What do a Black cowboy in Oklahoma, a crabber in Maryland, a Waffle House archivist in Georgia, and a queer party promoter in New York have in common? At first glance, probably not much. But each represents how a traveler experiences their home state—because don't we go to Maryland for blue crab, or remember those long, lively nights from a trip to New York? Places may give us reasons to travel, but people bring those experiences to life. As the nation approaches its 250th anniversary, it’s individuals like these who embody the living history of the place we call home.

Certainly, there are plenty of ways to mark a milestone birthday. We could have assembled a list of the country’s most unforgettable travel experiences—from watching sunrise over the Great Smoky Mountains in Tennessee to dancing until 2 a.m. on New Orleans’s Frenchmen Street as brass bands spill onto the street.

But the postcards of a place are its landmarks; rarely do we see the faces behind them. So we set out to identify the one person behind a defining attraction in every state—the person who brings that state’s humanity to life.

Some of the folks on this list are preserving history, like Barry McNeal, a historical content expert at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute in Alabama. Others are actively reshaping narratives, like Kevin Cook, a.k.a. the drag queen Poison Waters, an LGBTQ+ historian who is bringing marginalized stories to light in Oregon. And who doesn't love Gritty, the official mascot of the Philadelphia Flyers and unlikely hero of the city, or an Elvis impersonator in Las Vegas, that most unapologetically American destination of them all?

And finally, what could be more American than continuing to welcome new people into our midst? That openness is embodied by Doug L. Micko, a US District Court judge who has presided over hundreds of naturalization ceremonies at the Minnesota State Fair (which is also loved for its purveyors of butter sculptures and food on sticks).

Together, these individuals reflect the diversity that underpins this country—and remains one of its greatest calling cards. At a complicated time in the nation’s history, we hope this package can serve as a reminder of the optimism within us all. We hope it will also introduce you to lesser-known adventures and daydream-worthy experiences in your own backyard. But most importantly, we hope that the next time you travel across America, you’ll feel inspired to peer behind the scenes—and say hello to the people who make your favorite journeys unforgettable. —Arati Menon

- Alabama: Barry McNealy

- Alaska: Paul Swanstrom

- Arizona: Alex La Pierre

- Arkansas: Gary Vernon

- California: Pepe De Anda

- Colorado: Lori Spence

- Connecticut: Bill Pustari

- Delaware: Sarah Mullen

- Florida: Rick Rose

- Georgia: Julia Ludwiczak Buschman

- Hawaii: Kai Lenny

- Idaho: Tony & Tara Eiguren

- Illinois: Poochie Rollins

- Indiana: Zach Osowski

- Iowa: Matt Phippen

- Kansas: Linda Clover

- Kentucky: Jon Hartman

- Louisiana: Charlie Gabriel

- Maine: Tammy Hustus

- Maryland: Luke McFadden

- Massachusetts: Michael Lepage

- Michigan: Kevin Saunderson

- Minnesota: Douglas L. Micko

- Mississippi: Tracy “Rev” Collins

- Missouri: Johnny Morris

- Montana: Lailani Upham

- Nebraska: Marcos Stoltzfus

- Nevada: Brendan Paul

- New Hampshire: Jim Salge

- New Jersey: Mario Costa

- New Mexico: Dawn & Robert Federico

- New York: Nita Aviance

- North Carolina: Phil Jamison

- North Dakota: Danni Melquist

- Ohio: Amanda Pecsenye

- Oklahoma: Kenneth LeBlanc

- Oregon: Kevin Cook

- Pennsylvania: Gritty

- Puerto Rico: Efrén David Robles

- Rhode Island: Patricia Miller

- South Carolina: Corey Alston

- South Dakota: Sequoia Crosswhite

- Tennessee: Kathy Self, Cricket Russell, and Poke Fine

- Texas: Tootsie Tomanetz

- Utah: Lynn Turner

- Vermont: Matt Folts

- Virginia: Anna Prillaman

- Washington: Guy Curtis

- Washington, DC: Mariel Lally

- West Virginia: Kyle Mills

- Wisconsin: McKim Boyd

- Wyoming: Gus Davis

- Credits

Alabama: Barry McNealy

The stories of the Civil Rights Movement live on through people like Barry McNealy, historic content expert for the Civil Rights Institute.

Since the 1950s, Birmingham, Alabama, has been hallowed ground for the American Civil Rights Movement. It’s here that the A.G. Gaston Motel strategy meetings were held by Martin Luther King Jr. and his confidants, and the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing occurred in 1963. This legacy is preserved at the city’s Civil Rights Institute, founded in 1992, which houses a bounty of artifacts, photographs, and stories that depict not only the violent clashes with those opposing integration but also the intense resilience and fortitude of the Alabamians committed to the resistance, many of whom were students. Those who have lived to tell their tales have directly passed them down to a Birmingham native named Barry McNealy, an essential bard of Alabama’s Black American history. With a booming voice, and formidable as a bear, he has worked at the Civil Rights Institute since 1993.

For the last seven years, McNealy has served as the historic content expert for the Civil Rights Institute while also working as the department chair of history at Arthur Harold Parker High School and a professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. His command over oral storytelling grips all those who join him on his walking tours of Kelly Ingram Park in downtown Birmingham, the historic epicenter of the nation’s Civil Rights Movement. Tales of the past feel strikingly present through his power of speech, as he weaves details of dogs and fire hoses, solidarity and success, into every step of the tour through the park, which is dotted with statues and plaques memorializing the clashes.

“It’s a responsibility, an honor, and a pleasure to be able to hold these stories and share them with visitors as well as with the young people I interact with,” McNealy says. However, with that honor comes the heaviness of the work. His balm? A ride on his trusty Yamaha motorcycle out of town, past farmland and fields, until he feels reenergized and ready to share the stories again with pride. “It’s my decompression chamber,” he says. “I can get on that bike and the broken line in the highway makes everything melt away for a while.” —Stephanie Burt

Alaska: Paul Swanstrom

The rugged expanses of Alaska are best seen from a bush plane, on tours led by pilots like Paul Swanstrom.

After growing up in Chicago, Paul Swanstrom didn’t know what he wanted to be; he just knew that he wasn’t a city boy. After spending years as a “crusty” river guide in Moab, Utah, in the late 1970s, he turned his sights to Alaska and started leading 12-day rafting tours. “An old high school friend came to see me, and I took him for a flight in a rental plane when I just had 75 hours [of flying experience],” he recalls. Next thing he knew, Swanstrom had founded Mountain Flying Service, after convincing his buddy to go in on a vintage aircraft with him. Alaska is famously precarious for traditional vehicles—rental car companies often suggest bringing two spare tires to brave the washboard McCarthy Road into Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, and some won’t even rent to visitors, making bush pilots like Swanstrom a vital link between the developed world and road-free villages and national parks.

“In order to see Alaska, you have to get in the air,” says Swanstrom, who still lives in the artsy, remote community of Haines. Over his 34 years as a backcountry pilot, during which he has transported more than 60,000 tourists into Glacier Bay National Park’s remote eastern expanse and dropped off fly fishermen in the ragged wilderness of the Chilkat mountains, he’s seen the glacial landscape change with time. “Glaciers are shrinking and revealing more of the land,” he says. “You know, if you were a gold miner, there's a lot more places to look for gold now.” Still, there are dozens of enormous aquamarine glaciers to be found on “flightseeing” tours into Glacier Bay, and the intrepid travelers who embark on these bumpy flights in tiny planes get something that few visitors to the state do—a bird’s-eye view of the seemingly infinite sprawl of mountains, rivers, and fjords that make Alaska’s coastline so spellbinding. Acting as both tour guide and impromptu airplane anxiety therapist is all part of the job for Swanstrom. “You get a lot of people who are scared at first, but as soon as you take off, they forget,” he says. “They don’t look down—they look out.” —Emily Pennington

Arizona: Alex La Pierre

The flora, fauna, culture, and comida of Arizona are best appreciated through cross-border tour guides like Alex La Pierre of Borderlandia.

The borderlands are a 2,000-mile-long corridor straddling the line that runs through Tijuana and San Diego all the way to Matamoros and Brownsville—and Alex and Rocío La Pierre, the husband-and-wife duo who founded local travel service Borderlandia, want to show that this shared backyard can be a portal. “For us to understand Arizona, its ecology, its history, its heritage, you really have to look south,” Alex says.

Treating Arizona and the Mexican state of Sonora as a “two-nation destination,” their tours seek to show travelers both sides of the corridor and enable them to participate in the dialogue that takes place across it. The Tucson Origins tour explores Barrio Viejo, a district of 19th-century Sonoran row houses that serve as the city's architectural soul. On the Bacanora tour, travelers head into the Sierra Madre mountains to taste the smoky agave spirit that Alex calls “the perfect bridge” between neighbors. In Topawa, guests visit the Tohono O’odham Cultural Center to learn how the desert’s original stewards have flourished for millennia despite the modern line dividing their ancestral lands. Borderlandia also leads hikes along the Santa Cruz River to trace the Anza expedition, the 1775 trek that fundamentally shaped the American West.

Borderlandia reveals a lively region that refuses to be defined by politicized, alarmist news headlines. “I can’t tell you how many times absolute strangers have invited me in for coffee in Sonora,” Alex says. “It is like traveling to a place that feels 5,000 miles away, but it is only a day's drive.” —Chris Malloy

Arkansas: Gary Vernon

The thriving outdoor cycling scene of Arkansas is easy to tap into, thanks to advocates like Gary Vernon, the general manager of OZ Trails Bike Park.

When Gary Vernon began riding mountain bikes in Arkansas almost 40 years ago, there was very little infrastructure intended for riders without deep experience—or a devil-may-care attitude. Most mountain bike trails were built by and for confident cyclists, with steep drop-offs, sharp turns, and barely cleared surfaces lined with dangerously thick roots. But even these trails, like the ones Vernon carved out with friends near his home in Bella Vista, have had a positive effect. Often neglected as illegal dumping grounds, they’ve become amenities that residents feel motivated to protect even when they aren’t themselves cyclists. “People want to keep the trails beautiful,” says Vernon.

These advanced trails still exist in spades in northwest Arkansas, where Vernon now works as the general manager of the OZ Trails Bike Park, a ticketed mountain bike area set to open in June between the cities of Bella Vista and Bentonville. Where high-skill, palpitation-inducing paths were once the main game in town, they’re now just one part of a vast web of over 500 miles of free-to-access dirt and paved trails intended to connect cyclists of any skill level to Bentonville’s many parks, neighborhoods, and growing downtown. Vernon says the network, which he helped expand in previous roles with the Walton Family Foundation, is so well planned that some visitors never feel the need to drive while in town. “I hear this all the time: ‘I came here for a week, and I never even rented a car.’”

The development of these trails has significantly enhanced the area as northwest Arkansas now boasts a thriving outdoors culture that draws people from all over the world—traveler numbers peak in June for the Bentonville Bike Fest and October for the Big Sugar Classic. Perhaps the clearest indicator of change for Vernon: “Both my son, 20, and my daughter, 24, are choosing to stay in the area,” he says. “It’s cool now.” —Daniel Varghese

California: Pepe De Anda

Behind the Golden State’s star-studded scene are countless hospitality workers like Pepe De Anda, the restaurant director at the Beverly Hills Hotel.

California may be the state where you can surf in the morning and ski in the afternoon, but every day for Pepe De Anda starts the same way: It’s showtime. That’s his mantra when service begins at the Beverly Hills Hotel’s iconic Polo Lounge, an eatery that draws not only stars who want to evade the paparazzi but also visitors hoping for a glimpse of them—or, at the very least, a taste of the restaurant’s signature dishes, like the chopped McCarthy salad, nearly 600 of which are served each week in the candy-colored restaurant and via room service.

