Horrible Bear

Pennington, Minnesota

Standing next to a gas station and grocery store north of Pennington, there is an open-air shed sheltering a weather-worn wooden black bear, standing on the stump from which it was carved by a chainsaw. "Che-Muk-Wa," reads an accompanying sign, Ojibwe for "big bear," although this bear isn't particularly big. The grocery store has employed a professionally-drawn bear in its logo since 2019, but it isn't this bear.

Chainsaw bears are common, so the fact that someone went to the trouble to build a shelter for this ungainly example, a shelter that probably took a lot more time and effort to build than it took to carve the bear itself, struck us as puzzling -- but welcome on a long, straight drive through a forest with no other roadside landmarks.