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# Fact brief: Is South Dakota home to the tallest grain elevator mural in the country?
- URL: https://www.sdnewswatch.org/fact-brief-faulkton-grain-elevator-mural/
- Published: 2025-10-16T02:51:31.000Z
- Updated: 2025-10-16T02:51:31.000Z
- Description: A fact brief that refutes or confirms a claim with supporting information and additional evidence and context.
- Author: Michael Klinski
- Tags: Fact briefs

## No.

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/cb/ab/cbabab5e-2dc6-462c-94a0-b72956c0d224/content/images/2025/01/WhiteFACT-BRIEF--500-x-200-px--2-1-1.png)

Faulkton’s 110-foot tall grain elevator mural is the tallest in South Dakota, but a 135-foot tall mural in Toledo, Ohio, is the largest in the country.

The South Dakota town of about 800 people in the north-central part of the state commissioned Australian Guido van Helten to paint the mural in 2018\. It came to be after another Australian who lived in Faulkton showed town leaders the murals van Helten – his friend – had completed.

The mural, which took two years to complete from idea to execution, features a girl and a boy exchanging a cowboy hat across three sides of the elevator. It is among the largest in the country.

The Toledo grain storage mural is the biggest in the country. It spans 170,000 square feet — 100,000 square feet more than the next biggest mural — and features sunflowers and Native American portraits.

*This fact brief responds to conversations such as* [*this one.*](https://www.reddit.com/r/SouthDakota/comments/f6v2hi/small%5Ftowns%5Fwhatchu%5Fgot/?ref=sdnewswatch.org)

### **Sources**

Tri-State Neighbor, [A grand canvas](https://agupdate.com/tristateneighbor/news/article%5F61f757ae-b5ba-11e8-b988-7bc91c145c58.html?ref=sdnewswatch.org)

Great Lakes Seaway Review, [Art project at Toledo port to be the biggest mural in the U.S.](https://seawayreview.com/the-beauty-of-grain-silos-art-project-at-toledo-port-to-be-the-biggest-mural-in-the-u-s/?ref=sdnewswatch.org#:~:text=The%20mural%20features:%20%2A%20A%20field%20of,Toledo%20%2A%20Other%20local%20businesses%20and%20individuals)

Data Commons, [Faulkton demographics](https://datacommons.org/place/geoId/4621260?ref=sdnewswatch.org)

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