De Anda is now the restaurant’s director, having risen through the ranks over 40 years at Beverly Hill’s most famous property. At what has been called Hollywood’s Commissary, he’s on the receiving end of big-name text requests for reservations, but he’s also the one stopping by every table to ask how the tableside steak tartare is tasting. “I say hello to everyone, from longtime regulars to first-time guests,” says De Anda, who is always sporting a sharp suit and friendly smile.

He’s certainly seen his share of Hollywood moments. “I’ve worked the most incredible Hollywood parties,” he says, “seen guests holding—and dining with—their Oscars after their big wins, and gotten to know the world’s most famous athletes and legends in entertainment. But one of my favorite things is watching our guests’ families grow across generations: seeing their kids grow up, start their own families, and come back to introduce their own children to the Polo Lounge.”

De Anda’s own story has a touch of Hollywood flair. Born in Guadalajara, Mexico, he moved to Los Angeles in 1986; he soon began working at the hotel’s pool in the morning and helping with room service at night, while also chipping in as a busser at the Polo Lounge “when they needed the help.” Decades later, his days are still 12 to 14 hours long, he says, but his team feels like family—and if you've ever been greeted by De Anda, you’ve likely felt like family too. “I always say, it doesn’t matter if you’re the best restaurant in the world, but if the person who serves your food isn’t happy, they cannot deliver a dining experience that’s truly extraordinary,” he says. “At the Polo Lounge we serve guests from all over the world, so it’s important to make everyone feel seen and welcomed. We create moments that stay with them for a lifetime.”

When you come in for your own 15 minutes, go for the star treatment. De Anda’s advice: Order your soufflé half in the flavor of the day and half chocolate. As for the best seats in the house? “Each table has a story: Marilyn Monroe always requested Table 6, Frank Sinatra preferred Table 3, Ed McMahon and Johnny Carson always dined at Table 1,” he says. “The most important people in music and film have graced these tables.” And with a little Pepe magic, you can too. —Megan Spurrell

Colorado: Lori Spence

The world-class quality—and safety—of Colorado’s skiing relies on patrollers like Lori Spence at Aspen Highlands.

Ultra-dry and floaty, Colorado’s snow is so light it’s said to tickle your nose like Champagne bubbles. Factor in the state's high-altitude, low-humidity charming mountain towns and 300-plus days of sunshine, and you have a formula for a ski nirvana. The unsung heroes behind the state’s 28 ski areas are the patrollers. Yes, they get first tracks, but they also make critical decisions on when to open sections of the mountain. “Guests know they have to be patient, and it’s amazing how many thank us when they see the rope drop, meaning a trail has been checked for hazards and is officially open,” says Lori Spence, a veteran of nearly 40 winters on Aspen Highlands ski patrol. When she started in the 1980s, she was one of the few female patrollers. Today she’s patrol director—the first woman to hold the title at Aspen Highlands—and directly oversees a team that includes four other women. “As a woman and mom, I hope I’ve been a role model,” she says. “I have such a diverse, passionate team. It’s exciting to see the energy the younger generation brings to the mountain.” Spence’s job goes beyond keeping skiers safe. She sees herself as an ambassador, directing skiers to her favorite runs. Aspen Highlands’ famed 270-acre hike to Highland Bowl delivers some of the best inbound big-mountain skiing in the lower 48. On a powder day Spence recommends making early turns on the front side of Aspen Highlands, then lapping the steep glades off Deep Temerity lift so you’re in position for when the Bowl is greenlit, typically around 10 or 11 a.m. “I try to hike it every day,” says Spence. “It’s good for the soul.” —Jen Murphy

Connecticut: Bill Pustari

In the state with the most pizzerias per capita, restaurant owners like Bill Pustari keep the “apizza” coming.

On a sunny afternoon in May 2024, a hundred New England foodies gathered on the steps of the US Capitol to declare New Haven, Connecticut—in as official a manner as possible—the pizza capital of the United States. As they raised their cardboard pizza boxes into the sky, the self-proclaimed Connecticut pizza delegation chanted together, “Nothing ah-beetz New Haven apizza!”

Their defense to the Chicago and New York naysayers? Connecticut has the most pizzerias per capita in the US, and out of its 1,300 restaurants, nearly 80% are independently owned or family-run. The state is best known for its thin-crust, coal-fired apizza (pronounced “ah-beetz”), which is essentially a cross between a New York– and a Neapolitan-style pizza. And while Italian immigrants first brought apizza from Naples to New Haven in the early 20th century, the city’s booming restaurant scene has just recently started to garner national attention, as Bill Pustari, owner of New Haven’s Modern Apizza, explains. “We’ve always been where the locals go,” he says. “[Now] we actually have customers who fly up from the Carolinas just to do a pizza tour—they land in the morning, go Uber around to all the pizza places, then get back on the airplane.”

Alongside Modern—which was recently ranked No. 1 on the newly established Connecticut Pizza Trail by 13,000 voters—Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana (No. 2) and Sally’s Apizza (No. 3) form the “holy trinity” of New Haven’s pizzerias. Of the big three, Modern is the only to have refused corporate buyouts and franchise expansions, preserving a classic mom-and-pop feel. It’s also allowed Pustari, who has run the restaurant for the past 38 years, to prioritize high-quality ingredients (like a 100-year-old “mother” starter dough and organic flour) and employee well-being over cost cutting. “I’ve been making pizza since I was 13,” he says. “I’m the last OG. I'm not an office individual—I’m a kitchen guy, and I get to pick all my own ingredients and I buy what I want to buy.” —Hannah Towey

Delaware: Sarah Mullen

Don’t overlook small but mighty Delaware, whose contributions to America’s independence are brought to life daily by costumed interpreters like Sarah Mullen at the First State Heritage Park.

On July 2, 1776, Caesar Rodney rode his horse 80 miles through a thunderstorm to cast Delaware’s tie-breaking vote for independence from Great Britain. Soon other colonies followed the state’s lead, and the 13 colonies approved the Declaration of Independence two days later.

Sarah Mullen, the lead interpreter for Delaware’s First State Heritage Park, loves regaling visitors with this story about one of America’s lesser-known founding fathers during the 45-minute walking tour of the Dover Green. Surrounded by some of the state capital’s oldest buildings, the Green is where troops once assembled during the American Revolution and where suffragettes campaigned for women’s rights. The 30-year-old Delaware native wears 18th-century garb while playing a crucial role in helping visitors understand how the state shaped the nation’s founding. Walking tours begin at the John Bell House, the historic site where 30 delegates met before leading Delaware to become the first state to ratify the US Constitution in 1787.

“Growing up in Delaware, you're told that the state is maybe not the hottest destination,” Mullen says. “But Delaware has a lot to offer.” The job was a natural fit for the history buff who grew up visiting state parks with her family: “We’re getting people from all over the world who have traveled from China, Scotland, and Italy, interested to hear about how Delawareans lived. And it's so rewarding to see their eyes light up.” —Julekha Dash

Florida: Rick Rose

There’s more than meets the eye in made-for-vacation Florida, and historic home tour guides like Rick Rose in Palm Beach are proud to showcase it.

“Whenever someone does my tour, they leave with a bit of an aha effect,” says Rick Rose, author of Palm Beach: The Essential Guide to America’s Legendary Resort Town and the resort town’s favorite homegrown guide. Perpetually clad in a bow tie, a blazer, and a pocket square, and known among locals as Mr. Palm Beach, the second-generation Floridian grew up in the area and has been leading seasonal historic walking tours along Worth Avenue (Rodeo Drive was modeled after it) since 2011. Before then, says Rose, he spent five years as an understudy of Jim Ponce, Palm Beach’s most famous historian and a descendant of Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León’s family (a fixture at The Breakers, Jim Ponce passed away in 2016).

That Rose is always learning new things about Palm Beach himself is part of what keeps him hooked on the town and eager to share it with visitors. “There are all kinds of legends and anecdotes of people who've lived, worked, and shopped on the Avenue,” he says. His 75-minute-long tours feel less like being talked at and more like movable feasts of sights and storytelling. They offer fascinating insight into the town’s architecture, fashion ties, and high society in one of the country’s wealthiest coastal enclaves.

As you wander off Worth Avenue and into hidden courtyards, Rose delivers one delightful vignette after another. He explains how the tradition of cocktail hour was born in Palm Beach, tracing its roots to women’s suffrage, Prohibition, and the town’s social orbit. He unpacks how the region became the new Riviera after World War I—fueling the Mediterranean Revival architecture boom—and how a local juice stand evolved into Lily Pulitzer’s first Palm Beach store. Each season Rose’s tours raise money for a different charity, drawing not just visitors but also eager locals. Even people who live in the town leave saying, “Oh, that’s why Palm Beach is the way it is.” —Terry Ward

Georgia: Julia Ludwiczak Buschman

To know Georgia is to know the day-to-night, unfiltered comfort of Waffle House—and few people are more familiar with it than Julia Ludwiczak Buschman, archivist for the diner chain.

When you’re on the road and you pass that distinct yellow block-lettered sign, you know you’ve reached the South. Founded in 1955 just east of Atlanta in Avondale Estates, Waffle House has gone from local breakfast diner to Southern mainstay (not without moments of online virality and teleportative claims), and archivist and museum curator Julia Ludwiczak Buschman is preserving all those 71 years of late-night waffles and scattered, smothered, and covered hash browns. From the earliest (and relatively unchanged) menus and original white, button-up uniforms to a Waffle-Opoly board game and food-themed jukebox records, the archive holds much of the brand’s universe, unearthed from its now more than 2,000 locations across the country.

When not at the archive sorting through new material, Buschman can be found 14 miles south at the Waffle House Museum, the site of the first location, where she guides weekly tours by appointment and oversees exhibition programming on topics like the Waffle House Index, a metric using restaurant closures to gauge hurricane and storm severity. The museum also hosts quarterly open houses for locals looking to learn more about their hometown history and uninitiated out-of-towners intrigued by roadside mythos of the South’s most iconic diner. To Buschman, the franchise’s success lies in its unfailing consistency, as she especially sees how unchanged it remains in menu, design, and attitude. “It doesn’t matter if you’re a young family on Saturday morning [or] it’s 3 a.m. and you’re coming in from a night out,” she says. “Whatever you’re doing, it feels like you’re coming home.” —Skyli Alvarez

Hawaii: Kai Lenny

To connect with the sea that makes Hawaii such a postcard of a destination, take a page from watermen like Kai Lenny.

For Hawaiians, water—or wai—isn’t just vital for life; it’s vital to the soul. That deep connection to the ocean goes back to the ancient Polynesians, who were the world’s first watermen, using their intimate knowledge of the ocean to navigate the Pacific, discovering Hawaii thousands of years ago. Today the designation of waterman or -woman is bestowed upon ocean connoisseurs who excel at paddling, free diving, surfing, and navigation, and big-wave athlete Kai Lenny is one of those carrying on this legacy. “The concept of a waterman or -woman is very cultural,” says Lenny. “It’s not just about how good you are at ocean sports. It’s about living your day, your life around the beach and ocean.”

This innate connection to the sea is a huge part of the destination’s allure—the Hawaiian Islands are a mecca for water sports, drawing travelers eager to ride the legendary waves of Oahu’s North Shore or windsurf the famed gusts of Ho’okipa Beach Park in Maui. Lenny, who was born and raised on Maui, caught his first wave at Cove Park in Kihei at age four, was windsurfing by age six, and was tackling giant waves in his teens. He's considered one of the planet’s most versatile watermen, with accolades that include eight-time stand-up paddle world champion, hydrofoil pioneer, and big-wave master. If a person could be a postcard for a place, Lenny may be that for Hawaii—an emblem of what it means to live and breathe this culture and to embody the lifestyle so many visitors dream of.

“I’m purely a product of my environment,” Lenny says. “When you grow up here, the ocean dictates your day.” For visitors, he says, that might mean collecting shells, swimming or bodysurfing, or paddling a two-man canoe. But the key to Hawaii, to its spirit, is undeniably through the sea. —Jen Murphy

Idaho: Tony & Tara Eiguren

The great potato capital has no shortage of great Basque food either, thanks to a hearty diaspora and community members like Tony and Tara Eiguren.

