Late last fall we headed to Iowa for a wedding and stopped at my brother in law’s for a night on the way up. If there is anything more rural than northwest Oklahoma it is anywhere rural in Iowa. We decided to take the scenic route north from Crescent and wound up on Highway 25. We were traveling in the classic 58 Ford we own, a pleasure in itself. Mid morning with the windows down and this bright rock by the side of the road in the middle of nowhere (really) caught my eye. I knew I had seen it before, that is pictures of it, passed around in email probably a couple years ago. But here was the real thing!
A twelve foot high rock that is said to weigh 56 ton is sitting right beside the highway with the most beautiful art work depicting patriotic images. We quickly turned around at a safe spot in the road and went back for a closer look. A kiosk is located near the rock with information on the artist and the history of this tribute to freedom, aptly named the Freedom Rock. Ray “Bubba” Sorenson has been changing the faces of the rock every year since 1999.
What a surprise to actually see this neat spot in the middle of Iowa corn fields. A quick search when I got home produced the http://www.freedomrock.com/ web site that gives the whole story. I will never snooze on a cross country trip again, hard telling what I might miss!
