Midwest Mountaineering was more than just a store, and losing it matters

Three months into my job at Midwest Mountaineering, I had just finished working my first Outdoor Adventure Expo. The biannual expo, which one colleague called a "Woodstock for outdoor people," had the feeling of a family reunion.

After the last customer left the Minneapolis store, someone gave a signal and several staffers produced Nerf guns that had been stashed throughout the premises. The store erupted into a spray of darts. One of my new relatives handed me a plastic gun and told me to take cover.

This anecdote won't surprise former employees of the store. We were a community that worked hard and played harder.

The decision by owner Rod Johnson in August to close the 53-year-old outdoor retailer took many of us by surprise. Midwest Mountaineering felt permanent in a way that defied retail economics. If you worked there, you joined a lineage of city-bound mountaineers and aspirational 20-somethings who found a home and a shared joy in equipping people to get outdoors.

The iconic Cedar-Riverside neighborhood store has a brain trust of expertise in paddling, backpacking and more, and that knowledge benefited the many Minnesotans who recreate outdoors. The store gained a reputation for cultivating loyalty in those who shopped there. Interactions with customers could last hours, even days.

"Our motto was 'Ask us. We've been there.' So you'd better get there," said longtime manager Rudi Hargesheimer, who worked at the store for 40 years. With unlimited time off and copious deals on gear, employees embarking on a months-long trip was common and encouraged.

Midwest Mountaineering had long catered to specialized sports. Its Promethean origin story involved Johnson bringing climbing gear to the Twin Cities from California. Over the years, the store expanded into activities like dog sledding, whitewater paddling and ice climbing.

Just as central to the store's identity was its freewheeling attitude. Employees' dogs had name tags and received collegial treatment. My manager could send his dog, Cinna, bounding through the store after paging her over the intercom. The storied brick building at 309 Cedar Av. S. was filled with decorations left by past generations: a picture of a skier lying naked in the snow, or a sign in the upstairs bathroom that told the occupant they were being filmed. We were encouraged to add our own, and inspiration flowed from the potent coffee.

"Everyone was such an individual, and that was celebrated," said Kim Mason, who worked at the store in the 1990s. Mason was one of dozens of alumni who gathered in a St. Paul warehouse on Oct. 15 to honor the store. She met her future husband there, in fact.

"It was pretty free-spirited. There were people who lived in the store for months at a time," said Randall Mikkelsen, who traveled from New Hampshire to attend the event and still counts the job as his favorite, despite going on to work in the White House press corps.

Midwest Mountaineering was special because each generation made it their own. While trading well-worn stories about their tenure, multiple employees said they were there for the store's "golden age."

I, too, regarded my two years in the clothing department as a halcyon time. It textured my life by turning me into a West Bank regular. More than anything, the store helped me develop my enthusiasm for adventure into meaningful and lasting friendships.

"Midwest Mountaineering wasn't a place. It was the people," said former employee Jake Lindgren, who at one point lived with five of his coworkers during his stint at the shop. "We were just there for the pure passion of talking adventure and planning trips."

If anyone embodies that rough-edged passion, it's my former manager, Steve Schreader. He first visited the store with his dad when he was 5 years old. Now, he plans to open his own store, focusing on paddling and climbing, next spring.

Schreader is still looking for a location, but has a working name: Lake State Mountaineering. He aims to bring some needed updates to the business, including an online inventory and an in-store cafe. Cinna will be there too, albeit with a balding patch on her lower back—her preferred scratching spot.

"A phoenix will rise from the ashes," Schreader said.

And I believe he's right. Ask me. I've been there.