It’s a warm Friday and a line is forming along a shady sidewalk in downtown Boise, Idaho. Dressed in a black txapela hat, a gray T-shirt, and an apron, Tony Eiguren gently tosses shrimp into a massive shallow paella pan in the pop-up kitchen he’s set up in front of the Basque Market, which he owns with his wife, Tara. Eiguren makes just two batches a week to sell to the public, so people start queuing by midmorning for a taste of the garlicky, seafood-studded dish. His paella has become a beloved tradition—an excuse to gather with friends, chat up strangers, maybe sip a glass of wine. To Eiguren, that’s what makes Idaho so special. “People still hold the door open for you or say hi, and we’re a little part of that,” he says. “Family, culture, friendship—you’re talking to people, you’re helping each other out.” The Basque Market is a pillar of Boise’s Basque Block, a compact but vibrant stretch of a tree-lined street that’s home to a museum, a cultural center, historic boarding houses, shops, and other eateries. Eiguren’s grandparents were among the thousands of immigrants who settled in Boise starting in the late 1800s, giving rise to one of the largest Basque communities outside Europe. He grew up practicing Basque folk dancing and eating his amuma’s arroz con leche, so when the market came up for sale in 2006, he and Tara seized the opportunity. Two decades later they’re still dishing out pintxos—small bites similar to tapas—and arroz con leche based on his family’s recipe. “There are all sorts of ways to celebrate Basque culture in Boise: language lessons, music, Basque sports,” he says. “There’s all kinds of stuff. It’d be easy to stop and let the culture just go away, but I feel like everyone is trying to do their little part to keep it alive.” —Sarah Kuta

Illinois: Poochie Rollins

In this resilient and proud Midwestern state, a hot dog is more than a cheap eat—just ask iconic Chicago dog slinger Poochie Rollins of The Weiner's Circle.

By day, 43-year-old The Wiener’s Circle hot dog stand is a beloved go-to for locals and travelers to get a taste of one of Chicago’s signature foods: a frank in a bun dressed with mustard, onions, neon green relish, tomato slices, a pickle, sport peppers, and celery salt. By night? You can get that same dog, but this time it comes with a side of raunchy sass. Poochie Rollins, the city’s best-known hot dog slinger (she also cohosts the NBC series Poochie & Pang, which spotlights local businesses), loves the night shift, which goes until 2 a.m. during the week and 4 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays. “There’s the craziness of dealing with intoxicated customers, giving them shit, and them giving it right back to us,” she says.

The Chicago native, who has worked at The Wiener's Circle for 28 years, dishes out char-dogs, Polish sausages, freshly cut fries with cheddar sauce, and insults. Prudes need not worry, though. As Rollins stresses, it’s all in good fun. “Wiener’s Circle is a place where people can be themselves,” she says. “In the corporate world, you need to be professional—you can’t swear. When you come to Wiener’s Circle, you can be yourself, and we give you space to do that. We’ll roast each other, sometimes we’ll take a shot. This place is a nightly vibe.” Eating a hot dog is a quintessential Chicago experience. But so is connecting with locals in a place that’s an all-night party. —Amy Cavanaugh

Indiana: Zach Osowski

If you had to sum up the charm of Indiana in 63 characters, just reference the dad jokes on the OneAmerica Tower, selected each week by Zach Osowski.

Across the street from Indianapolis’s second-tallest skyscraper, the OneAmerica Tower, is a quintessentially humble Midwestern attraction: an old-fashioned signboard with a new dad joke every week. Tens of thousands of people see the puns daily on their commutes to work. The two signboards are just a couple blocks from Monument Circle, at the intersections of Capitol Avenue and Vermont Street, and New York and Illinois streets. Zach Osowski, the OneAmerica Financial external communications manager who's responsible for selecting the weekly jokes, says, “It’s like a puzzle sometimes. We only have 21 characters per line and three lines.” Internal submissions from OneAmerica Financial employees are sent weekly via email, reviewed by Osowski, and voted on by the communications team. Often the jokes are tied to an upcoming holiday or event. During Indy 500 weekend, when the Pacers were also in the NBA playoffs, the message “Indy’s to-do list: Kiss the bricks, beat the Knicks” went viral. “My candy cane collection is in mint condition” got chuckles during the festive season. There’s been talk about digitizing the signboard, but the letters are still put up by hand. “My goal is to give people something to look forward to and crack a smile when they come downtown,” Osowski says. “I think the folksy charm embodies the city a little bit. We try to keep it as light as we can.” —Amber Gibson

Iowa: Matt Phippen

The small towns of Iowa know how to come together for a good time, particularly when bicycle race RAGBRAI—led by locals like Matt Phippen—traces the state each summer.

Every July tens of thousands of cyclists cross Iowa from the Missouri River to the Mississippi, riding past farm stands that will turn into dance parties by nightfall, across miles of cornfields and up rolling hills. “Iowa is as flat as a waffle,” says RAGBRAI ride director Matt Phippen—something he learned the hard way when he first rode at 18. His introduction came at age 10, when RAGBRAI, which is an acronym for the Register's Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa, passed through his hometown of Oelwein (a town with a population of fewer than 6,000), filling yards with tents and strangers. It’s one of 939 towns that have dotted the ever-changing route since 1973.

Phippen, who is now 46, plans the route each year while also riding the seven-day course himself. When a town is selected for one of 38 coveted overnight host spots on a route, it means the opportunity to show off its unique flair, and an excuse to put on a party. While acts as big as Lynyrd Skynyrd have headlined these nightly events, local bands like The Pork Tornadoes draw just as big a crowd. Riders arrive ravenous, lining up for local eats like church spaghetti suppers. Homemade pies, Phippen says, are a big deal. While other states, including Colorado and Missouri, have tried to replicate this legendary bike ride, none have matched Iowa. “That’s because the people of Iowa open their hearts and houses to strangers,” says Phippen. “If a different state truly wants to pull off a multiday ride, they need to recruit Iowans to make it happen.” —Khalid El Khatib

Kansas: Linda Clover

In a country full of quirky roadside attractions, few can match the World’s Largest Ball of Sisal Twine, a 53-year effort led by Linda Clover, in Kansas.

For almost 30 years hopeful visitors to the World’s Largest Ball of Sisal Twine in Cawker City, Kansas, have received the same instruction: “Call Linda.”

This is Linda Clover, volunteer, curator, and caretaker of the 46-foot-wide creation, who’s met thousands of tourists from all over the world at the ball eager to spin some twine and a story. In the summer, she says, the ball might get 200 visitors a day. Last summer people from more than 31 countries signed the attraction’s guest book. “They want to see America,” Clover says. “They don’t only want to see the Gateway Arch or the Statue of Liberty. Sometimes they just want to see something that’s a little different.”

In Cawker City, population 465, the twine ball is a symbol of community—a collective commitment to the bit. Local farmer Frank Stoeber began spinning the ball in 1953, incorporating twine from the hay bales of 85 neighboring farmers. Today the ball comprises about 8.6 million feet of sisal twine, with a weight close to 27,000 pounds. At least a couple million of those feet are directly attributable to Clover, who always carries some twine with her so visitors can add to the ball.

Her dedication is no small thing: In November 2025, Clover was struck by a car while walking to meet a group of tourists and spent the next three months in the hospital, where she celebrated her 82nd birthday. “They didn’t expect me to live,” says Clover, who underwent multiple surgeries and had to learn to walk again. Cards and well-wishes poured in from around the world, as did calls from oblivious travelers. Now she can finally answer them. Clover was released from the hospital in February and has brainstormed a new way to meet visitors at the ball—this time, by golf cart. “I still need a little recuperation time,” she says. “But I will be the belle of the ball again.” —Liz Cook

Kentucky: Jon Hartman

Bourbon, lovingly known as “America’s Spirit,” is the high-proof pride of Kentucky thanks to artisans like Jon Hartman of Buffalo Trace.

For many, Kentucky means bourbon. Distilled since before America’s founding and officially recognized as “America’s spirit” in 1964, the liquor sets itself apart from run-of-the-mill whiskey through its aging process in new charred American oak barrels, among other requirements.

Because of this, the cooperage, or barrel-building facility, is a cornerstone of the Bluegrass State’s bourbon industry. Take Buffalo Trace’s parent company, for example, which makes more than 2,000 barrels a day that are used only once for bourbon, to preserve tradition and maximum flavor extraction. That’s where master wood crafter Jon Hartman comes in, creating heirloom-quality furnishing and gifts by upcycling the single-use barrels through his Whiskey Woodcraft program, located in the distillery’s former cooperage. “I think [these products] bring home Americana in a way nothing else really can,” Hartman says. “The barrels that we’re using, they’ve been used to make bourbon anywhere from four years to up to 23 years here at the distillery.”

After touring the rickhouse where the precious bourbon-filled barrels are stored, visitors can see the final step of the process in the workshop, where barrels are taken apart and given another life. “That's where we can hang out with our guests, educate them about the life cycle of the barrel, and really bring a new personalization to the distillery,” Hartman adds.

The puzzle-like slats holding the barrel together, called staves, are often used in his creations, incorporated into cocktail muddlers and cigar rests, not to mention a recent life-size buffalo made from the spent barrel pieces. Guests can also order customized barrel heads, or lids, to take home. Says Hartman: “I wanted to prove it can be a high-end product, that it can really accentuate what it means to be a Kentucky craftsman.” —Caroline Eubanks

Louisiana: Charlie Gabriel

Follow the sound of jazz through Louisiana, a state that has produced musical legends like Charlie Gabriel, who performs at Preservation Hall.

In the French Quarter of New Orleans, people crowd the sidewalk along St. Peter Street as bluesy notes emanate from an open door. That door leads to Preservation Hall, where musical director Charlie Gabriel lifts his tenor saxophone to play. There’s a soft intake of breath before that first dulcet note; a horn answers in turn. Both sounds curl around the voice of a warm baritone. Gabriel leans into the music, and the bell of his sax catches the light, flashing gold with each movement. The music flows out with ease—quick trills, raspy runs, then long, aching holds that stretch just to the edge of breaking. A woman near the stage closes her eyes, leans forward, elbows on knees, drink forgotten.

Gabriel is a fourth-generation New Orleanian whose family arrived from Santo Domingo in the 1850s. When he was growing up, music filled Gabriel’s childhood home: His mother taught his father (already an accomplished drummer) how to play the clarinet. His brothers picked up the trumpet; one sister played piano, and his oldest sister, the saxophone, as he did. New Orleans jazz legends George Lewis and Kid Shots Madison once came knocking for his father and, when he was “locked up” with other gigs, took young Charlie to play in a parade instead. He still remembers the “prettiest thing I ever heard”: three musicians harmonizing hymns beneath his mother’s window at his childhood home in the Sixth Ward.

He spent many years away from Louisiana; during almost six decades in Detroit, he returned to the Big Easy only once a year with his dad. When Gabriel was forced to watch Hurricane Katrina swallow his hometown on television, he decided to fulfill a promise to himself that he would take his “last breath of air in New Orleans.” He returned in the late 2000s to join the Preservation Hall Jazz Band and ensure that, despite the widespread displacement of jazz musicians in the wake of the hurricane, New Orleans would continue its legacy as the birthplace of jazz.

In that intimate, unamplified room where concerts have been held since 1961, you don’t just hear the music—you feel it vibrating in your chest. Joy threads through every jazz refrain. “He’s always been this guiding light,” says Ben Jaffe, Gabriel’s longtime friend and Preservation Hall creative director. “He [makes] sure this tradition doesn’t die.” Through the Preservation Hall Foundation, Gabriel—who describes himself as “the old guy they all look up to”—also teaches young musicians, handing them instruments and organizing community concerts. In this way, he’s passing down the jazz tradition “the way it passed to me.” —Carrie Honaker

Maine: Tammy Hustus

In the country’s lobster-fishing (and eating) capital, shell-cracking locals like Tammy Hustus of Abel’s Lobster welcome visitors into the fold.

