Dog parks, Diet Dew and car sickness: A collection of tidbits about Gov. Tim Walz

After weeks of swirling speculation over Kamala Harris’ running mate, the sitting vice president has tapped Gov. Tim Walz for the Democratic ticket.

Those who have known Walz for years have collected nuggets of information about the life and times of the second-term DFL governor.

He and his wife since 1994, Gwen, have two children: Hope, who recently graduated from college in Montana, and Gus, who is in public high school in St. Paul.

The couple met when both were high school teachers in temporary classrooms in Nebraska. The first lady said she was irked by his loud voice disrupting her classroom.

Their children were conceived through IVF and fertility treatments — as Walz has said, “There’s a reason we named her Hope.”

Walz doesn’t drink alcohol or coffee. His beverage of choice is Diet Mountain Dew, lots of it. He got a DWI in Nebraska in 1995 before he quit drinking.

He is unfailingly punctual.

He rides in the front passenger seat of the state SUV when he’s driven by state troopers because he gets carsick in the back seats.

He taught English in China in 1989 and can still converse in Mandarin.

He grew up in Valentine, Neb.

He is a 1982 graduate of Butte High School in Butte, Neb. He had 24 kids in his graduating class and always adds that “12 were cousins.”

His father died of lung cancer when Walz was 19.

His mother, Darlene Rose, still lives in Nebraska and occasionally comes to visit him at the Capitol.

Walz earned his undergraduate degree from Chadron State College, a public school in Chadron, Neb. He earned an M.S. from what is now Minnesota State Mankato.

He taught geography at Mankato West High School before being elected to Congress. He also coached football and helped the school win a state championship. He was the faculty adviser to the student Gay-Straight Alliance.

Walz is a runner who has slimmed down and has talked about doing the Twin Cities Marathon or 10-mile race that stretches past the governor’s residence on Summit Avenue in St. Paul.

He owns and tinkers around on a vintage blue International Scout, a four-wheel-drive vehicle that International Harvester stopped producing in 1980. He has custom plates that read, “ONE MN,” his campaign slogan for his gubernatorial bid.

He and his chief of staff Chris Schmitter have been together professionally much longer than most reality-show marriages. Schmitter, 40, has been with Walz for 18 years.

In his state Capitol office, he has on display hundreds of challenge coins that he’s traded and collected for years with military from around the world. Walz served in the Army National Guard and recently started receiving a monthly pension payment.

The governor made good on a promise to his son by adopting a rescue dog after he won statewide office and held a news conference to herald the arrival of the black Lab mix in 2019. The gentle giant, named Scout, silently greets visitors at the door and hangs out with guests during public events. The governor and Scout make daily morning visits to an off-leash Twin Cities dog park.

Walz was elected to Congress in 2006, the same year as Attorney General Keith Ellison, former U.S. Reps. Beto O’Rourke of Texas and Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona. When Giffords visited Minnesota to celebrate the passage of gun safety measures, both Ellison and Walz said she was the star of the freshman class, the one everyone thought would one day be elected president.

The governor, first lady and their son live have been living for the past year at the elegant and picturesque Eastcliff on East Mississippi River Boulevard while the governor’s official Summit Avenue residence undergoes renovations. Eastcliff is the official residence of the University of Minnesota president.

The family’s rescue feline Afton wandered off and didn’t return after the move a year ago. They’ve since adopted a replacement, Honey, who came with that name and is as sweet as she sounds.

Go deeper on Walz with his speech to the ESRI User Conference earlier this summer.