Ralph Malmberg, the former longtime owner of the Marine General Store in Marine on St. Croix, never set out to be famous.
But one of Malmberg’s frequent customers was radio broadcaster Garrison Keillor, who lived in Marine on St. Croix from 1977 to 1980. Malmberg was often mentioned in Keillor’s “News from Lake Wobegon” monologues on his weekly radio show, “A Prairie Home Companion.”
Ralph Malmberg outside the Marine General Store in Marine on St. Croix. Malmberg died Aug. 6, 2024, of complications related to Alzheimer’s disease at Croixdale in Bayport. He was 90. (Courtesy of Jennifer Malmberg Henry)
Malmberg died Aug. 6 of complications related to Alzheimer’s disease at Croixdale in Bayport. He was 90.
“The name ‘Ralph’s Pretty Good Grocery’ I stole from my landlady, Judy Wilcox, who was a good friend of Ralph and Marian Malmberg,” Keillor said Monday. “She also gave me the motto ‘If you can’t find it at Ralph’s, you can probably get along without it.’ That was her joke. Neither one was mine. I simply used them for 50 years.”
Keillor said he last mentioned “Ralph’s Pretty Good Grocery” and the slogan during a show on Friday night in Concord, N.H. “And it got the same reliable laugh. Not a guffaw, but a healthy laugh of recognition. I deserve no credit for it; Judy Wilcox gets that.”
Malmberg, who owned the store from 1961 to 1982, was an “amazing and interesting character for being, you know, a quiet Swede,” Keillor said. “That store was the heart of Marine on St. Croix.”
Malmberg, of Marine on St. Croix, never knew when the store would get a cameo on the radio show. Keillor once told a story about the store’s new “foot vibrator.”
“I had all my compressors in the basement, and it got very hot there in the summertime, so I installed a big circulating exhaust fan, and I hung it on the rafters near the produce counter,” Malmberg told a Swedish TV program in 2011. “When I ran that fan, it vibrated the floor quite a bit. Garrison walked in, and he was pacing back and forth and standing in front of that produce counter. I didn’t really think about it. The next day, he remarked on the air about the new foot vibrator that Ralph had installed, and that the people should come there after working hard and get their feet massaged.”
‘Wanted to work for himself’
An undated photo of the Marine General Store when it was owned by Ralph Malmberg. It was built in 1870 as a company store for a lumber company. (Courtesy of Marine General Store)
The white clapboard store, built in 1870 as a company store for a lumber company, is a landmark in northern Washington County, known as much for its original wood floor and counter as for its in-house deli and bakery.
Malmberg discovered that the store – then owned by the Strand family – was for sale during a sales call to the store in 1961, said Andrew Malmberg, Malmberg’s son.
Ralph Malmberg was selling trading stamps for Business Incentives at the time, “but he was looking for a business to buy because he wanted to work for himself,” Malmberg said. “He wanted to get out of Minneapolis. He wanted to try living in a small town, and the store came up and that’s kind of all she wrote.”
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Malmberg grew up in Minneapolis and graduated from North High School. He studied mortuary science at the University of Minnesota, but later graduated with an associate degree in business from the U, said Jennifer Malmberg Henry, Malmberg’s daughter.
He met Marian Wicker, who was studying education at the U, through mutual friends from North Minneapolis, Jennifer Henry said. The couple married in 1959 at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Minneapolis. They had three children.
Malmberg, who became the town’s butcher after he purchased the store, was especially proud of the store’s meat department. When he bought the store, there was still a chicken coop in the back – where the Nita Mae’s Scoop ice cream shop is now located, Jennifer Henry said.
Other endeavors
Malmberg expanded into other businesses as well. An avid cross-country skier, he opened a ski shop above the Marine General Store, where he sold skis and his own brand of Malmberg 3-pin bindings and a wax scraper he had invented, Andrew Malmberg said.
Ralph Malmberg inside the Marine General Store, which he formerly owned, in Marine on St. Croix in 2009. Malmberg died Aug. 6 at the age of 90. (Courtesy of Andy Kramer)
“He loved skiing,” he said. “He liked to compete. He was in a lot of ski races, and he liked to be outside.”
Malmberg was the founder of the Marine O’Brien Ski Race, a race from the Marine Elementary School to William O’Brien State Park. The race celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2022. The race, a fundraiser for the St. Croix Valley Ski Club youth-skiing program, includes 12.5 km and 25 km classic and skate races and a 6 km wood ski race.
Ralph and Marian Malmberg also ran an airline crew specialty store and founded the Marine Messenger, the predecessor of the Country Messenger. The free weekly newspaper, which started as a grocery store broadsheet, was published in the basement of the store.
“It had sale information, special information, they called it ‘gossip,’” Jennifer Henry said. “They expanded into local events, anniversaries, graduations, church events, news about the fire department, you name it. She wrote it by hand and then printed it out or used a typewriter and cut it out. She would literally use glue sticks to put it all together. She would stay up until 3 o’clock in the morning doing it.”
The Malmbergs “weren’t afraid to start new things,” said Gwen Roden, the store’s longtime manager. “He had an Episcopal church in the office area upstairs for a time as well. When the church left, he rented skis and the first VHS videos.”
When Ralph Malmberg would get an idea, “he would just march forward with it,” Henry said. “Because his personality was so palatable to everyone, he could just get people to help him make things happen. He could really get people to rally. He was quiet, but very friendly.”
Employed local youth
The Marine General Store was the first employer for many of the youth in Marine, Roden said. “He was fair, and he was funny,” she said. “He had a great sense of humor. He employed every kid who grew up in Marine and taught us how to work.”
“For scores of young people, it was where they learned good manners, how to deal with customers, reliability, cleanliness, the list goes on,” Keillor said. “It was like Junior Achievement. It was a forum for young entrepreneurs, and they went on to other things.”
Henry said her father had high expectations of his employees. “They learned so much from him,” she said. “He let them do a lot. He was willing to give them a lot of responsibility and trusted them.”
In 1982, Malmberg sold the store to Dan and Sue Pruden, who had worked in the grocery business in Forest Lake.
Andy and Karen Kramer, who owned the store from 2005 to 2015, said Malmberg loved sharing stories about his time at the store. “He said Garrison came in one day and was looking around and said, ‘Ralph, I don’t suppose you have any capers, do you?’ And Ralph looks at him and says, ‘What’s a caper?’” Andy Kramer said.
“When Ralph was telling us that story, I told him, ‘Well we have capers in the store now!’ and I showed him where they were,” she said. “He chuckled and thought that was kind of amazing.”
Lake Wobegon character
In the 2011 interview with the Swedish TV station, Malmberg said he could often picture himself in Keillor’s on-air stories.
“I think when he’s talking about the Lake Wobegon story and the character he’s talking about, I think people kind of fit themselves into that and dream along,” he said. “I know I do when I listen to him.”
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Malmberg loved Keillor and listened to the show religiously, Andy Malmberg said. As for being a featured part of the show, “he kind of ate it up, but he was a real humble guy,” he said. “He didn’t make a big deal of it. Mr. Keillor would come in and he would talk to him. He was just a regular friend of his.”
Malmberg was preceded death by his wife, Marian, and daughter Elizabeth. In addition to his son and daughter, he is survived by two grandchildren and a great-grandson.
Malmberg’s funeral service will be at 11 a.m. Friday at Ascension Episcopal Church in Stillwater, with visitation one hour prior.
Bradshaw Funeral Home in Stillwater is handling arrangements.
