As is typically the case, the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand is offering a diverse lineup of entertainment that includes country (Old Dominion, Hank Williams Jr.), pop (Meghan Trainor, a Taylor Swift tribute), classic rockers (Def Leppard, Daryl Hall) and not one, but two hip hop acts (Nelly, Atmosphere).

In recent years, the likes of the Jonas Brothers, Blake Shelton and Motley Crue had top ticket prices of more than $200. This year, only one does, but it’s a record-breaking $292 for Def Leppard.

Tickets are available through Etix, by phone at 800-514-3849 and in person at the State Fairgrounds Ticket Office. All concerts start at 7 p.m. unless otherwise noted.

Here’s a look at what’s on tap.

Old Dominion

Matthew Ramsey and Brad Tursi of Old Dominion perform in Nashville in 2023. Old Dominion will play the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand on Aug. 21. (Jason Kempin / Getty Images)

Aug. 21: Lead singer Matthew Ramsey and drummer Whit Sellers met as teenagers when they played on rival drumlines at two Virginia high schools. While attending James Madison University in Virginia, Sellers met bassist Geoff Sprung and guitarist Brad Tursi, while Ramsey met guitarist Trevor Rosen after moving to Nashville. The fivesome went on to form Old Dominion in 2007.

Old Dominion’s early singles “Shut Me Up” and “Break Up with Him” earned some airplay as well as the attention of RCA Nashville, which signed the band in 2015. That year, they opened for Kenny Chesney and hit it off, becoming semi-frequent tourmates. (Locally, Old Dominion has warmed the stage for Chesney three times, most recently in August 2022.)

In the years since, Old Dominion has maintained a steady presence on country radio with a string of hits that include “Snapback,” “Written in the Sand,” “One Man Band,” “I Was on a Boat That Day” and “Memory Lane.” They headlined the Grandstand in 2018 and made their local arena debut in September 2023 at St. Paul’s Xcel Energy Center. Local band Yam Haus opens. $149.25-$67.

Meghan Trainor

Pop star Meghan Trainor will headline the Grandstand at the Minnesota State Fair in Falcon Heights on Aug. 22, 2025. (Courtesy of the Minnesota State Fair)

Aug. 22: Pop star Meghan Trainor is finally hitting the State Fair after a vocal hemorrhage forced her to cancel her Grandstand show in 2015. That was a year after Trainor released her massive debut single “All About That Bass,” which hit No. 1 in 58 countries and earned a pair of Grammy nominations.

The Massachusetts native began singing in her church at the age of 6 and started writing songs and playing with the band Island Fusion as a teen. She also self-released three albums of original songs while in high school and turned down a full scholarship to the Berklee College of Music to pursue a songwriting career.

After spending time in Nashville writing for the likes of Rascal Flatts and Sabrina Carpenter, Trainor landed a deal with Epic Records. “All About That Bass” led the way for a string of mid-’10s hits, including “Lips Are Movin,” “Dear Future Husband,” “Like I’m Gonna Lose You,” “No” and “Me Too.” She won a best new artist Grammy in 2016.

In the time since, Trainor has continued to record while carving out a second career in reality television on “The Voice,” “The Four: Battle for Stardom,” “The Voice UK” and “Australian Idol.” Last year, she embarked on her first tour in eight years and sold nearly 260,000 tickets. $125.75-$56.

Atmosphere

Minneapolis hip hop duo Atmosphere will headline the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand in Falcon Heights on Aug. 23, 2025. (Courtesy of Samantha Martucci)

Aug. 23: Minneapolis hip hop duo Atmosphere heads up a packed bill that also includes Cypress Hill, Lupe Fiasco, the Pharcyde and DJ Abilities.

Rapper Sean “Slug” Daley and DJ/producer Anthony “Ant” Davis released their debut album “Overcast!” in 1997 on Rhymesayers, a record label they founded with Musab Saad and Brent Sayers. The pair broke through to a larger audience with 2002’s “God Loves Ugly,” which was later named as one of the 30 best underground hip hop albums of the 21st century by HipHopDX.

In the years since, Atmosphere has continued to regularly release new music, including their upcoming album “Jestures.” Over the past year, Ant has issued four instrumental albums dubbed “Collection of Sounds.”

