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State Fair
Andrew Krueger

Record crowds flock to Minnesota State Fair on opening day

A crowd of people at the fair.
A crowd packs onto the street on the opening day of the Minnesota State Fair on Thursday.
Christine T. Nguyen | MPR News file

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Thursday's near-perfect weather conditions helped the Minnesota State Fair set an opening-day attendance record.

Fair officials said 133,326 people passed through the gates on Thursday. That broke the previous opening-day record of 122,695, set just last year.

Partly sunny skies and temperatures in the mid-70s greeted fairgoers on the first day of the 2019 fair.

Despite the record, opening day is among the least-attended days at the fair each year, with the busiest two days usually falling on the Saturday and Sunday of Labor Day weekend.

The fair's all-time single-day attendance record is 270,426 — set last year on the Saturday before Labor Day.

Last year also saw record overall attendance at the fair, with more than 2 million visitors.