As the largest lobster-producing state in the US, Maine harvests more than 100 million pounds of the shellfish annually. Aside from delighting the taste buds of curious tourists and hardy locals alike, lobster contributes more than $1 billion to the state’s economy. Put simply, Maine would not be Maine without its lobster—and a trip to Maine wouldn’t be complete without eating some.

That’s why Maine’s lobster shacks see long, snaking lines from May through October: Everyone needs their fix, preferably tossed in mayo and tucked into a hot buttered bun. Visitors to the pound at Abel’s Lobster on Mount Desert Island have the privilege of watching 64-year-old Tammy Hustus at work. “I am the mastah lobstah pickah,” she explains, dropping her r's like a true lifelong Mainer. “That’s my title because I’m the fastest.”

After the lobster is cooked in bulk, Hustus puts claws, knuckles, and tails in their respective bins before she begins separating the meat from the shell. “Then I just start cracking away,” she says. “I have hands of steel, I think.”

Last season Hustus handled more than 16,000 lobsters all while chatting animatedly with visitors from around the world—and often introducing them to their first tastes of lobster. “Last year I assisted an elderly couple from out West,” she recounts, explaining they’d never cracked open a lobster before and wanted the full experience. “They were having a hard time doing that, and I happened to be in the dining area. I sat at the table with them, showed them how to do it, and conversed with them for a while. I just really like talking with everybody who comes in and out of there.” —Madeline Bilis

Maryland: Luke McFadden

Blue crab is a way of life in the coastal state of Maryland, and next-gen crabber Luke McFadden showcases it to millions through his social media.

Maryland’s identity is intertwined with the luminous blue crab, which builds up fat reserves in the cold waters of the Chesapeake Bay during winter hibernation, giving it a bold, rich flavor. The Chesapeake Bay produces about half of the United States’ total blue crab harvest, not to mention a bounty of other seafood, including oysters and rockfish.

“If you're coming to Maryland, you've got to try crabs,” says waterman Luke McFadden, one of the state's thousands of licensed commercial crabbers keeping the industry alive amid global competition (many local restaurants import their crabmeat from Venezuela or Southeast Asia to cut costs). At 30, the Asian American is an anomaly in an industry in which the average crabber is nearly twice his age and has far more resources.

His youthful energy has helped make him the face of Maryland’s crab industry in social media videos that cover how to eat, steam, and store the crustacean. With nearly 3 million followers across TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube, McFadden chronicles his adventures aboard his boat, FV Southern Girl, and some hazards of the job: In one video McFadden deftly picks up each crab one by one (and yes, he still gets pinched) and packs them into his ice cooler. You’ll also catch a glimpse of his roadside stand, Bodkin Point Seafood, where he sells his catch on Saturdays and Sundays.

“We sell the crab and the story,” McFadden says. For those visiting Maryland, McFadden advises seeking out obscure spots. If you're in a coastal town and you see a guy sitting with a truck full of crabs, there’s a good chance he caught them himself. —Julekha Dash

Massachusetts: Michael Lepage

In a state older than the country itself, follow the cry of Paul Revere—or a historical reenactor dedicated to portraying him, like Michael Lepage.

While hustling through the streets of downtown Boston, it wouldn’t be completely out of the ordinary to bump into Paul Revere in full period attire (horse not included). But instead of warning the good people of Boston that the British are coming, he’s more likely to be checking the Bruins score on his iPhone.

It happens more than you might think: Downtown Boston is filled with tour guides and historical reenactors who are inordinately passionate about bringing the city’s 401-year history to life. Among the city’s finest is Michael Lepage, who has been honing his Paul Revere character for over 30 years. Today he can be found dressed as Revere at the Paul Revere House or, on special occasions, reenacting the revolutionary’s famous midnight ride. “To be a good Paul Revere, you have to be human,” he says. “He had triumphs, mistakes, and a life beyond the midnight ride. I read his letters, contemporary accounts, and multiple biographies.”

Much of Boston’s tourism scene—which is most visitors’ first exposure to the state of Massachusetts—is dependent on folks like Lepage to keep New England’s centuries-old history relevant for a modern-day audience. This journey through time often follows the Boston Freedom Trail, a two-and-a-half-mile path connecting the city’s most popular historic sites, where international travelers, student groups, and regional visitors alike can be found wandering between centuries-old graveyards and American Revolution memorials.

After three decades of literally and figuratively stepping into Revere’s buckled shoes, Lepage plans on retiring from his day job this summer. And even though most visitors never learn his real name, it’s the human connections he’ll remember most fondly. “I love all the interactions with an audience,” he says. “Especially seeing kids engaged and asking questions, knowing they’ll carry this forward—that warms my heart.” —Todd Plummer

Michigan: Kevin Saunderson

The state that gave us the moving assembly line and the traffic light also gave us techno, whose beats live on through DJs like Kevin Saunderson.

Detroit techno started out as a futuristic experiment meant to “make people move,” says DJ, producer, and artist Kevin Saunderson. He and his collaborators—DJ-producer Juan Atkins and musician Derrick May, with whom he attended junior high in Belleville—took inspiration from early pioneers of the genre, like German electronic band Kraftwerk, and mixed mechanical precision with human emotion to create what he deems “the original signal.” These artists defined their own style in Detroit—raw, soulful, and forward-looking—and eventually captured a global audience. After playing drums as a child, Saunderson credits the 909 drum machine with helping him elevate his production skills and shape his sound—one still alive throughout Detroit. Festivals like Movement attract people from around the world, and big venues including Lincoln Factory host nights with thousands of fans, showcasing the scene’s energy. But the most authentic experiences happen in small clubs and at late-night radio shows where the music was first created. Saunderson suggests starting downtown or at the Jefferson waterfront, then exploring after-hours spots and headline events. “To truly understand Detroit’s spirit, it’s important to listen to the music that inspired us,” Saunderson says, “artists like Earth, Wind & Fire, Prince, Parliament-Funkadelic, Kraftwerk, and others. That foundation of soul, funk, and innovation shaped what we became.” This is music that “still breathes,” he says, connects generations, and is always recognizably Detroit. —Paris Wilson

Minnesota: Douglas L. Micko

Just as iconically American as the State Fair is the sheer act of becoming an American—why not bring two great traditions together, as Judge Douglas L. Micko does?

At the Minnesota State Fair—where most visitors come for cheese curds and seed art—US Magistrate Judge Douglas L. Micko shows up for something more profound: welcoming new Americans.

Appointed to the federal bench in 2023, the born-and-raised Minnesotan presided over the fair’s naturalization ceremony last summer, an effort that began in the 1990s and has taken place annually since 2023. While such ceremonies typically commence in courthouses, the fair’s International Bazaar offers a uniquely Minnesotan backdrop—and one that particularly resonates in today’s fraught immigration climate.

“Not everything you get to do as a judge is fun,” Micko says, “[but with] naturalization, everybody is thrilled.” The fair’s ceremony—usually with around 50 new citizens—feels especially intimate. The pride in the room is palpable: “It’s astounding to see all of the faces just light up…watching kids translate for their parents, couples holding hands as tightly as they ever had. It’s just fantastic to see.” The Oath of Allegiance, he reminds them, does not erase where they’ve come from. “It doesn’t mean that you turn your back on your homeland or your culture or your traditions,” he says. “Those are what makes America the country that it is.”

A lifelong fair devotee, Micko has traditions of his own: splitting a foot-long hot dog—half ketchup, half mustard—with his wife; ordering a bucket of chocolate chip cookies from Sweet Martha’s; and riding the Midway’s famously stomach-churning Zipper with his three kids. After all, as he puts it, “everyone has their spot [at the fair]…. Now all those families can point to the International Bazaar and say, ‘That’s where so-and-so became a United States citizen.’ That’s just really cool.” —Ashlea Halpern

Mississippi: Tracy “Rev” Collins

There are at least two sides to the story of life on plantations in antebellum Mississippi, and interpreters like Tracy “Rev” Collins are sharing all of them.

Natchez, Mississippi, once a booming plantation town in the South that, since the 1920s (when the boll weevil arrived), has relied on tourism of the wistful antebellum variety, is being pushed into a more truthful present by tour guides like the good Reverend Tracy “Rev” Collins. From his vantage point as a preacher and community leader in nearby Jefferson County, Rev saw that many homeowners who ran tours of the well-maintained historic piles that have stayed in their families for generations were not exactly grappling with the uglier aspects of life there not too long ago. Instead they’d invite guests to play dress-up in full hoop-skirt dresses, and whenever they did reference their ancestors’ slaves—if they were mentioned at all—they’d call them “servants” and “help.” That’s not the type of tour Rev is interested in giving when you come through Natchez.

If you’re visiting and haven’t booked with him in advance, you may first encounter Rev at the Natchez Visitor Center. We see it happen in Natchez, a 2025 documentary about the town’s history and tourism, in which Rev plays a big part. In the film he approaches a trio of aimless travelers collecting brochures and invites them to join his tour. Despite the somber nature of the sites he’ll take you to—including Forks of the Road, once the nation’s second-busiest slave-trading market and now a National Parks historical site—he is never dour nor chastising. Once they’re in the van, Rev lets his new charges know: “It turns out that millennials and Generation Z folks are not as interested in the antebellum story, the Gone With the Wind story, as the baby boomers are…which is where I come in,” he says. “I’m about to violate some Southern-pride narratives with truths and facts.” —Charlie Hobbs

Missouri: Johnny Morris

You can teach a man to fish, or you can take him to Bass Pro Shops, founded by Johnny Morris.

In 1970, after competing in Table Rock Lake’s first All-American Bass Tournament, Johnny Morris searched for specialized lures he’d seen other anglers use. When he couldn’t find them locally, he borrowed $10,000—cosigned by his father—and started selling tackle out of his dad’s liquor store in Springfield, Missouri. That tackle business ultimately evolved into the mecca of outdoor outfitters: Bass Pro Shops.

While the chain has expanded to almost 200 locations, local community and conservation (the company has preserved millions of acres of land for wildlife) are at the core of not only Bass Pro but also Morris’s personal ethos. “Thinking about the people who came before us—their reverence for the land and wildlife, their understanding of the need for conservation—it’s our obligation to share, to pass that on,” he says.

Morris grew up along the White River (a portion of which was dammed to create today’s Table Rock Lake) in the Ozarks, where fishing wasn’t just a pastime but a way of life. So much so that Missourians with Morris’s mentality self-imposed sales taxes to protect their waterways and wildlife so that future generations can take part in a tradition that has helped shape the tenacity and self-reliance of the area.

Morris likes to say he’s been trying to bend his fishing rod since he was in diapers, a lifelong obsession that influences how people experience the region today. Of the more than 40 million annual visitors to the state, about a quarter seek outdoor recreation, including fishing at the state’s extensive network of fishing holes—rivers like the Missouri and Mississippi, as well as more than 2,700 lakes—meaning a stop at Bass Pro is almost always in order. —Taryn Shorr-McKee

Montana: Lailani Upham

Hiking and storytelling coalesce in northwest Montana, where guide Lailani Upham teaches about Indigenous tradition while walking visitors across the land itself.

Montana has long inspired storytelling rooted in its history—from Norman Maclean’s A River Runs Through It to Taylor Sheridan’s Yellowstone. Its grandeur, natural beauty, and larger-than-life mythos fuel these narratives, with some of the most sacred stories belonging to those who have resided on the land from time immemorial.

