Pioneers come to life at Anoka County's Heritage Lab

Kyndell Harkness, Star Tribune

Krista Harrington, playing a school teacher in pioneer days, left Hunter Bodnar, 10, wearing a dunce cap as she explained students’ punishment for bad behavior.

A century and a half later, the settlers of Anoka County's Heritage Lab make sure kids learn their history lessons by living in the moment.

By PAUL LEVY , Star Tribune

Last update: October 20, 2009 - 5:00 PM

On the journey to claim a Minnesota homestead, traveling by covered wagon, Wenstrom's Mercantile is the only store you'll see for two days. To survive in this wilderness, you'd better stock up here.

"Looking at all the furs you have here, I think I can give you $22," Mrs. Wenstrom, the shop owner, tells her visitors -- a group of third-graders from Centennial Elementary School in Circle Pines.

The brightly colored currency she flashes displays no portraits of Washington or Lincoln.

"That's what money looked like in the olden days?" one of the kids asks.

"And is that thing on the back shelf a coffin?" says another.

Welcome to the 2009 Heritage Lab, where Minnesota's pioneers and settlers brought the olden days of 1858 back to life.

The project -- which ran from Sept. 17 through Oct. 12, across the street from the Wargo Nature Center in the Rice Creek Chain of Lakes Regional Park Reserve -- is part of a five-year rotation that continues next fall, when the Civil War era comes to Minnesota through this full-day historical education program.

For 20 years, Anoka Parks personnel and educators have created virtual history lessons outdoors on fall days bursting with color and an invigorating nip to the air, immersing students through a wilderness untangled as they live through the moment. With more than $500,000 in grants from Connexus Energy over two decades, the program gives students a chance to grab a bench and listen or enter a pioneer village and interact with personnel who dress, speak and breathe their parts.

Explaining the challenges

At the just-completed Pioneers and Settlers sessions, there was Todd Murawski, dressed like a player straight out of Cooperstown, N.Y., leading a group in rounders, a town ball game that preceded baseball. (Cooperstown is home of the Baseball Hall of Fame and touted as the game's birthplace.)

Mary Eggebraaten, who has worked for Anoka Parks for five years, explained the challenges of surviving the elements in a covered wagon. Maria Pierz, one of the people next door, told kids what life was like when you see your neighbors only once every three months because the nearest ones live miles away.

"What we like is that this is hands on," said Crystal Olson of Columbia Heights. Her home-schooled daughter, Melody, 8, assisted Pierz by playing notes on a single string fastened to a can she was holding to the ground with her foot.

"This is the fourth year we've come," said Deannah Muha, of Chisago, as her daughter, Becca, also home-schooled, made sweet music with the one-stringed instrument. "What a great adventure for these kids."

Krista Harrington, playing a school teacher, insisted that girls curtsy and boys bow before entering her classroom. She talked about how students once carried cooked potatoes in their pockets to stay warm. She said if girls misbehaved, they'd be forced to sit on the boys' side of the room.

Then she whispered something in one student's ear and asked the girl to whisper the message to the next student, who whispered it to the next, and so on.

The original message was: "The fox ran by the dog." Somehow, after a dozen passes, it became: "Back to back."

For Harrington, it meant back to the drawing board -- or the small slate boards with chalk that were handed to each student.

The students next year needn't worry about this lesson in diction and accuracy. Next year, it's on to the Civil War. In 2011, students will visit Minnesota's milling, mining and lumbering era.

"We pack up the props and store them," said Deb Gallop, the lab coordinator. "We won't do this lab again for five years."

Paul Levy • 612-673-4419

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