Beyond the music, Atmosphere is best known for their live shows. They’ve toured heavily since the beginning and started playing with a live band in the early ’00s. From 2008 to 2019, the duo headed up the Soundset Music Festival, which drew fans from around the world to the Metrodome parking lot and, in its later years, the Minnesota State Fair. 5 p.m.; $85.25-$51.50.

Melissa Etheridge and Indigo Girls

Melissa Etheridge, shown, will perform with the Indigo Girls at the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand on Sunday, Aug. 24, 2025, as part of the Grandstand Concert Series. (Courtesy of the Minnesota State Fair)

Aug. 24: Singer/songwriter/guitarist Melissa Etheridge first turned heads with her 1988 debut single “Bring Me Some Water,” which hit No. 10 on Billboard’s mainstream rock chart. Her first three albums earned warm reviews and helped build a cult following for the Kansas native.

But it was Etheridge’s fourth album, 1993’s “Yes I Am,” that broke her into the mainstream, thanks to the songs “I’m the Only One” and “Come to My Window,” which continue to be played on radio and used in television and movies to this day. While she never has replicated that success, she has continued to tour and release new music, while winning a pair of Grammys out of 15 nominations and a best original song Oscar for “I Need to Wake Up” from the 2007 documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.”

The Indigo Girls, shown, will perform with Melissa Etheridge at the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand on Sunday, Aug. 24, 2025, as part of the Grandstand Concert Series. (Courtesy of the Minnesota State Fair)

Childhood friends Amy Ray and Emily Saliers began performing together as high school students in Georgia and adopted the Indigo Girls name while they were students at Emory University. The pair’s 1987 debut album “Strange Fire” led to a deal with Epic Records, which released their self-titled 1989 album, which stands as their best-selling record to date. Saliers wrote the lead single “Closer to Fine,” which reached a new generation of listeners when it was used prominently in the “Barbie” movie.

The two acts are swapping spots each night and have made guest appearances during each other’s shows. They both also have new documentaries, with the two-part “Melissa Etheridge: I’m Not Broken” streaming on Paramount+ and “Indigo Girls: It’s Only Life After All” available on Netflix. $123.75-$56.

Happy Together Tour

Mark Volman, left, and Howard Kaylan of the Turtles made an annual tradition of bringing the Happy Together Tour to the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand from 2011 to 2016. Kaylan is retired, but the tour has continued.

Aug. 25: A half-dozen ’60s pop acts will perform in this package tour that debuted at the State Fair in 2011 and was a Grandstand staple for much of that decade. It returned in 2023 and drew a crowd of 6,718. Severe thunderstorms led to its cancellation last year.

The tour touts its artists as achieving “an incredible 55 Billboard Top 40 smashes.”

The lineup includes the Turtles (“You Showed Me,” “Happy Together”), Jay and the Americans (“Only in America,” “Come a Little Bit Closer”), Little Anthony (“Tears on My Pillow,” “Shimmy, Shimmy Ko-Ko Bop”), Gary Puckett and the Union Gap (“Young Girl,” “Over You”), the Vogues (“Five O’Clock World,” “You’re the One”) and the Cowsills (“Hair,” “Indian Lake”). $76.75-$33.

Def Leppard

Rick Savage and Def Leppard will play the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand on Aug. 26. (Paras Griffin / Getty Images)

Aug. 26: Multi-platinum ’80s rockers Def Leppard return to the Grandstand for the sixth time.

Formed in England in 1977, Def Leppard went on to become one of the biggest acts of the ’80s with a long list of smashes that include “Photograph,” “Rock of Ages,” “Animal,” “Pour Some Sugar on Me,” “Hysteria,” “Armageddon It,” “Love Bites” and “Rocket.”

The band’s hits dried up by the end of the ’90s, but they’ve continued to record new music while touring heavily, often on dual bills with the likes of Journey and Motley Crue. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2019.

In 2022, the group released their 12th album, “Diamond Star Halos.” More recently, they issued the stand-alone singles “Just Like 73” (featuring a guest guitar solo by Tom Morello) and a cover of Ben E. King’s classic “Stand by Me” (with all proceeds going to FireAid, which raises money for those affected by the fires in Los Angeles). $292-$77.

Hank Williams Jr.

