Rocori Students Unlock History As They Bring A Park Back To Life [PHOTOS]

COLD SPRING (WJON News) -- Some Rocori students are bringing a forgotten park back to life. FFA Students are cleaning up and revitalizing Lookout Park in Cold Spring as part of a school service project.

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Lookout Park is hidden behind Quarry Cinema just off Highway 23 and has had minimum upkeep done to it since the early 2000s. FFA Advisor Rylan Sabo says they removed over 650 pounds of trash from the park and were surprised with what they found:

"We were finding Pepsi Cola cans from the 1970s all the way up on to Mountain Dew case from 2023. It was just amazing to be able to pull that much garbage from almost 15 acres of property and say that this is the contribution that we have young leaders in the communty bringing back to the cities that they care about and they grow up in."

He says they removed an untold amount of invasive buckthorn to allow the natural trees and plants to come back, discovered a stream that was completely overgrown with buckthorn and other weeds, and have learned a lot about the history of the almost 90-year-old park in the process:

"It kind of felt like we were unlocking or discovering treasure because we had a trove here and a trove here that kind of all culminated into planning this service project for the community in Cold Spring."

Sabo says the park was built back in 1936 using Works Progress Administration (WPA) dollars, and 25 laid-off Cold Spring men did all of the work. He says half of the park has been closed off to the public because it is so overrun with weeds and the city has been extremely supportive of their efforts, helping where they can.

Sabo says they have about 25 students working on the project who have put in over 550 hours in research, removing the invasive buckthorn, cleaning up graffiti, and clearing hiking paths. They are in the 2nd year of the planned 3-year clean-up effort and hope to have everything done for the park's 90th Anniversary in 2026.

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