Top Banana Glen Speer
A humble exterior, four miles south of Interstate 15.
I finally got a chance to visit the new home of the International Banana Museum (previous posts here and here) earlier this month. It was awesome! I just missed Ken Banister – the museum’s founder, who moved his banana collection from the Los Angeles suburb of Altadena to the high desert town of Hesperia, California, about a year ago, but I found myself in the able hands of Glen Speer, whose business card lists him this way:
GLEN SPEER
Genuine Antique Christian Person
BEEN THERE, DONE THAT, CAN”T REMEMBER
Free Advice!
Top Banana – Banana Museum
Hesperia, CA
His credentials turned out to be impeccable and true. Glen graciously showed me around, recommended that I have lunch at the omelette place across the street – over 100 types of egg-based dishes – and encouraged me to take lots of pictures, which I did. As I was leaving, another local told me to quit with the snapshots: “You’ll make his head even bigger!” But from the looks of things, Glen has a lot to be proud of.
More on the museum, including additional pictures, after the jump.
I loved the old Altadena location, but in a lot of ways, the Hesperia site is better. The Altadena storefront was a little off the beaten path. Though this isn’t exactly adjacent to the freeway, it is in a heavily trafficked area, and there’s more elbow room on the inside. There’s a great tradition of little museums – the labors of a single person, often for no reason other than pure love – in America, and I’m glad to see that Ken Banister’s work not only lives on, but has gotten better.
Google map to the museum here.
Who would dare argue?
“Woodis” is the secret password for the banana club. “It can mean whatever you want it to mean,” Glenn says. “Depending on how you say it.”
anaBanana club founder and president Ken Banister with some other President.
Fridge magnets.
Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman 
WOW! What a great article ! Very impressive about Glen! The world needs more of this type of thing!!
Keep up the good work !
Ken Bannister
Top Banana IBC