Wabasha’s Project Get Outdoors is developing self-guided tours across Southeastern Minnesota that connect children with both natural environments and local history, drawing inspiration from Iowa’s Freedom Trail documenting Underground Railroad pathways. Project Get Outdoors interviewed descendants of 10-12 abolitionists and crowd-sourced stories through a Facebook group as a part of their research.
Transcript
This is Minnesota's Legacy, a look at the organizations and the people who have benefited from Minnesota's Clean Water, Land and Legacy Amendment.
Katharine DeCelle: Did you know you can walk through Southeastern Minnesota and learn the history of abolitionists who once lived there?
Sarah Holger: In Iowa, they've done what's called a Freedom Trail, documenting Underground Railroad activity.
Katharine DeCelle: Sarah Holger wanted to do the same thing in her state.
Sarah Holger: Create some sort of interpretive Freedom Trail-type thing in southeast Minnesota.
Katharine DeCelle: Sarah is the program coordinator for Project Get Outdoors, a small nonprofit whose mission is to connect kids to nature. With the help of Legacy funding, that's exactly what the organization is doing.
Sarah Holger: I was able to research 10 to 12 abolitionists and do oral history interviews with their descendants.
Katharine DeCelle: Sarah also learned how different identities impacted someone's role.
Sarah Holger: The white folks might have been station masters, and they would help folks in their houses, you know, as Underground Railroad stops. But it was oftentimes the biracial or black folks that were conducting the people on the Underground Railroad.
Katharine DeCelle: Minnesotans soon can walk these paths with Project Get outdoors’s self-guided, downloadable tour guides.
Sarah Holger: And teachers can bring students out to these places to learn about history.
Katharine DeCelle: For more information, visit mnprojectgo.org.
Minnesota's Legacy is produced by AMPERS with support from the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund. Online at AMPERS dot ORG.