This trinket basket is made of woven sweet grass. "Minneapolis Skinny" reaccounts the story of the basket. "A hobo traveled the railroad to a small town in central Minnesota in the early 1930’s. He and his friends worked the crop harvests. At the end of the harvest, he found work at a Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp nearby a Native American reservation. Like all hoboes, he was inventive and wanted to make extra money. He saw Native women weaving strands of sweet grass into the baskets and he knew that towns people would buy items that had practical applications – like containers to keep special, personal, items safe. So he made a deal with the Native women. He would trade cigarettes for lessons on how to harvest the grass, dry it, and weave it into basketry items. But being innovative, he wanted his hand crafted basketry to be more unique that the usual. One technique he used was to peel the thin layer of tin foil from sticks of chewing gum or cigarette packages and roll the tin foil over the strands of sweet grass."
