The road trip phenomena behind the world’s largest things is either a “you love it” or a “you find it weird” kind of thing.
Sometimes when you see something, you ask yourself “why” a hundred times over. In the end, however, it’s just art. Like all forms of art, its purpose is to evoke something, whether it’s a painting, statue, photograph, jewelry, coordinated pile of stuff, or even a baseball card.
That’s how I felt after visiting Iowa’s Largest Fryin’ Pan in a small town between Waterloo and Cedar Rapids.
Although they do exist, I’m not a “world’s largest things” fanatic. However, I can appreciate the art of it. A friend of mine recently made a stop in Casey, Illinois, where there are many “world’s largest things” – so much that the town made it a popular thing. I’ve known about Casey for quite some time (and even when it was an IHSA state softball powerhouse). Gawking and taking away things to create conversation pieces are the purposes of these things.
With some photographic ingenuity, these “world’s largest things” also can create compelling social media moments. Combine a clever thought with one, and you might get somewhere.
En route to Waterloo (John Deere Museum & Dan Gable Museum) from Pontiac and Dwight for my mid-July road trip, a Google pin popped up on my map about Iowa’s largest frying pan in Brandon, Iowa. So it didn’t quite make “world’s largest” status, but the people in Brandon (population 341) are proud of their attraction. Small towns could use something unique like this, and I’m sure the small businesses of the town can feel the ripple effect from these attractions.
***Click HERE for my Flickr Photo Album from this trip!***
So what’s this frying pan all about?
Iowa’s Largest Fryin’ Pan was built in 2004 by local volunteers to promote the community’s Cowboy Breakfast, a fundraiser that began in 2000. It is made from donated scrap steel, and the oversized skillet took approximately 41 hours of volunteer labor to construct.
The pan is modeled after a standard 10-inch cast-iron frying pan; it measures 8 feet across its base and 9 feet, 3 inches at the rim. Its 5-foot handle brings its total length to 14 feet, 3 inches, and the structure weighs 1,020 pounds.
The pan’s theoretical capacity has been somewhat calculated: 528 eggs, 88 pounds of bacon or 352 half-pound pork chops can fit inside it if it were a real thing. The actual Cowboy Breakfast, which takes place each third Sunday in September, is prepared outdoors over open fires using traditional cast-iron pans and Dutch ovens. The gathering serves hundreds of people and raises money for the Brandon Area Community Center.
The pan’s location is west of town, where the two main roads out of town intersect. An informational board tells visitors its story and purpose, and a donation tube is nearby to help make the attraction a longstanding one.
What did I think about it? I tapped into a little photo ingenuity for this stop. It just so happens that the pan is only a foot or so off of the ground, which makes it easy for someone to step onto the edge of the pan – which is sloped a little, so one should take caution of their balance while doing so. I timed a selfie a few feet away and acted as if I were “frying” on the pan.
Brandon is located off of Interstate 380 between Cedar Rapids and Waterloo, at either the Buchanan County route exists for D48 (south) or V65 (north). The interstate is part of the larger Avenue of the Saints highway that connects St. Louis and Minneapolis/St. Paul.
Although it was a brief stop for me, perhaps someone more creative than me can find a more unique way to make this fun.
Iowa’s Largest Fryin’ Pan – 802 Main St., Brandon, Iowa; open dawn to dusk; go to bacciowa.com for more information.
