MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
Walter Mondale, the former vice president and U.S. senator from Minnesota, grew up in Elmore, Minnesota. It's a small rural town just north of the Iowa border. A few people with ties to Elmore want to help put it on the map by getting Mondale's childhood home onto the National Register of Historic Places. Minnesota Public Radio's Catharine Richert has the story.
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WALTER MONDALE: This is a day full of memories and hopes for me.
CATHARINE RICHERT, BYLINE: That's Walter Mondale, Democratic presidential candidate, standing on the back porch of his childhood home. The day was July 13, 1984, and he'd returned to introduce his friends and neighbors to his newly announced running mate.
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MONDALE: And to come back to my own town with, I think, a magnificent choice for vice president with me...
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Yeah.
MONDALE: ...Geraldine Ferraro.
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RICHERT: Mondale's pick of Geraldine Ferraro, a congresswoman from Queens, New York, made history. She was the first woman at the top of the ticket from a major political party. Sue Dickson remembers that historic day well. She lives in Elmore and was one of many people in the crowd gathered outside the Mondale house that day back in 1984.
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SUE DICKSON: And so I'm standing by my grandma, and all of a sudden Walter goes by in his red Corvette convertible, and my grandma starts walking towards him. And all of a sudden, the Secret Service around her, surrounding her 'cause she's walking up to the car. And he goes, no, no, no, no, it's OK. She was my babysitter.
RICHERT: Today, about 550 people live in Elmore, and a different family owns the modest home where Mondale made history more than four decades ago. Josh Manske is part of that family. On a frigid, snowy morning late last year, he described what the scene must've been like.
JOSH MANSKE: Just picture of the backyard here with, you know, the people as far as the eye could see. And then, of course, this is where the microphones would've been.
RICHERT: How many people?
MANSKE: Hundreds, I think, from what I've read in reports.
RICHERT: Mondale's pick of Ferraro as a running mate, a woman from a big city on the East Coast, might at first seem out of sync with his rural roots. Dave Hage sees it differently. He helped Mondale write his book "The Good Fight: A Life In Liberal Politics." Hage says Mondale was a pragmatist.
DAVID HAGE: He knew that choosing a woman would get people's attention, and it would motivate Democrats and progressives.
RICHERT: But Hage says Mondale balanced his pragmatism with hope.
HAGE: He said, my career is about opening doors, and here's another way for me to open doors. You know, young girls all across America can see opportunity and hope and progress.
RICHERT: In the decades since Mondale introduced Ferraro as his running mate in Elmore, the town's population has shrunk. Businesses have shuttered and schools have closed. Now, Josh Manske's family wants to use the Mondale house in Elmore to signal hope and progress in other ways, by getting the three-bedroom, two-story Mondale home on the National Historic Registry. The process, though, can take months to years, and state and federal authorities need to approve the application. Still, Manske hopes getting the house on the Historic Registry could draw tourists and help boost the local economy. And he says it's also about what the house represents to Elmore and rural communities in general.
MANSKE: That greatness can come from anywhere, that you can be born here in Elmore, Minnesota, and have the opportunity to represent your country as a United States Senator, as vice president of the United States and as the nominee of a major political party.
RICHERT: Manske says they'll likely find out later this year if the house will be listed on the National Registry.
For NPR News, I'm Catharine Richert in Elmore.
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