Fairfax, MN

Fairfax is a small Renville County city at the meeting of Minnesota State Highways 4 and 19. The town was platted in 1882, and its post office has operated under the Fairfax name since that same year. The roads place Fairfax in the Minnesota River Valley network, with farmland and county routes spreading out from the city and Historic Fort Ridgely State Park a short drive south.

The city has built a strong recreation link to that history. An 8.1-mile non-motorized trail connects Fairfax with Fort Ridgely, where the remains of an 1853 military outpost and the story of the U.S.-Dakota War are interpreted within the state park. Inside Fairfax, Memorial Park and the municipal park system add shelters, a swimming pool, playgrounds, baseball and softball fields, basketball courts, and a grandstand complex. Those facilities give a town of about a thousand people a full calendar of outdoor routines. Fairfax works as a small service center for the surrounding farm country, with its highways, post office, parks, and trail all pointing outward to the wider Minnesota River Valley.