It is the desire of the O’Brien
Conservation Board to provide the best possible
education and preservation with regard to the nature
and environment so unique to this area.
The Waterman area offers some of
the most breath-taking views of nature in the area.
Formed during the last ice age by the movement of
glaciers, the geographic valley we are nestled near
a geographical wonder known as a hanging valley.
These glaciers carved the beautiful bluffs,
valleys, rivers and lakes we see today. They also
deposited some of the richest soil, known as till,
in the world.
In addition to the
landscape, the Waterman Area offers a wide variety
of flora and fauna, indigenous to the area for
thousands of years. Much of the native prairie
grasses, wildflowers and tree growth look the same
today as they would have when the first native
peoples inhabited this land. There are even plots
of land in the vicinity that remain virgin prairie,
untilled by human hands or machinery.
In the mid-1940’s Dr. Ada Hayden
of Iowa State University conducted a statewide
inventory of prairie remnants. Her #1 site for
preservation is the Waterman area. It should be
noted that according to a report for the Nature
Conservancy, this site is one of the few locations
for the Prairie Bush Clover, a rare species listed
with the federal government. The Conservancy has
also identified this area as "as site of regional
significance in our Northern Tallgrass Ecoregional
Plan".
The area is so
noteworthy in beauty, it is now part of the State
of Iowa’s Scenic By-Way program.
WHERE WILL IT BE LOCATED?
The site for the
Prairie Heritage Center is located in Northwest
Quarter of Section 26 in Waterman Township, within
two miles of the junction of Buena Vista, Cherokee,
Clay and O’Brien counties . The building site
itself contains approximately 38 acres, which would
be utilized for the building, displays and
activities, plus 235 acres of adjacent prairie and
preserved public lands. It would also serve as a
staging point for various excursions in the
surrounding public areas.
WHAT CAN YOU
LEARN?
The Prairie
Heritage Center will provide classrooms, exhibit
areas, demonstration plots and interpretive trails
to aid in increasing the public's understanding of
the prairie ecosystem and history of the area.
Regular, year-round environmental education
programs for school groups, 4-H groups, scout
groups and the general public will be presented at
the center by staff naturalists and guest speakers.
Rooms for public meetings will be available at the
center. The center would serve to collect and
disseminate information relating the environmental
issues in the region.
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Inkpaduta
and his fearsome band of followers used the
waterways of the Waterman Area for
transportation. In 1857 they stopped at
the Waterman cabin and the Kirchner cabin near
Peterson, terrorizing and stealing from the
settlers before continuing on to Okoboji where
the famous massacre took place. This was
the last Indian uprising in the area.
Inkpaduta’s canoe trail can be visited and
canoed today.
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In July of 1933 the Barrow
gang, a roving band of bank robbing outlaws
hid out in the Waterman Area after robbing an
Everly bank. Their leaders, the infamous
Bonnie & Clyde Barrow spoke with a local
resident, ate pheasant and hid from their
pursuers.
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Regular, year-round environmental education
programs for school groups, 4-H groups, scout
groups and the general public will be presented
at the center by staff naturalists and guest
speakers. |
The Prairie
Heritage Center has launched their fund-raising
campaign to finance the construction of the
building. Please feel free to attend any of
these town meetings or
contact
O'Brien County Conservation for more
information or visit their website at
http://www.prairieheritagecenter.org .
Place engraved bricks
in the Prairie Heritage Center for $100.00 each.
Engraving for one brick
is maximum of 3 lines - 14 letters per line -
spaces and punctuation count as letters
Mail to the Little
Sioux Valley Conservation Assn., 5660 - 460th St,
Paullina IA 51046
O'Brien County Conservation
4931 Yellow Ave.
Peterson, IA 51047
712-295-7200
E-mail:
occb@iowatelecom.net
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With
the need for environmental education on the rise,
the naturalist program aims at educating the public
by interpreting the natural resources of the county
promoting the natural resources of the county, and
developing an environmentally responsible
citizenry. 
O'BRIEN COUNTY PRAIRIE HERITAGE CENTER
