Flour!

Just as Albuqerque claims the title of Ballooning Capital of the World, the city Nationals will take place in next year was once dubbed Mill City during its peak in the flour industry. In fact, 12 million loaves of bread could have been made daily with the amount of flour produced in one of the largest mills in the U.S. during the 19th century, the Washburn A Mill. However, this same mill exploded on May 2, 1878 due to poor conditions inside. If any good came out of this tragedy it was that reforms were devised to prevent future misfortunes. Today, the Washburn A Mill is known as the Mill City Museum.

Just to emphasize how important the mill industry was to the city, they named their first professional baseball team the "Minneapolis Millers." Imagined if we named our team after the hot air balloon...

The destruction after the Washburn explosion

The Washburn Mill today

If we do get to visit the city next year (and hoping that we do) I'd love to get a tour of the museum. It looks colossal! I expect the rest of the city to be just as rich with history, since it did expand from this industry. As for the people, they'd naturally be just as friendly as the inhabitants of Albuquerque, New Mexico.