Tales of the Blanket

Being a True & Faithful Record of Remarkable Occurrences

Collected from the letters, memories, and sworn testimonials of those who have slept uncommonly well and eventually traced the cause to Faribault, Minnesota.

All Accounts Herein Are True in the Ways That Matter

Ghost Stories · Wilderness Lore · Romance

Since 1865, Faribault Mill blankets have turned up in the strangest circumstances and left the strangest impressions. The following accounts were submitted, recalled, or overheard in diners across the Upper Midwest.

We have not verified them. We have no intention of doing so.

I· Ghost Story ·

The Haunting of the Lindqvist House

Duluth, Minnesota  ·  Winter, 1962

The Hendersons moved into the house on November 3rd, which, in retrospect, was their first mistake. By Thanksgiving the radiators were moaning in what sounded like Norwegian. By Christmas, something was rearranging the silverware by pattern and date of manufacture. By January, Patrice Henderson had consulted two Lutheran ministers and one surprisingly well-reviewed clairvoyant, all of whom confirmed the house was, without question, densely haunted.

Then Gerald came home from Olson’s Department Store with two Faribault Mill wool blankets — on sale, because Gerald was constitutionally incapable of paying retail. That night they slept nine hours without event. The moaning stopped. The silverware stayed put. The cold spot near the upstairs hallway, which Patrice had begun leaving a cardigan near, simply warmed.

The following spring, clearing the attic, Patrice found a photograph of one Alvar Lindqvist — the home’s original owner, taken around 1918, returned from the war — seated in a wooden chair, wrapped in what was unmistakably a Faribault Mill camp blanket, wearing an expression of the most complete contentment.

Patrice put the photograph on the mantel. Nothing has moved in the night since.

“Alvar wasn’t haunting us. He was appalled by our bedding.”

“We still talk to him, just to be polite. He has never once complained about the blankets.”— Patrice Henderson, as told to her granddaughter, Duluth, 1991

✦   Continued on the Following Pages   ✦

II· Wilderness Survival ·

The Bear Who Lay Down

MONMOUTH, MAINE  ·  July, 1977

Ranger Dale Knutson has told this story at every campfire for forty-seven years, and it has not shrunk in the telling. A black bear — 340 pounds by conservative estimate — entered his campsite at 2am, sniffed the tent, sniffed the food pack, and then sniffed Dale himself with the focused attention of a man reading a menu. Then it lay down beside the tent and went to sleep for six hours.

When it woke, it looked at Dale with what he describes as “recognition,” and walked back into the trees at a dignified pace.

Dale had been sleeping under a Faribault Mill wool blanket his mother had given him. His theory: natural lanolin smells, to any creature with good instincts, like home. His supervisor’s official report attributed the incident to “unusual bear behavior.” Dale considers his explanation more complete.

“The bear knew quality when it smelled it. Most people take longer.”— Ranger Dale Knutson, still employed, still telling this story

III· Romance ·

The Proposal He Almost Missed

Minneapolis, Minnesota  ·  February 14th, 1988

Roger Mattila had been planning to propose to Susan Ikola for eleven months. He had a ring. He had a reservation at Manny’s. He had a speech rehearsed to such a degree that his roommate had begun leaving the apartment on principle.

The night before Valentine’s Day, Roger sat on his bed — recently dressed with Faribault Mill cotton blankets, a gift from his mother who described them as “the last thing I’m ever buying you” — “just for a moment.” He woke at 11:14am. The reservation had been at seven.

He proposed in the parking lot of a Perkins on Lyndale. Susan said yes without hesitation, later explaining that his expression was “the most honest I’d ever seen on a man — completely unguarded, like he’d slept nine hours and stopped lying to himself.” They’ve been married 36 years. The blanket is still on the bed. Roger still considers the Perkins parking lot an upgrade on Manny’s.

“The blanket made him vulnerable. That was the proposal.”— Susan Mattila, at every dinner party, without apparent plans to stop

IV· Historical Record ·

Lincoln’s Missing Afternoon

Washington, D.C.  ·  March 14th, 1865

Historians have long noted a gap in President Lincoln’s documented schedule on the afternoon of March 14th, 1865 — approximately four hours unaccounted for, during which no meetings were recorded, no dispatches were sent, and no one on his staff seemed to know, or was willing to say, precisely where he was.

The Faribault Woolen Mill had opened that same year. Its first production run was completed in late winter. Mill records from the period are, to use the archivists’ preferred term, “incomplete.”

We are not claiming anything specific. We are noting that a man who had spent four years making the most consequential decisions in the history of the Republic was, by every contemporary account, profoundly exhausted. We are noting that Faribault, Minnesota, is a real place that was making real blankets in the spring of 1865. We are noting that the four hours remain unexplained.

History, properly understood, has room for a good nap.

“A well-rested president is a more merciful one. We cannot prove this. We choose to believe it.”— The Faribault Mill Archives, on the matter of March 14th

V· Athletics ·

The Streak Nobody Discusses

Faribault High School  ·  1971–1974

Between 1971 and 1974, the Faribault High School wrestling team won 47 consecutive matches. Coach Bud Halvorsen attributed this to “discipline and fundamentals.” His wrestlers attributed it, less diplomatically, to the mandatory 22-minute pre-match nap that Halvorsen enforced in a training room outfitted entirely with surplus Faribault Mill wool blankets, acquired at personal expense from the mill’s outlet.

The streak ended in spring 1974 when the blankets were accidentally donated to a church rummage sale. The team finished third in district. Halvorsen attended the sale the following Saturday and purchased every blanket back at full asking price, without discernible embarrassment.

He never spoke publicly about the connection. He didn’t need to.

