16th Annual Winterfest Medallion Hunt Rules
Find the Medallion somewhere in St Peter, and you will win $1,000 in St. Peter Chamber Bucks!
There are a few simple rules to remember when searching for the St. Peter Winter Medallion:
- The Medallion is located within the St. Peter city limits and on public property.
- Do NOT dig in the soil.
- Please respect other people’s property and DO NOT search for the Medallion on private property (never search Treaty Site History Center or adjacent properties).
- Please DO NOT climb over any fences when looking for the Medallion. The Medallion is NOT located in a restricted area.
Clues will be listed on the following websites:
If you find the Medallion, you can turn it in at the St. Peter Area Chamber of Commerce office located at 101 S. Front Street in St. Peter. If you find the Medallion outside of the normal Chamber of Commerce business hours, please call Ed at 507-766-4560 so, as a courtesy to all Medallion hunters, we can report via the Chamber Facebook Page that it has been found. An e-mail also will go immediately to the St. Peter Herald and Mankato Free Press.
Special Thank You to the St. Peter Area Tourism & Visitors Bureau for donating the St. Peter Chamber Bucks for the Medallion Hunt once again this year!
2020 Medallion Hunt Blog Entries
11:15 a.m. Sunday, February 9, 2020 — One Saint Peterite sympathetic to searchers quipped, “Today’s clue will be GPS coordinates.”
As far as we know, that won’t be the case, but clues are getting more and more specific. Right? Aren’t they?
So many theories could be derived from the left-field and fences clues alone, not to mention the historical references. Assemble the jigsaw puzzle and the picture will serve vividly as a treasure map.
Consider that the longest the hunt has ever gone is 10 clues. Clue #9 was released night, and #10 is single-digit hours away.
Last year, the second line in Clue #10, “Just look for the right stake near the edge of the bowl,” coupled with the 45 mph sign in earlier clues, might just as well have been GPS coordinates.
Thank you, hunters, for your persistence despite the deep snow!
7:44 p.m. Saturday, February 8, 2020 — Has there ever been a year like this one?
Nine clues have been released, but the Collective Searchers Community (CSC) has not pinpointed the park.
Right now, headlamps and flashlights illuminate Minnesota Square, Veterans, Ramsey, Jefferson, Gault and Gorman, but neither Stones Way nor Rotary. Oh, or McGill. The nearly full moon has those beaming like noon, though.
If I were you, déjà vu would be a clue to re-pursue, albeit true, many not few are the parks with a crew or two.
You know when you are fishing, and you are catching several, and another boat nudges in on your action, and pretty soon there are, like, 10 boats by yours? That’s not so much the case with this year’s hunt. But past years, oh brother, past years.
Remember the mobs at Jefferson in 2019 and 2017, and the masses of humanity as the idol was found at the Gault stormwater detention basin and Minnesota Square? Or, all the headlights (on foreheads and vehicles) at Warren both years?
This year, the searchers, albeit scattered like pepper on a plate of parks, seem confident they are in the right place. They seem persistent in staking their claims in hopes of claiming high stakes fruits of their labor.
Many will come away saying they were oh so close. AGAIN. And that, friends, reflects “a tedious feeling of having already experienced the present situation,” which defines, wait for it … déjà vu.
9:31 a.m. Thursday, February 7, 2020 — Sadly, searchers are less than sharing with their theories when asked nicely by the writer of this blog.
Now we know what Walt of Walt’s Hook, Line and Sinker must feel like.
I mean, I am super careful with secrets and theories, just like Walt is when folks ask where the fish are biting and in his memory are thousands of stories told to him by successful anglers about places, favorite baits, time of year, time of day, immediate weather, predicted weather, storm fronts, high pressure, low pressure, water temperature, thermoclines, technology, gps specifically, and every lure of every color, texture, size, action and buzz.
I mean, no floppy-hatted wannabe fisherman dad with a 10-year-old kid in a Twins cap asking Walt, “Are the fish biting” would even want to hear an answer about how to make a watch when asking what time it is. Right? A simple “Yes, the fish are biting” will do.
So, when the 2019 medallion finder says the square park is not on the top of her list (as of Clue #3, anyway), or a hunter who has been within inches of the idol when it has been found during at least three hunts reveals the square park’s address is 1000 Minnesota Avenue, or the finder in Mill Pond Park the second time says the magic spot was covered in dig marks when he got there but found the idol there anyway, the writer of this blog would be careful to not give away too much of that stuff.
I mean, who do you think I am? C.J. the gossip columnist. Sheeesh.
