The Farmer-Labor Party was part of a movement that spanned rural and urban areas in Minnesota to fight corporate greed and provide mutual aid. It was the state’s strongest alternative to the two-party system until 1944, when it merged with Democrats to create the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party that Minnesotans know today. “This place was always a flashing beacon for progressives,” says David Bednarczuk…. who lives in Hibbing. When he joined the cooperative in the 1970s, he was one of the first members who did not speak Finnish. Part of a new generation of antiwar environmentalists, he helped reenergize the park after what he called a “lost generation” of members were subjected to FBI surveillance and political repression during the McCarthy era