Hank Williams Jr. will headline the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand in Falcon Heights on Aug. 27, 2025, with support from Marty Stuart. (Courtesy of the Minnesota State Fair)

Aug. 27: The son of country legend Hank Williams, Hank Williams Jr. began performing at an early age. He made his first television appearance in 1963 at the age of 14, singing several of his dad’s songs on “The Ed Sullivan Show.” Williams was highly influenced by his father’s friends, including Merle Haggard, Johnny Cash, Fats Domino, Earl Scruggs, Lightnin’ Hopkins and Jerry Lee Lewis.

Williams released his debut album, “Hank Williams Jr. Sings the Songs of Hank Williams,” in 1964, when he was 15. He continued to sing covers until the mid-’70s when he began carving out his own sound in Southern rock and outlaw country. His landmark 1975 release “Hank Williams Jr. and Friends” saw him drawing influence from Waylon Jennings, Toy Caldwell and Charlie Daniels.

Among the more than 100 singles he’s issued over the decades, “Family Tradition,” “Whiskey Bent and Hell Bound,” “All My Rowdy Friends (Have Settled Down),” “All My Rowdy Friends Are Coming Over Tonight,” and “Born to Boogie” stand among his biggest hits.

Williams first played the Grandstand in 1968 on a bill with Marty Robbins, Sonny James and Connie Smith. He returned as a headliner in 1983 with Aaron Tippin.

Marty Stuart and His Fabulous Superlatives are also on the bill. $125.75-$56.

Daryl Hall

Daryl Hall of Hall & Oates will play the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand on Aug. 28. (Mickey Bernal / Getty Images)

Aug. 28: The 78-year-old Rock and Roll Hall of Famer was a late addition to the Grandstand lineup. He replaces the Steve Miller Band, who canceled their entire upcoming tour last month, citing climate change as the reason.

Daryl Hall and John Oates met in Philadelphia in 1967 when they were each leading their own bands. They struck up a friendship and, in 1970, began performing together. Their early albums didn’t produce any serious hits, although locally, KQRS put tracks from their 1973 sophomore record, “Abandoned Luncheonette,” into rotation, one of several regional stations to give Hall and Oates their first significant airplay.

In 1976, the pair scored their first success with “Sara Smile,” which paved the way for “She’s Gone,” “Rich Girl,” “Kiss on My List,” “Private Eyes,” “I Can’t Go for That (No Can Do),” “Maneater,” “One on One,” “Say it Isn’t So,” “Out of Touch” and “Everything Your Heart Desires.” In total, they landed 34 songs on the Billboard Hot 100 and earned seven platinum and six gold albums.

In November 2023, Hall filed a lawsuit to prevent Oates from selling the pair’s publishing rights. Oates later told Rolling Stone the duo would not perform together again, which Hall confirmed in an interview with Variety. Earlier this week, news broke that the pair have resolved the dispute through arbitration.

The Rascals (“Groovin’,” “Good Lovin’,” “People Got to Be Free”) open. $100.25-$44.

The Avett Brothers

Scott Avett, left, and Seth Avett of The Avett Brothers will headline the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand on Aug. 29. (Amy Harris / Invision / AP)

Aug. 29: Founded by North Carolina siblings Scott and Seth Avett, folk rock band the Avett Brothers spent the 2000s recording for an indie label and building a following through heavy touring. They eventually attracted the attention of mega producer Rick Rubin, who signed them to his American Recordings label in 2008. The Avetts have since recorded six acclaimed albums with Rubin, including last year’s self-titled effort, the band’s 11th overall.

The group previously played the Basilica Block Party in 2010 and 2012 as well at the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand in 2015 and Target Center the following year. Their most recent local concert was with Trampled by Turtles at St. Paul’s Xcel Energy Center in October.

The Milk Carton Kids open. $121.75-$54.

Nelly

Aug. 30: Fresh from playing a post-Twins game concert last month at Target Field, ’00s hitmaker Nelly will return to the Twin Cities atop a bill that also includes Ja Rule, Mya and Ying Yang Twins.

St. Louis native Cornell Iral Haynes Jr. adopted the stage name Nelly and made a huge splash with his 2000 debut album, “Country Grammar.” It topped 10 million in sales and spawned hits in the title track, “E.I.” and “Ride wit Me.”

Nelly released his signature song, “Hot in Herre,” in 2002 and returned to the charts with “Dilemma,” “Shake Ya Tailfeather,” “Over and Over” and “Grillz.”

