The Silver Saddle Dance Hall, that’s where this all began, said Betty Fisher, as she shuffled green fliers for the Lyle Area Cancer Auction. Her back was to her son, Larry Ricke, who was at the far end of a line of white folding tables speaking to about 20 volunteers Tuesday night at Lyle American Legion Post 105. They were dividing territories for seeking donations for the two-day auction that begins Friday, Jan. 12.

Fisher said it was in 1980 when folks in Lyle put on the first cancer auction at the Silver Saddle, inspired by talk by Austin Camera Club members of another cancer fundraiser.

“They were a camera club that never had a camera,” Fisher joked.

The auction is the grand finale of a year’s worth of other fundraisers. In the end, hundreds of volunteers will have contributed to the effort that is headquartered in Lyle by encompasses a wider swath of southern Minnesota and northern Iowa.

The two-day event begins Friday, Jan. 12, at 6 p.m. at the Legion Post and Lyle maintenance shed. Day one will end after midnight, Ricke said. Day two, Saturday, Jan. 13, will begin around 11 a.m. and last into the early morning hours of Sunday, he said.

“It’s a group effort,” Ricke said. “It’s unbelievable, the preparation is unbelievable. I’ve been asked how many (people) volunteer. I quit counting at 400 throughout the year.”

The Silver Saddle hosted only the first auction, he said. Legion Post 105 was then its home for many years until it outgrew that building. It spread into the city of Lyle’s maintenance shed. A breezeway was built to connect the two buildings, said Gary Zeigler. These days, the Legion Post is where food and drink are served for the auction and the shed is where the auction action is.

The kitchen leader for the impressive spread of food and snacks for many years, Ricke said, had been his wife, Cindy. In her retirement from that role, the trio of Sherry Klein of Austin, Julie Small of Brownsdale and Barb Bissen of Lyle are running the kitchen.

“Our kitchen alone raises $5,000 on the days of the auction,” Ricke said. “We sell a lot of homemade food.”

The auction is in its 39th year and has raised more than $2.6 million in total, Zeigler said. Next year, it will break the $3 million mark, a good milestone for the 40th anniversary, he said.

Donations from fundraisers put on through the year for Lyle Area Cancer will be presented during the auction. Those efforts include a pool tournament this weekend in Carpenter, Iowa, at the Carpenter Community Center, will have a superhero theme and a prize will be awarded to the person with the best superhero costume.

The three-day tournament is for two-person teams and the entry fee is $70. It begins Friday, Jan. 6, with check in at 5:30 p.m. Competition begins at 7 p.m.

As of Wednesday, 86 teams had registered. To nab one of the remaining 10 spots, teams can contact Tim Johnson through the Lyle Area Cancer Pool Tournament Facebook page.

Other Lyle Area Cancer fundraisers through the year included a scrapbooking event in October, the 10th annual Crop for the Cure, in Carpenter. In June, Dean and Emily Kiefer’s 12 grandchildren put on their fourth annual lemonade and cookie event in Adams — Squeeze Out Cancer. Cans for Cancer is a yearlong collection. And, there is a raffle underway for a Harley-Davidson Road King on display at the Freeborn County Coop gas station in Lyle. The drawing will be Jan. 13 during the auction. Raffle tickets are $20 apiece.

The list of items to be auctioned is under construction, one of the largest so far is a $5,000 gift certificate from Overby Orthodontics in Austin.

“I can guarantee you that this is like no other auction that you have been to,” Ricke said. “We have a lot of fun.”

And people don’t necessarily go to it to find deals. They are trying to help find a cure for cancer. Last year, a lemon meringue pie sold for $1,400, a rocking horse sold for $3,500, and a Lyle Area Cancer quilt sold for $1,500 before being donated back and sold again for $1,000.

When the auction wraps up Saturday, Jan. 13, Lyle Area Cancer volunteers will head to Rochester to present their donation to the 64th annual Eagles Cancer Telethon, which is Jan. 13-14.