Grand Rapids, Minnesota

This is a town that you can really love to embrace

For it is Judy Garland's birthplace

Grand Rapids was originally founded as a logging town, as the Mississippi River provided an optimal method of log shipment to population centers. The predecessor of the Blandin paper mill was opened in 1902.

Grand Rapids was the birthplace and early childhood home of legendary singer and actress Judy Garland, although her family moved to Lancaster, California, when she was four years old. The Itasca County Historical Society maintains a Judy Garland exhibit in their Heritage Museum and Judy's fully restored birthplace, in a home built in 1892, is open to the public as the Judy Garland Museum.

For more information, visit: http://www.visitgrandrapids.com/