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Video: For Maine Students, 'Amazing Race' Brings History to Life

8th Grade Students in Presque Isle Participating in the "Amazing Race."
Nick Woodward/MPBN
8th Grade Students in Presque Isle Participating in the "Amazing Race."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JoS0E7dMGM&feature=youtu.be

PRESQUE ISLE, Maine - For young people in Presque Isle - and their peers in a lot of Maine towns - local history might not always be visible. But over the past decade, an eighth-grade teacher in this northern Maine city has developed a tradition of bringing the past to life, in what's known in these parts as the Amazing Race.

Bill Guerrette is driving his red pickup through the streets of Presque Isle, tracking his 25 eighth graders through the grids of the city’s downtown. "A lot of times they think nothing exciting ever happened here."

The students are on bikes, in groups of five or so, and occasionally - through backyards and fences - Guerrette gets glimpses of students pedaling through the streets.  Each team has a set of clues guiding them to historical landmarks and buildings.  Some of those clues require them to talk with business owners, town officials and residents.

"And so the more we can give them the ties to this community, now when they’re thinking about making choices of where they’re going to go afterwards, the more ties we can give them, maybe we can keep them," Guerrette says.

"We’ve been learning about old buildings that have been in Presque Isle - pretty much the history of Presque Isle," says Destiny Carson, one of the students taking part in the learning project. "We’ve been learning about old buildings and, like, how Converse used to be made in Presque Isle. They used to be made down in one of those old buildings down there. And I learned that a lot of places have burned. Everything burned. Pretty much everything burned."
 
Students like Destiny are surprised to learn that a number of prominent buildings in their city were destroyed in fires around the turn of the century. But Guerrette brings that history back to life through a collection of old photographs he shares as a preview to their bike trek through the town’s history.

A group of five girls has just entered the Haskell Community Center, and they’ve been met by Brad Boyles, the rec department’s program director. "I’m going to read your clue," he says. "What year was the Presque Isle High School built?"

The Amazing Race isn’t really a race but more of a tour of a city most of these students thought they already knew. In the course of a month, they learn that theirs was the first city to host the country’s Cold War nuclear missile arsenal in the late 50s, some of their grandparents helped make Converse sneakers, and a town with now just one movie theater once hosted five.

Libby Moreau says the tour is a way for her and her classmates to understand the history of their hometown "because we kind of get to live it. We get to go to the different buildings and get to go inside and it’s just like going back and living the past."

To prepare for the tour, Guerrette brings in old photographs from local history buffs to help show kids what life used to be like. And some years, he has to give bike riding lessons. "I’m finding that more and more for kids, riding the bike can be a lost art sometimes. Not as many kids do it now as they used to."

Even though most of these kids have spent much of their young lives here, some, like Austin Pictou, say they now have a different perspective on their hometown.

"Some of it’s actually pretty cool," he says. "There’s a lot more history behind it than what I thought was there before."

That’s what Guerrette is hoping students will develop: an appreciation for the past and a respect for the present. "I just think it’s important for them to know where they come from, and to know that today things aren't always bigger and better."

Like a lot of Maine young people, many of these students will graduate high school someday and head off somewhere new. But Guerrette is hoping the Amazing Race will give these young people a sense of curiosity about where they live, what’s around them, and might just keep Presque Isle’s future fascinated by their own town.