But those histories and legends, the ones of Montana’s Indigenous peoples, would be largely unknown to the wider population if it weren’t for people like Lailani Upham. A tribal member of the Amskapi Pikuni (Blackfeet Nation) and founder of Iron Shield Creative, an organization that centers storytelling through outdoor experiences and creative media, she leads workshop hikes through what she describes as “culturally and ecologically significant places across Montana,” with a focus on the public land around Glacier National Park. Her work ensures visitors understand that the majesty and importance of the natural world extend beyond entry gates and designated borders. Often, she says, travelers see Ninaistako (Chief Mountain), a 9,080-foot peak that straddles the boundary between Glacier and the Blackfeet Reservation, as a “geographical monument and not [a] place [that] holds spiritual and cultural meaning that predates Montana, let alone tourism of Glacier National Park.”

During the Iron Shield Creative experiences, Upham and other “story guides” introduce guests to Indigenous oral traditions, songs, language, and historical accounts; she calls them “intentional journeys into [the] larger community of our ecosystems.” Each hike varies by guide, location, and topics covered, but her goal remains the same: leave guests with a “deeper and personal understanding of place” and the awareness that Montana’s Indigenous communities are still here. —Lydia Mansel

Nebraska: Marcos Stoltzfus

One of the greatest bird migrations takes place in Nebraska each spring, and leaders of the Audubon Society like Marcos Stoltzfus connect those on the ground with winged friends overhead.

Each spring the skies over central Nebraska fill with a special sound—a rolling, trumpeting, almost prehistoric chorus—as a slew of sandhill cranes descend on the wide and shallow reaches of the Platte River. For a resplendent few weeks between late February and early April, this quiet stretch of prairie transforms into North America’s greatest wildlife spectacle: Roughly a million cranes stop to rest and refuel during their migration north.

At the heart of this experience is the Iain Nicolson Audubon Center at Rowe Sanctuary, a 3,000-acre preserve, where center director Marcos Stoltzfus and his team serve as planners and guides, coordinating both conservation efforts and the flow of tens of thousands of visitors each season. “In the morning guests walk out under cover of darkness using red flashlights and, once arriving at the viewing blind, wait as the sun slowly rises and the light allows us to find out where the cranes have decided to roost for the night,” Stolzfus explains. “It can be a magical experience to begin discerning the swath of gray on the river only to realize that...they are birds!” The evening viewing, he says, is more leisurely and allows visitors to see thousands of cranes circling and jockeying for the perfect spot on the sandbars. “For the best experience, do both,” adds Stozfus, who is passionate about sharing the wonders of the natural world with others.

While the sandhill (and whooping) cranes are the headline act; the sanctuary’s efforts extend beyond a single species. Stoltzfus and his team are deeply involved in protecting the broader Platte River ecosystem, a vital habitat that supports more than 240 species, including terns and bald eagles, year-round. Still, it’s the cranes that best define this place, an annual ritual that remains one of nature’s most stirring experiences. And Rowe Sanctuary, which celebrated 50 years of conservation in 2025, ensures that travelers will continue to witness it. —Katy Spratte Joyce

Nevada: Brendan Paul

For impromptu wedding ceremonies and what-happens-in-Vegas parties, Elvis impersonators like Brendan Paul keep the King of Rock and Roll’s spirit alive and well.

In 1995, Brendan Paul drove to Las Vegas with a microwave, a guitar, $400, and the dream of becoming an Elvis impersonator. While an art student at UCLA (and a punk guitarist), he had thick sideburns and styled his dyed black hair in spikes, grew it out in rebellion against the now too trendy punk scene, and got into classic rock. One day he cut his hair short, and suddenly people looked at him differently. A classmate said her roommate was an Elvis Presley fan. Could he sing her “Happy Birthday” for $100? That dorm-room performance led to one Elvis gig and then another, and after college Paul found himself living in a weekly hotel, thumbing through the yellow pages for Elvis opportunities in the city where the King himself revolutionized Las Vegas residencies.

If Las Vegas is a place of reinvention, then Paul has mastered the art. Today, after performing on cruises, at NASCAR events, and at Vegas conventions, he is the owner of Graceland Chapel, which claims to be the city’s first wedding chapel to offer Elvis impersonators as officiants. Some days he officiates 22 ceremonies: each 15 minutes long, replete with Elvis-themed puns (vows evoke “Blue Suede Shoes” and “Return to Sender”). He has become something of an ambassador for the city—the local tourism board sent him abroad on a number of trips to represent the city as Elvis—but he says his career is typical for Vegas, where workers serve some 40 million tourists annually. “This whole city is the service industry, whether you're parking cars, serving people in a club, checking them in to a hotel,” Paul says. “The limo drivers, the ministers, the coordinators, the Elvis impersonators, the photographers—we're all equal.” Just don’t mistake him for the actual Elvis. Now that the King has been dead for nearly 50 years, the impersonators have become more iconic in Vegas than the actual person. —Meg Bernhard

New Hampshire: Jim Salge

The art of leaf-peeping relies on perfect timing, and fall foliage reporter Jim Salge will help you witness this seasonal magic.

New Hampshire is special year-round, but it’s during fall—with the state’s unbroken forests, country lanes, and southern suburban neighborhoods erupt into an extraordinary palette of fire-engine red, marigold, and burnt orange—when it shines brightest. The fall foliage season, which draws “leaf peepers” from across the US and around the world, generates an estimated $1.8 billion in revenue for the state each year. As visitors plan their trips, hoping to time their arrival perfectly for peak foliage, many turn to one man: Jim Salge, a former meteorologist at the Mount Washington Observatory and longtime foliage reporter for the regional Yankee Magazine.

Salge’s work begins as far out as 16 months, when he begins measuring forests for signs of hydraulic stress by observing caterpillars, measuring winter snowpack, and tracking the seed production of trees—all in the hope of correctly forecasting a fleeting, days-long flush of colors. “It's really important to get the timing right, especially when people fly in from all over to see it,” says Salge, who couldn’t imagine doing anything else. “I love spending time in the forests of New England year-round—this job just grounds me in being extra observant about all the little things that make up the ecosystem.” —Catherine Tansey

New Jersey: Mario Costa

The humble diner is a longtime staple of any New Jersey visit, and gems like Mario Costa’s White Mana refuse to let tradition flounder.

Mario Costa started slinging a mop and a rag at White Mana Diner in 1972, when he was a 16-year-old high school student. A Portuguese immigrant, he was making $1.57 an hour in order to save money for law school. “It’s where you’d take a date or show off your car throughout the ’60s and ’70s,” he says. Seven years later Costa was practically running the establishment when it suddenly went up for sale. Risking his law school goals, he took ownership of the Jersey City hangout and built it into a standout within the state’s modern-day diner culture. Serving staples like breakfast sandwiches made with Jersey's iconic Taylor ham, egg, and cheese to everyone from cops and construction workers to mobsters and business executives, his diner remains the ultimate egalitarian gathering spot where one can find bottomless black coffee, Formica and chrome decor, cheap food, and speedy service.

The building was constructed for the 1939 World's Fair and dubbed “the diner of the future” because it allowed cooks to prepare and serve food with unheard-of efficiency. With an exterior that looks more like a circular UFO, the structure is a departure from the rail-carriage design common among many American diners. Since landing on Tonnelle Avenue in 1946, it has stood as a token of New Jersey's history, and today White Mana is juxtaposed against the renovated warehouses beside it.

Yet despite being the predecessor to McDonald’s and Starbucks, the humble American diner has been fading across the country—although it remains the backbone of communities across New Jersey today. Immortalized in numerous songs by the pride of Jersey, Bruce Springsteen, some 500 diners can still be found in the tiny state, which also served as the hub of prefab diner manufacturing for much of the early 20th century. In White Mana’s case, the diner’s rise from fair exhibit to real restaurant has brought nationwide attention over the years, but most reviewers agree that its burger cooked over a bed of onions lives up to the hype. Culinary fame aside, this seems to be exactly what Costa was aiming for: a place where locals and visitors from around the country can connect. “The diner was the place to meet,” says Costa. “When I started, the diner mentality was: ‘No one is more important than anyone else here.’ And that hasn’t changed.” —Jen Murphy

New Mexico: Dawn & Robert Federico

Along Route 66, neon motel signs guide travelers through New Mexico, and friendly faces like Dawn and Robert Federico are always behind the check-in desks.

Driving along Route 66, through the high-desert town of Tucumcari, the Blue Swallow Motel glows like a multicolored mirage. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the 12-room boutique boasts the kind of neon-lit stucco that inspires travelers to hit the brakes, whether for a tour, a night, or—like owners Dawn and Robert Federico—a lifetime. “It aligned with our interests in Americana and neon,” says Dawn, who bought the motel in 2020. “Keeping that piece of Americana alive, when everything [in America] is being torn down and replaced, these historic relics are few and far between.” It was originally the Blue Swallow Court when it opened in 1940, and the Federicos join a lineage of travelers transfixed by its exterior. In Pixar’s Cars, the Cozy Cone Motel was inspired by the Blue Swallow Motel, and Bob Dylan even stopped to paint it around 2019. “We know the angle [from which] he painted it,” she says, pointing to the iconic blue swallow sign out front. “But we don’t know if he stayed here, because if he did he used a pseudonym.”

With nonguests encouraged to take photos and tours, the property functions as much as a Route 66 museum as it does a motel, with the Federicos doubling as guides. “Being on the National Register of Historic Places, it preserves each room as a time capsule as to what life was like in the ’50s,” Dawn adds, describing each day—and each passerby—as a new adventure. “You can never script a day at the Blue Swallow Motel, and we are constant docents for this place. You never know what every day brings.” —Matt Kirouac

New York: Nita Aviance

At the heart of New York is the city that never sleeps, and DJ Nita Aviance keeps the beat going.

From the Warholian muses of Midtown megaclubs to Brooklyn warehouse raves, nightlife is a cornerstone of New York’s history and identity—it now brings in over $35 billion annually. Every neighborhood has its own part in the story too, as the nightlife nexus has migrated up and down Manhattan, shimmied across the East River and back, and transformed, faltered, and thrived again over the past six decades. For many, the city after dark is a way of life and means of reinvention.

DJ, producer, and party promoter Nita Aviance knows this to be true. She came to the city in the late 1990s for college but stayed for the community she found going out dancing to synths. She quickly became involved with the House of Aviance—an intrinsic part of the historically Black, brown, and queer ballroom subculture—by performing drag, and then she moved into DJ’ing. “These were dives, but they were our dives,” she recalls of the poor sound systems, broken equipment, and overall charming dilapidation of the downtown do-it-yourself spaces she frequented along Bowery and Avenue A as a newcomer to the city. Though she’s traded in sets at the now closed Opaline and Twilo for ones at hugely popular Brooklyn and Queens venues like Nowadays, Good Room, and Basement, the continual transformation of the city’s queer and nightlife scenes remains a source of excitement. “This is a beautiful thing we have that’s ours—truly ours—and it could really change your life,” Aviance says.

Whether she’s spinning on her own or performing as one half of electronic duo The Carry Nation, the musician sees a good DJ set as one that embraces the unexpected, allowing its clubgoers to listen and experience. Whether it’s house rhythms, hard drums, or playful samples, it’s about pairing things together that one might not think to match, breaking down a song and stitching it up with another, toying with genre or doing away with it entirely. It’s that distinct American sense of discovery and freedom that keeps fans—both seasoned and new—resonating with her work over two decades later. Aviance has seen the rise and fall of music scenes and queer spaces, still with all the hope and curiosity for what’s to come. “There’s something new to discover around every corner,” Aviance says. “That’s New York, and I think that’s the dance floor too.” —Skyli Alvarez

North Carolina: Phil Jamison

There’s a lot more to square dancing than just the formation, and that’s what keeps contra caller Phil Jamison performing the regional art.

Phil Jamison travels the world sharing his love of Appalachian folk dance with diverse audiences—but western North Carolina is lucky to have him as a regular “caller,” or instructor, at local square dances.

Jamison first began calling square dances 50 years ago and has been based in the Asheville area since 1980. Every dance begins with a lesson, he says, making it an accessible way for visitors to take part in a small piece of Appalachian culture, regardless of whether they are a dancer themselves or just a music lover. March through May, visitors can join a monthly square dance at the Haw Creek Commons, a community center in Asheville, the first Saturday of each month, September through May.

