BANCROFT— Riders could see the smoke drifting over the horizon well before they entered downtown Bancroft, RAGBRAI’s Day 3 meeting town.
As they turned onto Ramsey Street, they saw the familiar pink bus and its corn cob-fired grills loaded with pork chops.
Mr. Pork Chop had come home.
Bancroft was where Paul Bernhard created the Mr. Pork Chop stand in 1979 to cater to the Register’s Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa when it traveled through the town of about 700 that year.
Bernhard went on the road with the ride a few years later, piloting his pork chop bus and stopping along the way to grill up loads of his thick, Iowa-style chops. He became a RAGBRAI celebrity, legendary for his ear-splitting pork chop shout.
He retired after the 2007 ride and died in 2016 at age 88. His son Matt took over, running Mr. Pork Chop from 2008 until 2023 and becoming known as Mr. Pork Chop Jr. He died in 2024.
Now his son Aaron, Mr. Pork Chop III, runs the family business with sisters Amanda and Ava. RAGBRAI memorialized their Dad with Mr. Pork Chop Jr. Day on last year’s ride.
Tuesday, July 22, took RAGBRAI riders 74 miles from Estherville to Forest City. And Aaron Bernhard was at the midpoint in Bancroft, waiting for them.
Bernhard grew up in Algona and worked his first RAGBRAI week with Mr. Pork Chop in 2000, when he was in fifth grade. But he spent much of his childhood at his Dad’s house a block away from where he parked the bus and set up on Tuesday morning.
“It was really important to Dad,” Bernhard said of his Dad’s love for Bancroft. “He loved it. He would always showcase it.”
Though his presence in Bancroft honored tradition, it was a bit of a departure Mr. Pork Chop, which is known for choosing sites between towns where it can set up its grills a yard or less from the road to lure in riders with the aroma of the chops and the sweet, corn cob smoke.
“Grandpa set up in the country because of the novelty that it brings being out in the corn and the beans,” Bernhard said. “We find that cool and want to keep that tradition alive, but when it goes through your hometown it’s hard not to show off Bancroft.”
Bernhard’s uncle owns his Dad’s old house now, and the family stayed there Monday night. On Tuesday, he and his sisters confessed they were holding back tears as they took orders.
Mr. Pork Chop will go on, but life will never be the same without their Dad, who was just 58 when he died the spring before the 2024 ride.
“This means a lot for us to be able to carry on the tradition,” Bernhard said. “It seems weird doing it without him.”
Philip Joens is riding his 20th RAGBRAI. He has completed the river-to-river trek eight times. He covers retail and real estate for the Des Moines Register and can be reached at 515-284-8184 or at pjoens@registermedia.com.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Mr. Pork Chop comes home to where it all started as RAGBRAI 2025 rides through Bancroft
Reporting by Philip Joens, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
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