“Just a Dream,” from 2010, turned out to be his last major solo single, but Nelly got a career boost in 2013 when he was a guest on the Florida Georgia Line smash “Cruise.” Soon after, he hit the road opening for the country duo. His most recent album, 2021’s “Heartland,” included collaborations with Florida Georgia Line, Darius Rucker, Jimmie Allen and Kane Brown.

Over the past decade, Nelly has played Target Field (with Florida Georgia Line), the Myth, Treasure Island Casino, Twin Cities Summer Jam and, last year, Xcel Energy Center as the opening act for Janet Jackson. $121.75-$54.

The Rock and Roll Playhouse Plays Music of Taylor Swift

The Rock and Roll Playhouse Plays Music of Taylor Swift and More for Kids featuring Bri and the Anti-Heroes will play two shows at the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand in Falcon Heights on Sept. 1, 2025. (Courtesy of the Minnesota State Fair)

Sept. 1: The Rock and Roll Playhouse, which bills itself as “the largest national kid-friendly live concert series,” will play the music of Taylor Swift during two shows on Labor Day.

The New York-based company presents live concerts aimed at families with children ages 10 and under. The interactive shows include games, movement and “an opportunity to rock out in an effort to educate children and encourage them to explore their creativity.” It has hosted more than 1,000 concerts for hundreds of thousands of kids and families across the country, “filling the void for shared musical experiences between parents and children.”

The concert will also feature Bri and the Anti-Heroes, a band of six friends who came together in the spring of 2023 to pay tribute to Taylor Swift. Led by vocalist and North Dakota native Brianna Helbling, the group has sold out every show they’ve played, including First Avenue. 11 a.m. and 3 p.m.; $19.25-$10.

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Any trip to the dark night skies of our Southern California deserts reveals a vista full of wonder and mystery — riddles that astrophysicists like myself spend our days unraveling.

I am fortunate to study how the first galaxies formed and evolved over the vast span of 13 billion years into the beautiful structures that fill those skies. NASA’s crown jewel, the James Webb Space Telescope, has delivered measurements of early galaxies so puzzling that, more than three years after its launch, we are still struggling to understand them.

My work on ancient galaxies may seem to have no relevance to the enormous challenges that confront our nation every day. But if we look back over the last 80 years, ever since World War II turned America into the epicenter of global science, curiosity-driven investigation — in astronomy, quantum materials, evolutionary biology and more — has been a pillar of American progress.

But science in America is now under dire threat. President Donald Trump’s administration is laying waste to both national laboratories and federal support for academic science.

Scientific staff is being sharply reduced from the National Park Service to the National Science Foundation and everywhere in between. Looking at the president’s science funding proposals across many agencies, the 2026 fiscal year budget calls for a 34% cut to basic research. The plan slashes NASA’s budget to the lowest amount since human space flight began more than 60 years ago, canceling or defunding dozens and dozens of NASA missions. Already, the NSF has halved support for the most promising American graduate students.

Scientists are speaking up against this destruction, of course. There are strong practical reasons to back science: It is a powerful engine for economic growth, and it is essential for understanding and mitigating the dangers of the natural world — whether they be the Los Angeles wildfires (which my family fled in January) or the tragic floods in Texas last month.

As important as these pragmatic arguments are, their focus on quantifiable, short-term benefits undervalues the true worth of the scientific enterprise. Occasionally, curiosity-driven inquiry — basic science — rapidly enables new technology, but more often its first impact is the wonder we experience at novel measurements, whether contemplating ripples in space-time generated by colliding black holes, underwater ecosystems that draw energy from geothermal vents rather than the sun, or the relic microwave radiation of the Big Bang.

The practical impacts that follow are unpredictable; if the goal is to explore the unknown, then the benefits are also unknown. (Let us not forget that even Columbus was sorely mistaken about what his journey would uncover.) Only through hard work to understand and unpack new discoveries do their full benefits become clear, and that can take decades, as with how Einstein’s theory of relativity (published from 1905 to 1915) eventually enabled GPS technology.

Government support is essential in this process. Although Hollywood often portrays scientific discovery as the work of lone geniuses, far more often it is an incremental process, inching ahead through insights from disparate research groups leveraging cutting-edge infrastructure (such as Arctic research facilities and orbiting telescopes), which can only be built through the focused resources of government investment. Every American taxpayer has helped enable innumerable scientific advancements because they are largely due to our nation’s investments in the public goods of people and facilities.