From 2020 to 2024, Asheville’s population boomed, with more than 16,000 new residents moving in, and the question of who gets to participate in Appalachian culture found an answer in the square dancing circles that have always welcomed newcomers to the Tar Heel State. Jamison says that, after the French helped America beat the British in the Revolutionary War, Americans became enamored with French culture. One aspect of that cultural exchange was the square form in group dances, which the French called the quadrille. In the Appalachian mountains, this form took particular root. “Appalachian forms are more circular in nature, rather than lines, like contra dances,” says Jamison. “So rather than being across the line from your partner, your partner’s beside you, either in a square or a circle.”

As this new influx of North Carolinians begins to take part, Jamison says his own dedication comes down to the human connections dancing fosters. “It’s rare that in normal life you’re holding hands with people you don’t know, or putting your arms around them swinging,” he says. “You do that in the course of the evening, and you have connections with people.” —Sarah Melotte

North Dakota: Danni Melquist

North Dakota might not be the first stop on a journey to visit every state, but as visitor center director Danni Melquist sees it, everyone loves to save the best for last.

Danni Melquist came to North Dakota in 2015 by way of San Diego, where she attended college. While some might question trading the beach for the Badlands, it took only weeks for the under-the-radar state to win her over. Days after arriving she signed up as a travel ambassador for Visit Fargo-Moorhead, hoping to get to know her new home from the inside out.

Once she’d settled in, Melquist invited her boyfriend (now husband) to visit, taking him on a cross-state road trip to see the places she’d been recommending all summer. “We were blown away by the sunflowers and loved seeing the world’s largest Holstein cow in New Salem,” she says, recalling the 38-by-50-foot bovine, which can be seen from five miles away. “That trip cemented my love for the region.”

Now the marketing director of Visit Fargo-Moorhead, Melquist relishes helping others rethink North Dakota. She knows it’s rarely at the top of must-visit lists. Instead of resisting that reputation, she leans into it. Enter the Best for Last Club, founded in 2013 to honor people who have visited all other 49 states first, and make North Dakota their 50th. Promoted by locals, hotels, and restaurants, the club has inducted more than 8,600 members, each receiving a T-shirt, certificate, and a round of applause. Every inductee matters, Melquist says, but one stands out: a 97-year-old man from Indiana who reached out to a nonprofit to help fulfill his bucket list dream. Unable to reach the visitor center, he received his certificate and shirt delivered to his car—sparking smiles and heartfelt thanks.

“North Dakota often ends up as the final state because it’s seen as ‘out of the way,’” she says. But she firmly believes it’s worth a detour for its food (“The best dirty martini in Fargo can be found at Mezzaluna”), history (“I can’t wait for the the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library to open in Medora this summer!”), and its serene landscapes (“A show at Bluestem Amphitheater just steps from the Red River of the North in Moorhead is a must”). Turns out, there are even beaches—among the other reasons to swing through or settle down. —Karla Walsh

Ohio: Amanda Pecsenye

Behind the handwritten lyrics and archival concert outfits in Ohio’s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is Amanda Pecsenye, whose curatorial eye uncovers new artifacts amid the persistent rumble of rock music.

Set on a plaza shaped like a massive record player, the sparkling glass pyramid of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame stands out in Cleveland’s industrial skyline. But it’s not the building that draws visitors from around the country. The real attraction is the work of a couple hundred people behind the scenes, sourcing and arranging everything inside. At the center of it all is Amanda Pecsenye, director of curatorial affairs, who started as an intern in the early 2000s and cycled through different roles before landing in curation. One of her first tasks was collecting and curating for an exhibit on U2, a band she loves. Since then, she’s met inductees, unpacked artifacts from visionaries like George Michael, and worked with artists to open new exhibits. Above all, she is a music fan, emotionally connected to every exhibit at the Rock Hall.

After college in Bowling Green, Pecsenye was drawn to Cleveland, the beating heart of rock and roll. DJ Alan Freed, who popularized the term “rock and roll,” was based here, and the city hosted what’s widely considered the first rock concert. Pecsenye is passionate about diversifying the Rock Hall’s exhibits to reflect the genre’s scene today. On your way to see a garment worn by Chappell Roan or Prince’s Cloud #2 guitar, you’ll pass gallery labels—many written by Pecsenye—highlighting lesser-known talent. “I want fans to not only see the artifacts and exhibits of their favorites,” she says, “but to learn about artists they haven’t heard of.” Her deep knowledge and love of music are obvious, but she makes everyone feel included: “Music has always been part of my life. If you think rock and roll does not include the music that you like, you’re wrong. Rock and roll is a spirit and an attitude.” —Jamie Spain

Oklahoma: Kenneth LeBlanc

Black cowboys have long shaped Oklahoma culture, and third-generation cowboy Kenneth LeBlanc gives the community a stage with the annual Roy LeBlanc Invitational Rodeo.

In 1956, at a time when Black cowboys weren’t allowed to compete in rodeos, Charles LeBlanc wrangled 22 Black farmers and ranchers to create the Okmulgee County Roundup Club, an organization that would go on to launch the Okmulgee All Colored Rodeo. Seventy years later, his grandson Kenneth LeBlanc is keeping tradition alive at what has become the nation’s oldest continuously operating Black rodeo. Now named after his late father, Roy, Charles’s son, who was himself instrumental in keeping the Black rodeo running every August, the Roy LeBlanc Invitational Rodeo remains an enduring homage to the overlooked legacy of the Black cowboy. “There have always been Black cowboys, even when they were written out of history books,” explains LeBlanc, producer of the invitational rodeo and a cowboy specializing in steer wrestling, which entails jumping onto a running bull from a horse and grappling it to the ground.

Due largely to Native tribes’ bringing enslaved people with them to the region in the mid 1800s, Oklahoma and Texas have the largest number of all-Black towns in the nation. This has resulted in these two states also having the most Black cowboys, LeBlanc says—like legendary Oklahoma cowboy Bass Reeves, who served as deputy marshal in Oklahoma Territory during the late 19th century, said to have inspired The Lone Ranger. But rodeo attendees include hundreds of out-of-state cowboys and thousands of spectators, who come from across the country for calf roping, steer wrestling, bull riding, and the Pony Express, an eight-man relay race on horseback, which originated at Oklahoma rodeos in the early 1970s. This year’s rodeo, held on August 7 and 8, is moving to the Heart of Oklahoma Exposition Center in Shawnee to accommodate rising attendance. “We can turn on the TV if we want to see white cowboys,” says LeBlanc. “This is one of the few places where you can watch Black cowboys and cowgirls.” —Matt Kirouac

Oregon: Kevin Cook

Oregon promised you drag brunch, and at Darcelle XV Showplace, the good times stand on a long legacy of queer history, carried forward by performers like Kevin Cook, a.k.a. Poison Waters.

When you walk into Darcelle XV Showplace in Portland, Oregon, you step into something between a drag queen’s time capsule and the liveliest room in the city. Framed photos and decades-old show posters cover the walls of the Old Town Chinatown venue, where drag artists have performed since 1967. In a city where seemingly every neighborhood now has its own drag brunch or bingo night, Darcelle’s is the foundation they all stand on: the longest-running drag venue on the West Coast, opened two years before Stonewall by the late Darcelle XV, who held the Guinness World Record for oldest working drag queen until her death in 2023 at age 92.

“Of course, the concern when Darcelle passed was, is that the end of the club? Is there any interest in Darcelle’s without Darcelle?” says Poison Waters, a.k.a. Kevin Cook, the venue’s main host and inarguably the reigning queen of drag in Portland. Evidently so. When 60-plus performers staged a 48-hour Dragathon to honor Darcelle’s memory, they raised $293,000 for The Trevor Project and nabbed a Guinness World Record of their own.

Cook has performed at Darcelle’s since the 1990s and has spent 38 years in drag. She’s a campy-meets-glamour queen whose reach, like the late Darcelle before her, now extends well beyond the club. She hosts monthly drag queen bingo at the landmark McMenamins Kennedy School, plays Mother Ginger in Oregon Ballet Theatre’s annual Nutcracker, and last year received an honorary doctorate from Portland State University for her support in student and cultural life in the city. “My personality, my stage presence, my work in the community are just so quintessentially Portland,” Cook says. Visitors from around the world now regularly stop in, and Cook says that drag in her hometown has never been busier. “Because the world is so crappy right now, people are coming out. There are almost not enough queens for all the needs,” Cook says with a laugh. “People want joy and laughter, and we’re happy to bring it.” —JD Shadel

Pennsylvania: Gritty

Nobody ever said Pennsylvania was short on personality—and hometown pride takes a baffling but beloved form in Gritty, the Philly Flyers mascot.

Few faces are as iconically Philadelphian as Gritty. Since his debut in 2018, the Philly Flyers’ mascot has speed skated, tasered, and body-checked his way into the heart of the City of Brotherly Love. Whether he’s raising hell and chucking buckets of popcorn at the home crowd during hockey games at Xfinity Mobile Arena or dumpster diving down Broad Street for half-eaten cheesesteaks, never expect Gritty to do anything partway.

Debate persists on exactly what Gritty is—man, muppet, furry orange cryptid—but he’s not one to wallow in existentialism. “Honestly, I don’t think. I just be. Be present, be chaotic, be Gritty,” the mascot told Condé Nast Traveler. “Thinking is boring, thinking is going through the motions. I don’t want the crowd to watch me. I want them to experience me.”

While some say he's rough around the edges, a little more forcefully enthusiastic than necessary with his never-blinking googly eyes and seven-foot frame, he’s always been unapologetically himself. Friend or foe? Well-meaning or vaguely threatening? Gritty thrives in the center of the Venn diagram connecting these tensions. He’s the modern all-American rogue we never knew we needed. And he suffers no fools when it comes to defending Philly Flyers pride (watch out, Penguins fans), and it just doesn’t get more Philly than that. —Kat Chen

Puerto Rico: Efrén David Robles

It’s hard to turn away from all those dazzling beaches, but the natural bounty of Puerto Rico is equally compelling at farms like Fruitos del Guacabo, run by Efrén David Robles.

In Manatí, near a chain of Taíno caves and the Tortuguero Nature Reserve (the island’s only natural lagoon), Efrén David Robles is expanding the idea of what Puerto Rico offers beyond San Juan’s beaches and El Yunque National Forest. At Fruitos del Guacabo, Robles’s 250-acre family farm, visitors step into what he calls “a small agro-ecological campus—life science going on all the time.”

“It’s a classroom,” says Robles, who was born in Arecibo and raised in Manatí and is now a cofounder of the culinary agro-hub farm. “A way of understanding how we grow food; what happens after harvest; the cooking methods; the preservation; and the sustainability behind it.” Guests milk goats, walk down hydroponic rows, learn how edible flowers act as pollinators in pesticide-free ecosystems, and sit down for farm-to-table meals meant to spark conversation. “You taste, you smell, you touch, you feel. That’s the essence of what we do.”

Since its 2010 inception, the small hydroponic farm has been powered by Robles’s family along with 16 employees from the local farm-to-table community, and it has evolved into a comprehensive, sustainable agro-tourism experience that stretches island-wide as a distribution network. They grow everything from lettuce and arugula to peppers, carrots, mangoes, and more—depending on what’s in season and requested from their chefs and partners. Guacabo collaborates with another 50 farmers and roughly 200 restaurants, like Mario Pagán’s group and Bacoa, as well as organizations like World Central Kitchen. “We don’t consider ourselves suppliers,” he says. “We’re partners. I take chefs to the farm to understand what it costs to grow and harvest.”

That collaboration extends to travelers too—hosting group dinners, film screenings, and community events on the farm that bring fresh energy to his hometown. “For us, it’s an honor to show who we are as Puerto Ricans,” Robles says. “Food is the most expressive art we have.” —Jessica Chapel

Rhode Island: Patricia Miller

The smallest state is also home to “America’s First Resort Town,” where Gilded Age mansions are lovingly maintained by conservationists like Patricia Miller.

