From the moment uniformed officers -- one with a police dog -- stood guard on the two-lane bridge over the Cannon River, this would be no ordinary summer morning in Cannon Falls.
The small town of 4,100 people with the main street bakery, the teenager selling sweet corn out of a pickup truck and the deli featuring strawberry malts welcomed President Obama on Monday.
The president's jet black bus was greeted by protests, applause and fathers holding their children over their heads for a peek. Jenae Pagel, selected from the crowd with her 5-year-old son to meet the president, said afterward that "stuff like this doesn't happen to me."
For an instant, the usual weekday routines halted. A dozen people gathered in silence around a beige Honda near the park where Obama spoke, listening intently to the president over the car radio -- a 21st century version of President Franklin Roosevelt's fireside chat.
"I thought it was terrific," said Bruce Roberts of Northfield.
Some came to Cannon Falls to remind anyone who would listen that Obama, faced with plummeting public opinion ratings and a dismal economy, offered nothing to celebrate. "I told my wife, if he's coming nearby, I'm going to go," said Paul Hyland of Woodbury, explaining why he traveled to Cannon Falls to hold a sign that read "Repeal Obamacare, Restore the Constitution."
Standing on a downtown sidewalk, Diane Logue had also had enough of the Obama mania. But she held her tongue and urged a friend to do the same. "I'm a Tea Partier, [but] I don't think you have to be ugly," Logue said.
When Republican National Committee Chair Reince Priebus spoke to a crowd behind a realty office, Larry and Betsy Senrick of Shoreview arrived with signs supporting Obama and waded into the flock of Republicans. As Larry Senrick began heckling Priebus, he was quickly drowned out by the crowd, which began chanting "USA! USA!"