After all, no one would tell the blog writer or Walt anything if they weren’t as wily as foxes and guarded with information. Staying in fair territory, not fowl in this community of allowed chicken coops, is paramount pretty much.
Ever see the scene in Princess Bride where the guy who says “inconceivable” throws down a match-of-wits challenge? This blog is not at all like that.
This blog exists (not exits) to decode and indeed expose the tendencies of the Medallion Rapscallion, who hides the idol and writes the clues.
9:01 a.m. Thursday, February 7, 2020 — Two truths and a lie: The Rapscallion takes great joy in misleading searchers; the Medallion has been hidden high/out-of-reach in trees; Snowflakes falling in massive abundance from the sky fills the Rapscallion’s heart with glee.
The mistruth lies in the clause about trees. The medallion is never out of reach.
AND, the Rapscallion insists the clues are telling to where the Medallion is hidden. BUT, the Rapscallion giggles at searchers entangled in synonyms, dual interpretations and double entendres.
Snowfall, well, the Rapscallion seems mixed. Can a clue be written late in the game to place searchers virtually on top of the idol? If not, snowfall is stressfall.
3:30 p.m. Thursday, February 6, 2020 — Here, for a change, are two definitive answers to two questions:
The medallion is hidden somewhere outdoors (NOT indoors).
The medallion is NOT hidden at the dog park on the Le Sueur County side of the Minnesota River.
Thanks for your queries, everyone!
It’s fun to keep an eye on other medallion hunts. Mankato’s idol turned up in Sibley Park, and St. Paul’s was embedded in a doll’s head near #13 at Highland Park Disc Golf Course. The “bonus” hint released 10:30ish today for Waseca’s was so specific we’d be surprised if that prize hasn’t been swooped up by now.
It was thrilling last night to learn Coolercrew.com pays attention to the St. Peter medallion hunt. The group is based in St. Paul and lives and breathes the St. Paul medallion extravaganza.
But what’s up in St. Peter? Here we are, on the verge of releasing Clue #7, and there’s no clear picture of which park the sought-after rectangle hunk of plastic might occupy. There are theories. We’ve heard from several hunters. Grand could refer to an address, for instance.
Clue #5 harbored “déjà vu” and when this hunt is all said and done, mark these words, the Rapscallion will spell out its important meaning. Call it spider sense or Sherlock instincts.
What signals, signs or otherwise entities of this physical world would encourage folks to slow down?
Last year, Clue #7 alluded to a circular path around a Jefferson Park stormwater basin. It was a key clue.
Will tonight’s Clue #7 be telling? Only time will tell, and the telling will be here soon — at 6:01 p.m.
9:27 a.m. Monday, Jan. 30, 2017 — We did some figuring to learn the Medallion has been hidden twice in Gault, Stone’s Way, McGill, Warren and Mill Pond. It has been hidden once in Veterans and Minnesota Square.
February 5, 12:22 p.m. — You read that right: It’s a Medallion hunt blog post from 2017.
Just to update that important database, the Medallion has also been hidden three times in Jefferson Park.
February 5, 9:01 a.m. — “So exiting and new” was a phrase in last night’s clue.
The question was, did the Rapscallion intend to instead say “exciting”?
It’s so hard to know the answer.
Remember last year, when one of the words showed up as Clueses, and hunters thought the Rapscallion committed a typo, but later learned Clueses is the birthplace of Joseph Nicollet, for whom Nicollet Avenue is named, and runs alongside Jefferson Park, where the Medallion was buried in the snow?
You get the point. It’s impossible to interpret beyond a reasonable doubt what’s rattling around in the complicated, tangled brain of the Rapscallion. Did he mean “mean” in Clue #1, or was it a math or not-nice denotation? What to make of “exiting”, perhaps a park exit place, is anyone’s geuss. Even the great tangled brain Dr. Seuss, a renowned buster of rhymes, would agree the Rapscallion plays with our minds.
February 4, 9:30 a.m. — Do you have favorite clue words so far?
Wow, we have collected solid theories from hunters. Clue #4 was released yesterday.
Clue #5 could be very telling. Remember that last year’s Clue #5 included the number “45”, which turned out to be the speed limit sign along Nicollet Avenue and Jefferson Park. The medallion was found very close to the 45 sign on Day 10 of the hunt.
It stands to figure that far less snow, and much friendlier temperatures, favor the hunters over the hider in 2020.
We anxiously await your telephone call to tell us you have found the coveted rectangle piece.
February 4, 9:21 a.m. — “Is the missed “s” on the word “mean” a typo or part of the clue?”