Forget about the Hamptons—in the mid-19th and early 20th centuries, everybody who was anybody (the Astors and Vanderbilts chief among them) absconded to gobsmackingly glamorous vacation homes in Newport, Rhode Island, earning this seaside city the title of “America’s first resort town.” Wealthy sunseekers still summer in many of these Gilded Age mansions, but a smattering of the most grand estates are open to the public as museums, dubbed the Newport Mansions. They’re connected by a free three-and-a-half-mile coastal trail known as the Cliff Walk—one of the biggest tourist draws to America’s smallest state.

Perhaps no one understands the allure of these properties better than Patricia Miller, the chief conservator at the Preservation Society of Newport County. Since 2015 she’s led a team of highly trained conservationists who work day in and day out to ensure that the period furniture, textiles, artworks, and exteriors of the 10 heritage properties designated as Newport Mansions—from iconic The Breakers to more under-the-radar Chateau-sur-Mer (her favorite)—are protected for centuries to come. “Just about everything that you see in these homes is under our purview,” says Miller.

A typical day on the job might entail whipping out cotton swabs to repair a centuries-old console table, conducting deep-dive research on any given artifact, or helping HBO’s production team with set dressing when they come over to film The Gilded Age, which they’ve been doing since 2021. “I can be in two or more mansions in one day,” Miller says. “The most common question I get from the public is ‘Oh my gosh, what is it like to work here?’ And I tell them it's a dream. Every once in a while, you stop in The Breakers and look out a window at the beautiful ocean, and it's almost better than living there.”

While many visitors to Newport end up saving their mansion tours for spots of bad weather, when sailing trips and beach days are off the table, Miller recommends doing the opposite: “They're spectacular on a beautiful day, because that's how they're meant to be seen—especially the gardens.” And don’t be surprised if you do run into someone from the conservation team when you’re oohing and ahhing. “You can witness some sort of preservation going on at pretty much any time of year,” she says. “These houses are not getting any younger.” —Hannah Chubb

South Carolina: Corey Alston

The Gullah Geechee culture of the Lowcountry lives on through art forms like sweetgrass baskets, deftly woven by people like Corey Alston.

Welcoming visitors at the entrance to the Historic Charleston City Market, Corey Alston sits weaving strands of sweetgrass into intricate basket designs. Though the craft has traditionally been passed down from mother to daughter across Gullah Geechee communities, Alston learned the skill from his mother-in-law 22 years ago and is now a fifth-generation sweetgrass weaver. He remains one of the few men actively practicing the art, carrying on a family tradition deeply rooted in the history and culture of the Lowcountry.

Historically, these coiled baskets were used by enslaved West Africans to separate husks from grain in rice fields throughout the 18th century, as the Carolinas’ grasses resembled those found in West Africa. Over time, basketry evolved into a craft among their descendants—with designs used to carry items such as sewing tools, homemade bread, and flowers—for both practical and economic purposes. Recognized as the official state handcraft of South Carolina since 2006, this coastal art form has endured for over 300 years and remains a cornerstone of the Gullah. “When people enter the market, I get to provide them with both history and a keepsake of Charleston’s rich Gullah Geechee culture,” Alston says.

“What is America without the Gullah people?” he asks. “Gullah sweetgrass baskets are a national treasure, and I am proud to be able to represent our culture and the history of South Carolina.” —Barbara Skidmore

South Dakota: Sequoia Crosswhite

A lot is left out of the history carved into Mount Rushmore, and cultural interpreter Sequoia Crosswhite is ready to share those overlooked perspectives with visitors.

As you approach Mount Rushmore, you’ll see the faces of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln towering overhead. During the summer you’ll also see, at eye level, Sequoia Crosswhite (of the Cheyenne River Sioux tribe), who might greet you with a Lakota flute song or dance—or a history lesson.

For the past 13 years, Crosswhite, a direct descendent of Chief War Eagle and Chief Swift Cloud, has acted as a cultural interpreter for the Mount Rushmore Society. He uses his performances to educate visitors about the history of the Black Hills and the power of conservation, while also honoring those who will never have their likeness carved in the big wall of stone looming overhead. “[The performances] allow me to reflect on all of the individuals—many of whom have zero monuments in their honor—who had to sacrifice so much for our lives to be easier and paved the way for so many others,” he says. “I think of people like the athlete Jim Thorpe or Hiroshima veteran Ira Hayes. Being able to share those stories makes me even more proud to be an American.”

Crosswhite, who was raised by a Native American mother and a German English father in Rapid City (about a half-hour drive from Mount Rushmore), has mixed feelings about what the monument traditionally represents. Because it was constructed on burial grounds for the Lakota people and other Black Hills–based tribes, “at first it felt almost like graffiti to have a monument here,” he says. Now Crosswhite can acknowledge the beauty in the art, respect the workers who crafted the carvings, and appreciate the opportunity to tell a story larger than the monument itself.

As such, Crosswhite ends every conversation at the monument the same way: “Mitakuye oyasin,” a sacred Lakota phrase that translates to “We are all related.” —Karla Walsh

Tennessee: Kathy Self, Cricket Russell, and Poke Fine

If Dolly Parton’s music is a portrait of life in Tennessee, then Dollywood is the gallery within which to enjoy it. Consider longtime employees (and sisters) Kathy Self, Cricket Russell, and Poke Fine your fun-loving docents.

For Kathy Self, Cricket Russell, and Poke Fine, the well-worn aphorism that their workforce is just like a family is grounded in an astounding truth: The three sisters work at Dollywood as hosts, which the theme park calls its employees. Less a job description than a philosophy, hosts are a reflection of its mission to treat each and every one of the park's 3 million annual visitors like guests in their home—a task the trio have been pulling off at the Pigeon Forge–based theme park for 40 years.

When the siblings picked up summer jobs back in the 1980s working concessions at East Tennessee’s then newest attraction, they had no idea they’d found their lifelong vocations. “I guess they just loved us, and we made a great big hit, I reckon,” Fine says, “and we hope we can make Dollywood a better place because we are here.”

Nowadays, if guests should be lucky enough to find Self watering the flowers with her landscaping team, Russell serving soft serve and fries from her food stand, or Fine keeping the facilities tidy as she works house and grounds, they can rest assured they’ll be taken care of. From their reassuring East Tennessean accents, with staccato swings and high pitches akin to Dolly’s own, to their dedication to get up as early as four in the morning to start the day, the sisters embody a core truth about the park that hasn’t changed since its opening day: As Russell puts it, “When you’re treated good, then you will treat other people good as well.” —Kat Chen

Texas: Tootsie Tomanetz

Pitmasters tend the flames of Texas barbecue with heart, soul, and a whole lot of dedication—and the smoky, juicy meat, like that of Tootsie Tomanetz at Snow’s BBQ, draws diners across state lines.

On Saturdays thick plumes of smoke rise from the pits at Snow’s BBQ in Lexington, Texas (population: 1,319; just under an hour away from Austin by car), carrying the scent of post oak over a line of hungry barbecue devotees waiting in camp chairs that they set up before the sun even rose. Coals crackle, flames lick meat, and at the center of the pit stands Tootsie Tomanetz, 91 years old with tree-trunk arms and the nimble grace of a woman half her age. With her snow-white hair swept back, she’s flipping briskets, gauging heat by feel, and conducting a symphony of fire and smoke with six decades of practiced care.

But her path began somewhat by accident back in 1966, when she stepped in to help a short-handed crew at City Market in nearby Luling, Texas. One day turned into a decade, then a lifetime. When Snow’s BBQ opened in 2003, its owner, Kerry Bexley, asked his longtime friend Tomanetz to run the pits. “The TLC she gives the meat, that’s the key,” Bexley says. Her methods—slow, deliberate cooking; seasoning meat only with salt and pepper; mopping the chicken with a special sauce—almost stand in for that true Texan attitude: bold, straightforward, no-nonsense. These days Tomanetz’s methods are the secret sauce behind the fare at Snow’s BBQ. She arrives at the pit around 6:30 or 7:30 a.m. each day, after others have tended the pit overnight, stoking the fire and keeping an eye on the meat that cooks for upwards of 12 hours. When it’s her turn, she applies the finishing touches, coaxing the final product to that perfect balance of juicy interior and crusted bark.

For Tootsie, the joy is simple: “I love being around people, barbecuing, and seeing their expressions when they take a bite.” Travelers come to Texas for barbecue, but here they come just as much to see the woman tending the fire. “As long as God gives me a good, strong body, clear mind, and the ability to get around and meet people, I will keep showing up,” she says. “At 91 years old, I know I’m living on borrowed time, but I sure hope I have a lot of that borrowed time left.” —Carrie Honaker

Utah: Lynn Turner

Fun fact: Your family history may sit in Utah, within the world’s largest collection of genealogical data, where genealogists like Lynn Turner help visitors uncover their history.

Visitors passing through the imposing glass doors of FamilySearch Library on Salt Lake City’s Temple Square are likely to pause at the sheer size of the five-story, 135,000-square-foot archive, which houses the largest collection of genealogical data in the world. The center’s resources—all free—include more than a million books and periodicals, with 400 terminals and 75 staff members available to help dig through them. “We have county histories, marriage records, newspaper clippings, obituaries, and tombstone transcriptions,” says director Lynn Turner, explaining that the majority of the collection is based on lineages compiled by families and genealogical societies. “People are surprised to discover the amount of expertise we have to help people overcome roadblocks. Our staff can help people in 20 languages, so if someone can’t read documents in Swedish, for example, they can help them.” While the genealogical society behind the library was founded in 1894 by members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Turner says, “that’s actually a very small percentage of the total global population doing family history and genealogical research in our archives—our resources online and at the library are available to everyone, not just members of the LDS faith.” And with roots travel booming, the library’s visitor numbers increased by more than a third between 2022 and 2025. “Sometimes we feel disconnected from society today, and learning more about our family history helps us build an identity for ourselves and gives us a sense of belonging,” Turner says. “Discovering the difficult circumstances that led families to immigrate, such as religious persecution and economic hardship, helps people feel more resilient in their own lives.” —Melanie Haiken

Vermont: Matt Folts

We can’t control when Vermont’s leaves change color, but snowmakers like Matt Folts at Bromley Mountain Resort have mastered the elements needed for a long, powdery ski season.

Matt Folts, the head snowmaker at Bromley Mountain Resort in southern Vermont, always knew he wanted to work in the ski industry—his dad oversaw Belleayre Mountain in the Catskills, and his grandfather was one of the first ski patrollers in the United States (No. 783, to be exact). Originally Folts wanted to go into lift maintenance, but then he realized halfway up the tower that he was afraid of heights. That’s how he ended up in the ground-level career of snowmaking, a job he’s watched evolve rapidly over the past 20 years. “Back in the late 1940s, when a group of engineers first discovered how to make artificial snow, it was considered a type of magic,” Folts says. “Nobody really understood what was going on.”

Fast-forward to today and ski resorts across the country are investing millions of dollars in automated snowmaking technology—something that has become all the more valuable due to climate change. (This year, parts of the Western US saw the lowest percentage of snow cover in modern record, while parts of the Eastern US got over 100 inches above their historical average, per AccuWeather.) “Eighty percent of our terrain has artificial snowmaking or man-made snow on it,” says Folts. “If we don't make snow, the ski areas cannot open. It's [Vermont’s] largest industry, so obviously it's what keeps us alive.”

Behind the scenes there are “groups of very hardworking women and men out there in the middle of the night dragging hoses at minus-10 degrees for not a whole lot of money—all because of people's love for this sport,” explains Folts, who says his 12-hour workdays are well worth it when he gets to watch the sunrise over the mountain to the quiet noise of the snow guns. “I like to sit there, turn the snowmobile off, and just watch the process. In the craziness of the world, it’s a good way to keep grounded.” —Hannah Towey

Virginia: Anna Prillaman

In the moonshine capital of the world, a long, boozy legacy of spirits-making lives on thanks to distillers like Anna Prillaman of Twin Creeks.

