Mankato has always had an identity crisis. We’re a growing regional center, but we never had a clear sense of what defines or describes the city.

Which is a real problem for the tourism, chamber of commerce and booster types who are trying to market the city to visitors and potential new residents and businesses.

I had lunch with our new chamber director a few months ago. He’d come from out of state and was trying to get a handle on what Mankato was known for, what defined us. I told him there are just four things people from outside the area recognize the city for.

1) It’s the place where 38 Dakota Indians were hanged in a mass execution the day after Christmas in 1862. Not exactly something the community is proud of.

2) People see Mankato on the news every summer because the Minnesota Vikings have summer football camp here. Not bad, but hard to hang an encompassing tourism campaign on.

3) Many know Minnesota State University because they or their kids or a relative went there. Helpful, but there are lots of university towns.

4) And, guys who’ve been to Mankato for a convention know about the topless dancers at Mettler’s, a fixture in downtown Mankato for decades.

The chamber director actually resigned and left town a few weeks later. I hope it wasn’t something I said.

For decades, Mankato’s slogan was: “At the Bend in the River.” Which always seemed satisfactory to me — to the point, truthful, not flashy. Anyone looking at a map of Minnesota could easily identify the sharp bend taken by the Minnesota River here.

But it wasn’t good enough for the city’s promoters.

In 2003, after many focus groups and much money, city tourism officials unveiled the new slogan for Mankato/North Mankato.

“A Little Twin Cities. A Lot Minnesota.”

Not bad, I guess. We were told the slogan would be used far and wide. It would become our “brand” and make us famous.

It hasn’t seemed to have caught on. A Google search of our slogan turns up only a handful of hits — most of those tied to our chamber — and at least one reference belittling our slogan as stupid.

Still, it could be worse.