Even the heartbeat of America stopped dead at the end of Main Street a year ago, when the Chevrolet dealership pulled the plug on its neon sign.īut just a mile or so from downtown, near the entrance to Grand Casino Hinckley, a very different picture emerges. To someone standing in Hinckley's downtown today, it might well seem that the town's worst fears have been realized: Stores have closed.
But the casino went up anyway, and soon gamblers streamed in from the Twin Cities to the south. Meetings were held, speeches made, editorials written. Small towns often fear change, and in the early 1990s, the citizens of Hinckley, Minn., worried that a new casino being built nearby would harm the vitality of their community.
