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Door County Community Foundation

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Belgian Heritage Center

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Belgian Heritage Center Fund

www.belgianheritagecenter.org
(920) 825-7319

Starting in the 1850s, groups of Belgians left the economic hardship of their homeland and ventured to northeast Wisconsin for better opportunities. Here, they faced the hardships of creating a new home in a harsh woodland. The Belgian Heritage Center aims to share the legacy of those more than 15,000 immigrants and their descendants who greatly influenced the culture of rural Door, Kewaunee, and Brown Counties with a farming landscape and customs which included the Walloon language, unique architecture, ethnic Belgian foods, and more.

Located in the heart of a rural district that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Belgian Heritage Center offers programs, festivals, events, tours, traditional and interactive exhibits, as well as a resource for genealogical and historical research. Oral history videos preserve stories in English and Walloon from Belgian descendants who have kept the language alive in Northeastern Wisconsin for more than 150 years.

Friends of Whitefish Dunes DDC Challenge Fund

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Whitefish Dunes State Park is a unique area, housing Wisconsin’s tallest sand dunes, the unique ecosystem created by them, and a deep Native American cultural history.

The Friends of Whitefish Dunes State Park would like to renovate the Nature Center museum exhibits to showcase the indigenous history of the area and the intimate relationship they shared with the unique local ecosystem. Split Rock Studios, a renowned museum design group, has produced a potential design on how the exhibit might be constructed. The Friends are collaborating with the Ho Chunk, Potawatomi, and Menominee tribes to get their input on the design.

The potential exhibit topics will cover the local dune landscape; unique flora, fauna, and geology; and indigenous historic and modern connections. The overarching theme will showcase how intricately linked the original inhabitants of this area were to the unique environment around them.

Please help us reach our $50,000 goal for this project that will help educate our visitors on our invaluable cultural and natural resources in the park.

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