Star Tribune
Iowa man visiting every U.S. Pizza Ranch in U.S. is wrapping up his Minnesota leg
When Jason Halkias digs into a slice at the Pizza Ranch in Willmar on Saturday, it won’t just be any old bite of pizza. It represents a culminating step in what’s become an epic pizza pilgrimage.
Saturday’s stop in Willmar will be the 219th Pizza Ranch restaurant visited by Halkias, a 38-year-old resident of Davenport, Iowa, as he nears his goal of eating at every Pizza Ranch in the United States. It’s also the 44th, and last, Pizza Ranch in Minnesota on Halkias’s list.
“Willmar will complete my visits to the Land of 10,000 Lakes,” he said on Thursday, as he drove from Iowa toward Minnesota. “I feel really good that I’m able to complete what I once thought was a challenge.”
Halkias began his quest in 2014. This trip to Minnesota is one of the final legs on the journey, with only five Pizza Ranches yet to visit after this weekend.
His pizza pilgrimage has brought Halkias all over America. At home, he has a closet overflowing with gifts from all the pizzerias he’s visited: hats, hoodies, a squishy football. A Paul Bunyan shirt from Bemidji, Minnesota. A pin with his name on it from Holland, Michigan. A Bible from a Pizza Ranch in Lincoln, Nebraska. At the pizzeria arcade in Helena, Montana, he once scored enough points to win the plastic disco ball that now graces the dancefloor at his DJ gigs.
Jason Halkias wears a Pizza Ranch shirt as he puts together his to go order at a Pizza Ranch in Shakopee, Minn., on Thursday. (Renée Jones Schneider)
Halkias said he lives by a code for his trips, which he calls “swings.” When he visits one of the buffet-based restaurants, which typically feature not just pizza but also fried chicken, pasta and a salad bar, he must spend enough time there to experience it. “I’m not just going to go in a location and get a picture and then leave,” Halkias said. “No, that doesn’t count in my opinion. Ha!”
Halkias sees each Pizza Ranch as different, a reflection of its community. The chain’s locations tend toward smaller towns and regional centers and are rarely found in urban centers. Halkias also notices smaller distinctions: some Pizza Ranches, for example, don’t have spear pickles in the buffet, he said.
On his Facebook, Halkias has chronicled the landmarks he’s visited on his swings: the geographical center of America in South Dakota, the remnants of the Oregon Trail in Wyoming, a meeting with Elsie Eiler, the sole occupant of Monowi, Nebraska (population 1).
LAFAYETTE, Wis. — About 25 children and adults were injured Wednesday when a wagon carrying them overturned at a western Wisconsin apple orchard.
The children, parents and chaperones were on a field trip to the orchard in Lafayette when one of two wagons being pulled by a tractor turned sideways and rolled over, Chippewa County Sheriff Travis Hakes told reporters. Hakes said the tractor was traveling at a low speed when the wagon rolled over while going downhill.
Three people suffered critical injuries, while injuries to five others were considered serious. Authorities didn’t say how many of the injured were children.
The elementary school-age children attend a school in Eau Claire. Lafayette is northeast of Eau Claire.
After about five minutes and several warnings that students participating in the protest would be suspended,, the protesters exited Northrop and Cunningham continued her speech. They later gathered outside on the mall afterwards to shout, “Cunningham, you will see, Palestine will be free.”
Cunningham recounted the story of Norman Borlaug, the U alumnus and agronomist whose research in wheat saved millions from starvation, and said she would prioritize keeping a college education affordable for students.
Cunningham actually took over presidential duties on July 1, replacing Interim President Jeff Ettinger. She oversees a budget of more than $4 billion to run the university’s five campuses, which enrolled more than 68,000 students and employed 27,000 people during the last academic year.
She was chosen for the job last winter over two other candidates: Laura Bloomberg, president of Cleveland State University and former dean of the U’s Humphrey School of Public Affairs, and James Holloway, provost and executive vice president for academic affairs at the University of New Mexico. She is the U’s second woman president, following Joan Gabel who held the office from 2019 to 2023.
Cunningham will be paid more than $1 million per year — about $975,000 in base pay and an additional $120,000 in retirement contributions. The compensation puts her in the top quarter of Big Ten university presidents.
Sgt. Gordon Blackey, once a security guard to Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, allegedly admitted to tracking the woman’s movements in her vehicle, according to a criminal complaint.
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