerts and the city of Mitchell’s Corn Palace Festival every year.
Meet Cornelius. And yes, I too wondered why the World’s Only Corn Palace really needed a mascot.
Also the fiberglass cartoon corn statue that I took a photo with has a name. His name is Cornelius. Cornelius is apparently very popular. So popular in fact, that the Corn Palace applied for and won a $25,000 grant from the Department of Homeland Security to protect him. True story.
So obviously this place works great as a tourist trap. I literally detoured off the highway, past the Tesla supercharger, just to get to this shit show of a “palace.”
But, did it really work? Sure they got me to come there, take a few ridiculous photos with corn statues, and write about my experience months later because it is literally burned into my memory… but I didn’t spend a dime in this place. Even though the whole place smelled like buttered popcorn and I was jonesing for some lunch, I could not bring myself to buy an overpriced bag of what looked like hella old popcorn with negative amounts of seasoning in a lame clear plastic bag.
Even the town itself didn’t get a dime of my money as wandering around the immediate area showed me more kitschy shit that no one was buying and a bunch of weird dirty-looking places that did not give me the warm and fuzzies. For a fleeting moment I even considered actually going to the aforementioned skeevy-looking taco truck, but just settled with eating some snack bars and hummus in the car.
All in all, was I glad I went? For sure - it’s given me ample things to write about and ponder and compare other tourist traps along highways in the US to. Would I ever go back? Honestly, if I was on another road trip driving by Mitchell, South Dakota with someone who had never been - I’d recommend a drive by. And do I think the World’s Only Corn Palace has met its true potential and squeezed all the money out of the nearly half a million tourists that stop by? Absolutely not, not even close. From a marketing perspective they’ve done great getting the word out, now they just need to figure out how to capitalize on it.
