Learn more about the lives and legacies of American heroes, the Tuskegee Airmen, on February 18 at Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore’s Paul H. Douglas Center for Environmental Education. Cullen Daniel, president of the Miller Historical Society, will present “The Real Red Tails, America’s Forgotten Black Heroes” at 1:30 p.m. during the Saturday afternoon Open House at the Douglas Center.

These airmen were the first African American combat pilots in the United States Air Force. Although they suffered greatly from racism, discrimination and Jim Crow laws, their bravery in combat helped win World War II. After the program, visitors can mingle over coffee or hot chocolate to compare this presentation with a movie currently playing in theaters. Then, learn about the two national park sites in Alabama that share the airmen’s story.

This program is offered in partnership with the Miller Historical Society and is part of the year round free Saturday open house programs at the Douglas Center. Bring the whole family and explore this fascinating chapter of American history while having fun and learning about the national lakeshore.

The Douglas Center is located at 100 N. Lake Street in Gary, Indiana. For more information on this or other programs at Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore, visit the park website at http://www.nps.gov/indu/parknews/tuskegee-airmen-history-presentation-at-national-lakeshore.htm or contact our information desk at 219- 395-1882.

“There never was anything quite like the old Kankakee marsh in northwestern Indiana. … The superabundance of its feathered game and fur and fish was next to unbelievable.” –William Bridges, New York Zoological Society, Nov-Dec, 1935

As the Wisconsin Glacier melted 16,000 years ago, the moraines of the Valparaiso area north of the Kankakee Region acted as dams, trapping melting water and forming glacial Lake Chicago. Those meltwaters finally overtopped the moraines, unleashing the Kankakee Torrent, a huge flood that left enormous sand deposits here in the Kankakee Region. Black oak savannas and sand prairies flourished in this sandy soil. The Kankakee River meandered through these flatlands, flanked on either side by wetlands that spanned hundreds of thousands of acres. A scarcely imaginable abundance of wildlife lived in these marshes, prairies, and woodlands.

That landscape changed dramatically in the early 1900s as marshlands were drained and converted to agriculture, the Kankakee channelized, and the prairies plowed. At several sites within the Kankakee Region, you can see impressive remnants of this native landscape—from the Jasper-Pulaski Fish and Wildlife Area, where tens of thousands of Sandhill Cranes gather during fall migration, to Kankakee Sands, where The Nature Conservancy has restored 5,000 acres of wetlands and prairie. Many of these sites offer few visitor amenities—often little more than a parking area. This lack of development makes these great places to see wildlife and immerse yourself in nature.

While dramatic natural sites like the Aukiki Wetland Conservation Area dominate the Beyond the Beach Discovery Trail here in the Kankakee Region, you’ll also find cultural sites like Dunn’s Bridge, believed to have been constructed of steel salvaged from the world’s first Ferris Wheel exhibited in Chicago in 1893. As you explore the region, be sure to stop in the community of Kouts for a heaping serving of home cooking and Midwestern hospitality.

A long legacy of art in the National Parks continued at Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore when four artists unveiled their visual interpretations of the park during a brief ceremony on December 12th in the park’s visitor center. Mark Burkett (Mooresville, IN), Susan Henshaw (Union Pier, MI), Nancie King Mertz (Chicago, IL), and Jeannie McLeish (Mooresville, IN) each presented artwork created during their stays as Artists-in-Residence this past summer. Accepting their work on behalf of the park was Superintendent Costa Dillon.

The park’s Artist-in-Residence (AIR), program continues a rich heritage of artists like writer Edwin Way Teale, poet Carl Sandburg, and painter Frank V. Dudley who were inspired by the dunes and whose work and words helped move others to preserve this special place along the southern shore of Lake Michigan.

Now in its 15th year, the AIR program at Indiana Dunes offers professional artists the opportunity to live along the lakeshore for two weeks giving them uninterrupted time to create art that helps generate increased appreciation and support for the national lakeshore. In exchange, the artist provides a public program and donates one piece of art created during their stay. The work produced by these artists becomes a permanent part of the park’s collection and is currently exhibited in the visitor center. Additional opportunities for displaying the collection are being explored including traveling shows and using a historic structure in the park as an arts center.

The Indiana Dunes Visitor Center is located at 1215 North State Road 49 in Porter, Indiana. For more information about the Artist-in-Residence program please visit the park website  or call the park’s information desk at 219-395-1882.

Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore is part of the National Park Service. More than 20,000 National Park Service employees care for America’s 397 national parks and work with communities across the nation to help preserve local history and create close-to-home recreational opportunities.

Mayor Rudolph Clay will join City of Gary officials, representatives from the Northwest Indiana Regional Development Authority (RDA), the Lakefront East Advisory Board, and the Marquette Park Project Team for a ceremony dedicating the first phase of the Marquette Park Lakefront East Project.

The ceremony will be held in front of the Father Marquette Monument on Friday, December 23, 2011, at 1:00 p.m.   Improvements at the Recreation Pavilion and Site, the Father Marquette Monument and Site, and the Oak Savanna Restoration will be highlighted and dedicated with the unveiling of project plaques. During the ceremony, a ribbon cutting will take place to mark the opening of the newly renovated Father Marquette Monument.

The $9.06 million restoration of the Recreation Pavilion and Site, Father Marquette Monument and Site, and the Oak Savanna represent the first phase of capital improvements that are being constructed under RDA grant funding. The Marquette Park Lakefront East initiative was made possible when the City of Gary was awarded, in June 2009, a grant for $28,190,000 from the RDA for planning, design, engineering, and select capital and operational improvements.

One of the many Beyond the Beach sites located along Lake Michigan, the 241-acre Marquette Park is one of Northwest Indiana’s most admired and historic regional parks.   Capital improvements, which are laid out in The Marquette Park Lakefront East Master Plan (MPLEMP), provide access to and circulation within the park, preserve and strengthen the park’s natural features, provide new recreational and educational amenities, and restore the park’s signature historic facilities.   Collectively, when construction throughout the park is complete in 2012, revitalization and improvements will help re-establish the park as one of Northwest Indiana’s premier lakefront destinations and enhance the quality of life and park experience for Gary and Northwest Indiana residents.

The December 17 installment of the  Calumet Outdoors Series is slated to take place at a Beyond the Beach site.

Coffee Creek Watershed Preserve is 167 acres of an aesthetically stunning marriage of nature and culture, and is also a popular hiking, biking, fishing area in Northwest Indiana.

If you’ve never been to Coffee Creek, this hike is the perfect time to visit a unique setting. The weather forecast seems cooperative, and the hike will be led by Kris Krouse, Executive Director of Shirley Heinze Land Trust.  This is a great opportunity to learn about two organizations with some of the best natural settings in the region.

As always, the hike will start at 9 AM. Participants are instructed to meet at the pavilion parking area on 1050 North, and everyone can warm up by the fire with hot chocolate afterward.

Coffee Creek Watershed Preserve is located on 1050 North in Chesterton, Indiana, just east of State Route 49.  To get there from I-94, exit at 26-A (Chesterton exit), Look for the white fence on the left.  Turn left at the next break in the median, Voyage Boulevard.  Head back north on State Route 49 to 1050 North, which will be the next right.