That question came to us from a happy hunter a few days ago.
The answer: Well, if you know the Rapscallion, which you by now no doubt do, your right eyebrow darted up your forehead while your left eyebrow didn’t move. Find the Medallion, and then, and only then, will the Rapscallion reveal whether “mean” is a typo, legit clue or red herring.
We will say that grammatically, the Rapscallion’s skills are tight. The Rapscallion is obviously a word smith, and with every day busting a rhyme that’s right on time (6:01 p.m.), which is tricky, we could refer to that person as Rappa-Rappscal.
Rappers wear medallions. Rappa-Rappscal hides them.
January 31, 12:11 p.m. — When we refer to the Rapscallion, we are referring to the hider(s) of the medallion!
Leave it to a historian to find the Winterfest Medallion under 9 inches of new snow.
David Briese of Saint Peter was clearing a path from the park's north entrance south to the ball diamond fence when he hit something hard with his metal shovel.
“I knew it wasn’t ice. I picked it up, saw what it was and started screaming to my girls that I found it,” said Briese, who was with daughters Rainn and Helen.
That was the scene at 3:30 p.m. in Ramsey Park on Sunday, February 9. The dad and daughters were the park’s only hunters.
Clue #10 in the 16th Annual Winterfest Medallion Hunt was scheduled to be released at 6:01 p.m. Sunday, but the find ended the search.
Briese had searched for an hour on Sunday, following a clue that the idol was hidden beyond a fence and near left field.
He had been searching an hour every day, only in the park named after a former governor of the territory and state, because as early as Clue #3 the first letters in the lines started to spell R-A-M-S-E-Y, he said.
One of the clue words was “mean”. Briese, who holds degrees in Anthropology, Ethnic Studies and American Indian Studies, commented, “I know Alexander Ramsey was not known as a nice man.”
The 12-year resident of Saint Peter, who serves as site manager at Jeffers Petroglyphs with the Minnesota Historical Society, has searched each of the past three years for the Medallion. Clues about history are always sprinkled in.
“I think it helps to know history with this,” Briese said. “The clues always have something with the past.”
Briese grew up in Mankato and earned his history degrees at Minnesota State University – Mankato.
The Medallion nets him a $1,000 prize in Chamber Bucks. Briese doesn’t know yet how he is going to spend the loot, other than to give each of his three girls $100. His wife Dana and daughter Estella, who is the twin sister of Helen, stayed home instead of joining the search on Sunday.
David chucked when saying Dana did all the shoveling of the snow that fell overnight Saturday to Sunday.
“But I did the laundry and meals,” Briese laughed. “So at least I was doing chores.”
The prize of Chamber Bucks can be spent with any of the 240 Chamber member businesses.
Briese wore only a sweater – no coat -- on the 20-degree sunny day, while his girls bundled up in parkas.
“It’s so nice out today,” he said. “That’s why we’re here.”
The longest the hunt has ever gone is 10 clues, and while this year’s hunt was just a few hours short of that, Briese was unaware. He said he was happy to find the Medallion but not overly surprised, because he knew it was in the park on the ground extending from the fence line.
The shovel-wide path he was digging from the park’s north entrance south toward the ball field dugout confirmed his strategy.
On Saturday around 6:30 p.m., a vehicle with four hunters roared into Ramsey Park and searched close to where Briese was searching. A nearly full moon offered illumination, but not enough to find the plastic rectangle idol.
Searchers on Saturday after Clue #9 was released combed Minnesota Square Park, Veterans, Gorman, Gault, Jefferson and Ramsey. No one with flashlights occupied McGill, Stones Way or Rotary.
True meanings of the clues will be released soon. Clues are posted on the Saint Peter Chamber’s Medallion Hunt web page at https://www.stpeterchamber.com/event/medallion-clues/. The Saint Peter Chamber of Commerce is the official Medallion Hunt organizer and appreciates the Saint Peter Herald posting clues every night and spreading the word about the find. The Medallion Hunt has been sponsored every year by the Saint Peter Tourism and Visitors Bureau.
Medallion hunt organizers worried melting snow during the weekend of February 1 and 2, with temperatures in the 40s, would expose the sought-after black post-card-sized treasure. A very thin blanket of snow covered Saint Peter’s 19 parks during the week and temperatures stayed below freezing.
Photo: David Briese poses with the 2020 Winterfest Medallion and daughters Rainn and Helen in Ramsey after finding the idol at 3:30 p.m.
Photo: David Briese shows the path he was digging from Ramsey Park’s north entrance south to the fence of the ball diamond.
