Spreading A Little Patriotism: Snow Flag In Manhattan Goes Viral

MANHATTAN, IL — Farmers in the Midwest usually have a bit of downtime in the winter. One Manhattan farmer decided to make the most of that time and achieved internet fame recently when he created a larger-than-life American flag in the snow on his 160-acre property.

Dave Kestel, a third-generation farmer, made the roughly 90-foot by 60-foot flag Feb. 5. The flag itself is gone now, thanks to sunshine and warmer weather this past week, but the images are still there and making the rounds across social media.

Kestel started by carefully laying out the stars and stripes using his Gator 4x4 utility vehicle. “There’s no erasing. You have to do it right the very first time,” he said.

Once the outline in the snow was finished, Kestel made a trip over to the grocery store to get food coloring to make the flag pop. He only needed to get blue and red because “Mother Nature took care of the white for me.”

But, Kestel wasn’t able to find any grocery stores that carried blue food coloring.

Determined to get the flag finished while the snow was fresh, Kestel came up with a solution: Why not call up Kirby’s Korner Bakery and see if they had any of the elusive blue food coloring?

Sure enough, Kirby’s came through in the clutch, and Kestel was able to finish coloring the flag.
The whole process took a little under two hours, Kestel said.

“I couldn’t have been more excited about how it turned out,” he said.

But the giant flag wasn’t Kestel’s first foray in “ag art,” as he called it.

On Good Friday in 2020, during the early part of the pandemic, Kestel decided to do something uplifting for the community. So, he got on his tractor and created a cross. That first piece of agricultural art grabbed a lot of folks’ attention.

“When all that stuff started, people were looking for a direction, you know,” Kestel said.

Photos of Kestel’s cross got more than 300,000 views across the globe on Twitter, he said. And then he knew he was onto something.

In February of 2021, Kestel laid out his next big design: the logo for Pioneer Seed, the company Kestel deals seed for. That also got a fair amount of attention.

And that’s when the wheels started to turn in Kestel’s mind about what to design for the next winter. His American flag design was in the works.

Kestel decided to do a literal dry run this past spring for the flag by laying out the design and a cross in the snowless field on his property. That turned out pretty well. But, so far, nothing Kestel has created has come close to the amount of attention his giant American flag in the snow has gotten.

“I am so overwhelmed about how it’s gone over because on my Twitter account — I’m a zero with 700 followers — last I looked, it’s got 66,000 or 67,000 views on Twitter,” Kestel said.

The flag has also been shared and reposted all over Facebook, including by WGN’s Tom Skilling’s Facebook page and the Manhattan Weather Channel’s page.

“The comments people make are just really heartwarming,” Kestel said.

So what does Kestel have planned for future ag artwork projects?

“Maybe next winter, if we get a decent snow, I would like to make a flag maybe three times the size,” Kestel said.

That will require a lot of food coloring. Let’s hope Kirby’s Korner is stocked up on plenty of blue for next winter.

Check out Kestel's Facebook page and Twitter account for more images of the flag and past art.