“He called it discipline. We called it the blankets. We were both right.”— Dave Nieminen, 1973 district qualifier

VI· The Unexplained ·

The Blizzard of ’91

Medford, Minnesota  ·  Halloween Night, 1991

The Halloween Blizzard dropped 28 inches on southern Minnesota in 24 hours. Power failed across three counties. The temperature hit single digits.

The Gustafson family of Medford lost power at 6pm. Arvid Gustafson — 74, and 31 years a Faribault Mill employee — went immediately to the linen closet. The family built what the grandchildren still call “the fort” in the living room: every Faribault Mill blanket in the house, layered with the confidence of a man who understood the product personally. One candle. A deck of cards. Five people.

Rescue workers arrived the next morning to find the family warm, well-rested, and in measurably better spirits than the rescue workers. The official report notes they “appeared to have slept well.” Arvid simply pointed at the blankets. The rescue worker wrote that down.

“Thirty-one years at the mill. I knew exactly what those blankets could do.”— Arvid Gustafson, age 74, Medford, Minnesota

VII· Culinary Mystery ·

The County Fair Incident

IOWA STATE FAIR  ·  August, 1983

Dorothy Eikmeier won the Iowa State Fair’s blue ribbon for apple pie nine consecutive years. Her recipe was, by her own frank assessment, “nothing special — decent crust, standard filling, good apples.” When pressed on her method, she said only that she always baked on mornings after she had slept particularly well.

In 1983, her daughter replaced Dorothy’s aging bedding with a Faribault Mill cotton blanket. That August, Dorothy won the apple pie competition, the rhubarb competition, the bread competition, and — in an outcome that surprised everyone, Dorothy included — a rosette for watercolor painting, a medium she had never previously attempted.

The judges noted her work showed “an unusual calm.” Dorothy said she had been sleeping better. The judges wrote that down too.

“I wasn’t a better baker. I was better rested. It turns out those are the same thing.”— Dorothy Eikmeier, nine-time champion, DES MOINES, IA

✦   Three More Accounts of Note   ✦

VIII· Business Legend ·

The Negotiation That Wasn’t

New York City, NY  ·  October, 1998

A Minnesota textile executive — who has requested anonymity, which we respect, though his initials are not entirely unlike those of a former Faribault Mill principal — flew to New York in fall 1998 for what his board described as “the most contentious contract negotiation in recent company history.”

Opposing counsel, a Manhattan attorney of considerable reputation, opened by announcing he had slept four hours and intended to be “particularly unpleasant about the indemnification clause.” The executive, who had slept nine hours under his travel Faribault Mill throw, responded to every point with such unruffled composure that the attorney eventually stopped mid-sentence, studied him across the table, and asked what he was on.

“Wool,” said the executive.

The contract was signed by noon. The attorney purchased two Faribault Mill blankets at a department store on his way to the airport. His assistant later confirmed he sleeps “markedly better” than he used to, and has become “considerably less unpleasant,” though she was careful to attribute this to no single cause.

“The best position in any negotiation is genuine rest. Everything else is theater.”— Anonymous Minnesota executive, initials withheld by request

IX· Road Trip Lore ·

The Car That Quit (And Why That Was Fine)

Highway 35, Albert Lea  ·  December, 2003

Kevin and Marla Backstrom were driving Minneapolis to Kansas City when their 1997 Buick LeSabre decided, with total conviction, to stop working outside Albert Lea at 11pm in December. Eight degrees. Triple A estimated four hours. Kevin is not, by his own cheerful admission, “a car person, a patient person, or a person who handles surprises with any grace.”

They had, by fortune or instinct, a Faribault Mill plaid wool throw in the back seat — purchased that afternoon at a rest stop gift shop because Marla had liked the colors. They reclined the seats, pulled it over them both, and waited. Both asleep inside ten minutes.

The tow truck driver knocked three times. “You two doing okay in there?” Kevin said it was the best sleep he’d had in two years. The driver looked at the blanket in Marla’s arms, and gave the slow nod of a man who required no further explanation. “Faribault,” he said. As if that settled it.

It did.

“The car broke down. We didn’t.”— Marla Backstrom, who still has the blanket and has never once considered replacing it

✦   A Final Account, For the Record   ✦

X· Diplomatic History ·

What Happened at the Governor’s Mansion

St. Paul, Minnesota  ·  Year Withheld by Request

A former Minnesota Governor — who has asked not to be named, a request we are honoring in the spirit of future goodwill — was preparing to deliver a state budget address that his communications team described, in a memo later obtained by no one in particular, as “a career-defining disaster in progress.”

The night before the address, the Governor’s residence was re-outfitted with Faribault Mill blankets as part of a Minnesota-made procurement initiative. The procurement team considered this routine. The Governor went to bed at 9:30pm and slept eleven hours, which was, by all available evidence, unprecedented.

He arrived at the podium the following morning looking — per the Minneapolis Star Tribune’s political correspondent, who had covered seventeen budget addresses — “almost unsettlingly calm, like a man who had genuinely stopped worrying and found the experience agreeable.” The address was described across the aisle as “the most coherent thing he’d said in public office.” One senator, who had prepared a rebuttal, folded it back into his jacket pocket partway through and did not take it out again.

The blankets remain in the residence. The address is occasionally cited in political science seminars at the University of Minnesota, though not for the reasons anyone expected. When asked what changed, the Governor’s former chief of staff pauses, smiles slightly, and changes the subject.

Which is, we think, answer enough.

“Good governance begins with good sleep. We’ve always known this. We simply hadn’t tested it at scale.”— Unnamed former Minnesota Governor, off the record, over walleye, sometime after his term ended

— ✦ —

More Tales Are Being Gathered.

If a Faribault Mill blanket has done something improbable for you — resolved an argument, survived a disaster, facilitated a nap of unusual quality — we want to hear about it. All accounts are taken seriously. None are doubted.