Of course, these advances have cost money, and we must always ask how best to balance the long-term benefits of science against our country’s other urgent needs. (The enormously popular James Webb Space Telescope, for example, was massively over budget, which led to budget-estimation reforms at NASA.) In 2024, the total science budget, outside of medical research (and its obvious practical benefits), was about $28 billion.

This is a large number, but it is still just over one-half of 1% of all spending outside of Social Security and Medicare: For every $1,000 in spending, about $6 — one tall Starbucks Caffè Mocha or Big Mac in California — supports fundamental scientific inquiry.

Yet the current administration has chosen to hack away at budgets rather than do the hard work of self-examination and improvement. American science, and especially the emerging generation of young scientists, will not survive these cuts. If implemented, the administration’s framework will choke off new technologies before they are only half an idea, leave fundamental questions about the universe unanswered and chase a generation of scientists to other countries.

By any measure, American science is the envy of the world, and we now face a choice: to remain at the vanguard of scientific inquiry through sound investment, or to cede our leadership and watch others answer the big questions that have confounded humanity for millennia — and reap the rewards and prestige. Only one of those options will make the future America great.

Steven R. Furlanetto is a professor of physics and astronomy at UCLA. He wrote this column for the Los Angeles Times.

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Before Poland’s illiberal Law and Justice party came to power in 2015, the country had been deep in a reckoning over its role in the Holocaust. In 2000, historian Jan Gross published an explosive book, “Neighbors,” about a 1941 massacre in the Nazi-occupied Polish town of Jedwabne, where Poles enthusiastically tortured and murdered up to 1,600 Jews. The book punctured a national myth in which Poles were only either heroes or victims in World War II.

After “Neighbors” came out, Poland’s president, Aleksander Kwasniewski, went to Jedwabne for a ceremony broadcast on Polish television. “For this crime, we should beg the souls of the dead and their families for forgiveness,” he said.

The notion of Polish historical guilt made many conservative Poles furious. The Law and Justice party capitalized on their anger, running against what its leader called the “pedagogy of shame.” After the party’s 2015 victory, one of its first targets was the Museum of the Second World War, then being built in Gdansk.

The museum was supposed to explore the war’s global context and to emphasize the toll it took on civilians. Among its collection were keys to the homes of Jews murdered in Jedwabne. Before it ever opened, Law and Justice wanted to shut it down for being insufficiently patriotic.

Today in America, this history has an eerie familiarity. Five years ago, many institutions in the United States tried, with varying degrees of seriousness and skill, to come to terms with our country’s legacy of racism. A backlash to this reckoning helped propel Donald Trump back into the White House, where he has taken a whole-of-government approach to wiping out the idea that America has anything to apologize for. As part of this campaign, the administration seeks to force our national museums to conform to its triumphalist version of history.

In March, Trump signed an executive order, “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” criticizing versions of history that foster “a sense of national shame.” Museums and monuments, it said, should celebrate America’s “extraordinary heritage” and inculcate national pride. This past week, the administration announced that it was reviewing displays at eight national museums — including the Museum of American History, the National Museum of African American History and Culture and the Smithsonian American Art Museum — and giving them 120 days to bring their content in line with Trump’s vision.

We’re already seeing glimpses of what that looks like. Last month, the National Museum of American History removed references to Trump’s impeachments from an exhibit on the American presidency. Those references were restored this month, but with changes: The exhibit no longer says that Trump made “false statements” about the 2020 election or that he encouraged the mob on Jan. 6.

Amy Sherald, the artist who painted Michelle Obama’s official portrait, canceled an upcoming solo show at the National Portrait Gallery after being told the museum was considering removing her painting of a transgender Statue of Liberty to avoid angering Trump.

The National Portrait Gallery denied this, but the Trump administration declared victory. “The Statue of Liberty is not an abstract canvas for political expression — it is a revered and solemn symbol of freedom, inspiration and national unity that defines the American spirit,” said Lindsey Halligan, a Trump lawyer who is now in charge of getting museums to reflect the administration’s ideology. What Trump and his allies seem to want from our museums is self-glorifying kitsch, the aesthetic lingua franca of all authoritarians.