Call it fate or family tree, Anna Prillaman was born into the craft and culture of spirits. “It was a part of our ancestors when they settled here,” she says while glancing at a legacy photo behind the bar. She’s a fourth-generation distiller at Twin Creeks Distillery in Franklin County, Virginia, the Moonshine Capital of the World. It’s a moniker her lineage solidified. Her great-great-grandfather “pulled time” in jail, as Prillaman says, after the Great Moonshine Conspiracy Trial of 1935. Historically, bootlegging went hand in hand with old-time music. Attend an Old Time Jam at Twin Creeks Distillery on a Wednesday night, and you might be lucky enough to listen to Anna’s father, Chris, pluck away on a family heirloom fiddle (represented prominently in the distillery’s logo) as she flatfoots alongside and other attendees play and sing.

While Chris started the current (legal) business in 2014, the generational profiles remain, as do the stills and methods from their family nearly a century ago. It’s one reason folks head to the rural town of Rocky Mount, Virginia: to sample flagship Copper Corn Whiskey or savor the deeply layered flavors of a cocktail made using Anna’s recipe. It’s more than just alcohol; it’s sipping a legacy—one that Anna intends to continue with her children. “I hope to be progressive but also hold fast to what those mountain folks instilled in me,” says a 39-weeks-pregnant Anna. That fusion of past and present molded her into who she is today, shaping how she shares her craft while still demonstrating the overt resiliency of rural Southerners. —Jennifer Prince

Washington: Guy Curtis

If you want to follow the sound of grunge music through Washington state, you’ve got to pay tribute to the storied Central Saloon, owned by Guy Curtis.

Guy Curtis bought Seattle’s seminal grunge venue, the Central Saloon, in 1989. It was just one year after the bar hosted Nirvana’s first Seattle show, a culture-jolting moment that caused Sub Pop executives in attendance to immediately sign the band for their first record deal. Before Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament formed half of Pearl Jam, their previous band, Mother Love Bone, played its final show at the Central in 1990. “All these bands [didn’t know] what would happen,” marvels Curtis. “As time goes by, I realize what a big deal it was to be there.” Today the state’s lush green wilds and coffeehouse culture may be obvious draws for tourists, but grunge, a scene to which musicians in Washington cities like Olympia and Tacoma also contributed, is known as the “Seattle sound” for a reason.

The worn penny tile floor and brick wall collection of show posters—Soundgarden, Butthole Surfers, Sonic Youth, Alice in Chains—are hallowed ground on any grunge lover's pilgrimage to the state. A shrine between the kitchen and the sound booth honors Jimi Hendrix, Layne Staley, Chris Cornell, and Kurt Cobain; a painting of Kurt’s famous face also presides over the men’s room entrance, while a painting of Courtney Love greets the ladies with her middle finger.

After working his way up from busboy to general manager at neighboring J&M Restaurant, Curtis saved up and purchased the Central at age 33. A lot has changed during the Central’s 134-year history (a legacy that makes it the oldest bar in the city), but Curtis's stewardship ensures some things don't. “Stone Gossard’s graffiti is still on the backroom wall,” he says. “You’ll still get to watch as a band loads in. It’s hard to describe, but you can still just feel the past.” Stick around for one of the almost-nightly shows that span a range of music genres, and you could be listening to the future too.

Despite its outsized influence in music and putting Seattle’s culture on the map, the grunge movement was, inherently, somewhat self-destructive, leaving behind few icons of the era. The Central is an exception. “It was here before me, and it will be here after me,” says Curtis. Though grunge's heyday faded decades ago, teenagers still wear Nevermind shirts, their parents still listen to “Black Hole Sun,” and people still visit Seattle to soak up the flannel vibes. So Curtis's words about the bar feel just as true of the genre itself: “It keeps going.” —Naomi Tomky

Washington, DC: Mariel Lally

In a city best known for politics and international relations, perhaps the greatest ambassadors of all are the famous giant pandas, cared for by zookeepers like Mariel Lally.

A hard day at work might feel like wrangling wild animals, but for Mariel Lally, a giant panda keeper at the Smithsonian's National Zoo in Washington, DC, that’s quite literally her job description. “It’s a special thing being a panda keeper because there aren’t many of us,” Lally says. DC is the only place in the US where visitors can see pandas for free 364 days a year (the zoo is closed only on Christmas), thanks to the Smithsonian Institution’s educational mission. The panda exhibit is made possible by the National Zoo’s 10-year partnership with the China Wildlife Conservation Association, through which the DC organization pays an annual fee to support conservation efforts in China. “Our pandas are like huge celebrities,” Lally says. Millions of viewers from around the world watch the bears in real time on the zoo’s Panda Cam.

Even though Lally grew up in the DC metro area, she never quite understood the panda hype until she started working as a temporary keeper. Now 10 years into the job, she’s tasked with taking care of Bao Li and Qing Bao, the four-year-old bears who made their debut at the National Zoo in 2025. “The pandas dictate my whole day,” she says. Her 9-to-5 involves plotting out their diet and enrichment activities, training them to become comfortable with vet care, and working around their nap schedule: “You never want to wake a sleeping panda,” Lally says. “They get very upset.” Each one she’s ever worked with has their own unique personality.

Even though the animals are adorable, being a panda keeper isn’t always cute. Lally also has to clean their enclosures, and weigh and track all of the pandas’ feces in order to monitor their health. And no, she doesn’t get to cuddle the pandas—it’s too dangerous—although she says Bao Li is so social she thinks he would love a hug. —Adele Chapin

West Virginia: Kyle Mills

West Virginia’s caves aren’t just for mining, and with an adventure guide like Kyle Mills, travelers can appreciate the state’s natural wonders in a whole new light.

“What Yosemite Valley is to rock climbing, West Virginia is to caving,” says adventure guide Kyle Mills. “It’s the birthplace of the sport, and it’s still the proving ground.” Mills met his first cave when he was less than a year old on a family trip to Carter Caves State Resort Park, but it wasn’t until he was a sophomore at the state’s Davis & Elkins College, crawling around the dark corridors of an infamous nearby cave with just a flashlight on him, that he got hooked on the sport.

New caving techniques, beginning in the 1940s, have made it possible to reach once unreachable places. Today, in one of 4,500 known caves, you might see an intact mastodon skull from the Ice Age or a 400-million-year-old coral reef in the middle of the Appalachian Mountains. “You’ll be walking through limestone and hit these patches that are just frozen in time,” says Mills. “You’re immediately confronted with what a million years actually means.”

Whether you want to spend an afternoon admiring stalactite formations or discover previously uncharted territory, West Virginia has a cave for you. Lost World Caverns in Lewisburg and Seneca Caverns in Riverton have well-lit walkways with handrailings. For the daring there is Mills’s Karstlands & Wildwater Institute leads training expeditions into “the most rugged terrain on the East Coast,” with auditorium-sized caverns accessible only by ropes, harnesses, and tunnel crawls. For Mills, nothing beats the unfettered connection caving has to nature. “It’s probably the last place in America where you can truly feel wilderness,” says Mills, “No sky, no signal, no horizon. There’s just darkness and the knowledge that you’re hours from daylight.” —Sarah Mullens

Wisconsin: McKim Boyd

Whether it’s a fish fry or homemade pies on the table, a Wisconsin supper club is about the people—just ask McKim Boyd, who runs his family’s Union Hotel & Restaurant.

In Packers country, celebrity doesn’t trump tradition. Vince Lombardi once arrived after the kitchen closed at the Union Hotel & Restaurant, one of Wisconsin’s most beloved supper clubs. The owners didn’t budge: “I could give a damn who’s out there. Nine o’clock means nine o’clock.”

Those owners were McKim Boyd’s great-uncles, and now Boyd himself runs the family business that his great-grandparents acquired in 1918. Having grown up a block away, Boyd remembers when the Union operated as a small hotel with boarders upstairs and he would knock on doors to invite them down to dinner. “It made them part of the family,” he says.

Now, as the fourth-generation proprietor of the historic property in the city of De Pere, Boyd is in the process of passing the torch to his own children. The Midwestern supper club ritual hasn’t changed, bringing guests together for long, unhurried evenings of dining and entertaining. Guests still arrive early, order a brandy Old Fashioned—made the local way, without muddled fruit—and settle in for the experience. Dinner begins with a relish tray (“We make our own, including the ham salad”), followed by the kind of hearty classics that define this genre of communal dinners: steaks, chops, seafood, and dessert. At the Union the meat is still cut in-house and aged on a band saw, a practice Boyd says has all but disappeared elsewhere. Family recipes endure in the kitchen too: The coconut cream pie and pecan pie are still handmade by Boyd’s sister using techniques passed down through generations.

Even the logistics feel delightfully analog. Reservations are handled by phone, penciled into grids that Boyd prints each month. When the restaurant opens bookings for its popular holiday caroler dinners, the lines light up; one year the local carrier counted 26,000 attempted calls in the first hour alone. Some families now span multiple generations of diners at the Union—proof that a great supper club is as much about the people who gather there as the food on the table. —Ashlea Halpern

Wyoming: Gus Davis

To see the bison, bears, and moose that grace Wyoming’s land, follow a guide like Gus Davis, co-owner of Teton Wilderness Tours.

Wildlife sightings in Wyoming are dictated by three things: location, timing, and luck. But that’s exactly why visitors seek out wildlife tours, especially in Jackson Hole and the Greater Yellowstone Valley, led by naturalists who follow in the footsteps of the local hunting and fishing guides who came before them. Here, in the heart of bear, bison, and moose country, guides who understand key ecological rhythms—the rut cycles, the migration corridors, the seasonal foraging and hunting patterns—make finely tuned predictions of where (and when) you may come across a herd or, if you’re lucky, witness a mountain lion claiming the carcass of an elk. We “move through the landscape the same way people have for hundreds of years,” says Gus Davis, a wildlife guide and co-owner of Teton Wilderness Tours.

A small, nimble outfitter, Teton Wilderness Tours offers customized experiences to its guests, including half-day excursions around the town of Jackson and extended adventures on horseback through the Teton Wilderness. Beyond tracking wildlife, Davis says the job requires being a “steward of the environment” and “educating guests on the interconnectedness and fragility of Wyoming’s public lands.” In a place as vast as Yellowstone National Park, which spans 2.2 million acres, so much of what shapes the ecosystem tends to be overlooked—whether it's how wildfires are critical for forest regeneration or how the survival of the white bark pine tree is directly linked to that of the grizzly bear. “Wyoming is just so unique in that we have the advantage of being the least populated state,” says Davis. “Over half of our state is public land, and the majority of the people living in the state utilize the public land in some fashion.” When you explore with guides like Davis, though, you get deep-rooted knowledge translated into a complete picture of Wyoming—a rugged, wild, elemental state. —Lydia Mansel

For more inspiration, read our guide to the most iconic dish in every US state, and the cuisine to try in each.

Credits

Lead editors: Arati Menon, Megan Spurrell

Editors: Skyli Alvarez, Lale Arikoglu, Erik Buckingham, Jessica Chapel, Kat Chen, Hannah Chubb, Taylor Eisenhauer, Madison Flager, Charlie Hobbs, Meaghan Kenny, Shannon McMahon, Rebecca Misner, Matt Ortile, Jamie Spain, Jessica Sulima, Hannah Towey, Paris Wilson

Copy editors: Damian Fallon, Rachel Whalen

Research: Ivette Manners, Alexandra Sanidad

Lead visuals: Julia Abbonizio, Pallavi Kumar

Supporting visuals: Andrea Edelman

Social media: Bridget Knowles, Mercedes Bleth

Audience development: Abigail Malbon

Production: Skyli Alvarez