MINBURN, Iowa — Freedom isn’t free. Nor is it light, as witnesses learned when they saw the 18-ton Dallas County Freedom Rock erected in Minburn Saturday morning along U.S. Highway 169.
Dennis Allen of Herndon and Steve Salzer of Perry transported the granite boulder from rural Perry, where it was probably deposited about 12,000 years ago after riding here on a retreating glacier.
The Minburn American Legion Post 99 acquired the “glacial erratic,” as geologists call such non-native Iowa boulders, thanks to Allen’s donation, and the Legionnaires contracted with Ray “Bubba” Sorensen of Greenfield to paint patriotic images on the sizeable stone, which rests south of the Raccoon River Valley Trail and near the historic Minburn depot on the west side of the highway.
A Minburn American Legion spokesperson said the timetable for painting the Minburn rock is uncertain. Minburn lies outside Iowa House District 20, where Sorenson seeks the Republican nomination in the June primary election, and the patriotic painter’s services are in high demand among Iowa’s freedom-loving counties.
The Minburn Legion plans to collect funds for landscaping and beautifying the area around the freedom point.