For Pawel Machcewicz, founding director of the Museum of the Second World War, it’s been unsettling to see American museums subject to the sort of political intimidation he experienced in Poland. “I believed that American democracy had somehow stronger rules,” he told me by phone this past week. “It’s older than Polish democracy. I thought the autonomy of research, the autonomy of museums, would be something sacred in the U.S. It turns out that it can also be subverted. So this is a very pessimistic lesson for us.”

But Machcewicz’s story has a lesson for Americans that’s at least cautiously optimistic. Rather than submit to Law and Justice’s attempt to destroy his museum, he battled the administration in court and was able to hang on long enough to open it in 2017. After only two weeks, the government succeeded in ousting him, but the fight over the museum’s fate garnered major national and international attention, dramatizing the autocratic nature of the new Polish regime.

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Standing up to his government was costly. Machcewicz said he was subject to two separate criminal investigations, and for a time he left the country. “There is a high, high price to pay for such a resistance, and I am not going to condemn anyone who is not willing to pay such a price,” he said. But for him, it was worth it. After Law and Justice lost the 2023 election, Machcewicz became chair of the board of the museum, and it has been restored to its original design.

That doesn’t mean the contest is over; Law and Justice may well retake power in 2027. But for now, Machcewicz has the peace that comes from doing the right thing. “If I had capitulated, I would have been a completely frustrated man, because I would feel like someone who has betrayed himself,” he said. It’s a message that those who are tempted to try to appease this administration, at our museums or anywhere else, might remember.

Michelle Goldberg writes a column for the New York Times.

For 10 years, Pat Anderson has been running a nonprofit from her home, spending upward of 40 hours a week knitting, packaging and sending products to her valued network of women, all by hand.

Anderson, 92, retired from work in 2015, but a passion kept her on her feet: one that supports breast cancer survivors who’ve undergone mastectomies, like she did after being diagnosed at 74.

“Just look at how enthusiastic I am after 10 years,” Anderson said. “You know, this is by far the best and most rewarding project I’ve ever done, and the one I’m most proud of.”

Her passion project began 43 years after moving from her home state of Minnesota to California. In 2015, Anderson was introduced to the concept of hand-knit prosthetics after her daughter sent her a photo of knitted bust forms she’d seen in a shop. The product lit a fire in her, Anderson said, as she researched the knitting pattern and thought, “I can do this better.”

In 2017, she began sending samples of her Busters Project knitted bust forms to hospitals in San Diego and received referrals from survivor after survivor. Since then, Anderson has gifted Busters to more than 4,000 survivors across the U.S.

“The whole purpose of the Busters Project is to help restore some feminine dignity and normality for those women who have undergone mastectomy,” Anderson said. “Simple as that.”

Instilling confidence in survivors

Busters Project hand-knit bust forms. (Talia McWright / Pioneer Press)

Having one’s breasts removed is an incredibly vulnerable and invasive experience, Anderson said.

It can leave women feeling as though they’ve lost a part of themselves – a physicality that is linked to their femininity, sense of self and sexuality, she said. The Busters Project recognizes this complexity and has created a bond between the thousands of members nationwide who have received a pair of Busters and support the mission.

So what are Busters exactly? Busters are bust forms made from soft knit and padding material that can be placed against the skin, inside a bra, as an option for those who’ve undergone mastectomies to keep the shape of breasts under clothing, as they desire.

Busters range from size double A to double D and rest comfortably against the chest. They are machine washable, seamless, lightweight and more comfortable and affordable than any silicone prosthetic Anderson has ever come across – a design obviously created by a man, she said. Busters come in pastel colors of pink, blue, yellow and more, but never beige or anything dark.

“This is about the most feminine project you can imagine,” Anderson said.

Any breast cancer survivor can request a pair of Busters from Anderson free of charge, though they are encouraged, but not required, to send in a donation after they’ve received the product, which helps pay for materials to create the next pair of Busters. It functions as a sort of pay-it-forward system, according to Anderson.

“These are presents,” Anderson said. “These are personal gifts from one survivor to another.”

Serious knitters

Busters Project founder Pat Anderson, left, and trainee Pat Schaniel look through Anderson’s favorite handspun projects, like her red cardigan, at her home in Chisago County on Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2025. (Talia McWright / Pioneer Press)

Anderson is no “little old church lady,” she said, and running the Busters Project is not meant for the enthusiastic beginner knitting hobbyist. Knitting the way she does is something that requires years of experience, dedication and care for the craft.

“This is a serious operation because it solves a really serious problem,” Anderson said. “Those darn silicones are the number one source of misery and stress for every single woman who has undergone a mastectomy.”

At age 3, Anderson said she was constantly fiddling around with yarn, string and fabric. Then, during World War II, at the age of 8, Anderson learned to knit from her mother and grandmother, who belonged to a knitting auxiliary, creating sweaters, vests, bed socks and more.

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“I was sitting around watching them, and the next thing they did to shut me up was teach me how to do a long-tail cast-on and gave me a ball of yarn,” Anderson said. “I spent one whole summer casting on and ripping out. I wore out that ball of yarn.”

She established Spin Shuttle Studio in 1971, a textile and textile teaching studio, where she taught weaving to students in her home in Roseville. In 1982, she moved to California, where she and her daughter, Chris, worked together. Chris was a shepherd, Anderson said, and the two created wool yarn from the sheep, which Anderson spun.

Anderson also developed patterns for hand knitting and worked on woven and hand-knit projects, which the two sold, along with their yarn, “Ewe and Me,” at the Boardwalk Crafts Market in Poway, Calif., until Anderson retired.

“My students in Roseville, if any of them are still around, will remember me exclusively as a weaver,” Anderson said.

By 2019, Anderson was joined by two other stellar knitters who have been an integral part of the Busters Project, Pat Moller and Jane Rilly. The two are close friends of hers as well, she said, something that tends to happen when people are passionate about the work they do, something bigger than themselves.

“We were a really tight-knit group,” Anderson said. “It’s amazing, I was talking to Pat the other day and she said when she first started working with me, she thought it was just a knitting project. But once we got into it, and we started getting feedback from women in the mainstream and finding out what we were actually doing, she said, it became more of a calling.”

The next step

Busters Project founder Pat Anderson, left, shows trainee Pat Schaniel what a fully stuffed Busters looks like at her home in Chisago County on Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2025. (Talia McWright / Pioneer Press)

At 92, Anderson is looking to pass the mantel to a new team of volunteers. She’s lived in Minnesota now for a little over a year and deemed it “serious knitters country,” something California was not, she said.

“I couldn’t take it any further in California, because I just couldn’t find good knitters, and this calls for really top-notch technique and knitting skills,” Anderson said.

Her dream would be to have a team of six volunteers with knitting experience from childhood, especially “women who were taught by their mothers or grandmothers and have been seriously knitting ever since.” They would be asked to produce two pairs of Busters a week and meet with the team monthly for business meetings and to purchase materials.

“With personal knitting, or recreational knitting, you have no rules, anything goes, you can do whatever pleases you, but studio knitting is different,” Anderson said. “There are strict, stringent rules that have to be met: legal, technical and ethical.”

Experienced knitters interested in volunteering will be trained by Anderson in her home in Chisago County for about a month to learn how to create Busters from start to finish. Once the team has been trained to meet artisan standards, Anderson said, they can work independently and find their own pacing. While two pairs a week are expected, the quota is not set in stone, she said, and no one will be shamed for not meeting it.

Anderson said she also needs someone who can take over her managerial role. Someone with small-business experience, preferably with a connection to the arts, who knows how to update a webpage, she said. She wants someone who understands her determination to keep the Busters Project on a reasonably sized scale, who will not commercialize it, as it would reduce the quality and detract from its origins, she said.

“And we always could use women who serve as advocates to help spread the word, because this is all word of mouth,” Anderson said. “I never run an ad and I never solicit donations, except when I send out Busters.”

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Leading the Busters Project has never tired Anderson, she said. She is just as passionate about it now as she’s ever been.

One thing that keeps her going, she said, is the thank-you letters she receives in return.

“Thank you for helping me feel like a woman,” they say.

Or, “This is an answer to a prayer.”

Other recent messages: “God bless you,” “I feel like a girl again,” “I feel normal,” and “the smallest things do actually make the biggest impact.”

“It’s not just an object,” Anderson said. “It’s something that becomes personal to their dignity. That’s the thing about the Busters Project, everybody wins.”

Busters Project

To learn more about the Busters Project, visit spinshuttlestudio.com.

Those interested in joining the team can reach out directly to Anderson at spinshuttlestudio@gmail.com.