Grosse Pointe Academy students test-driving new MotorCities Junior Ranger program

GROSSE POINTE FARMS — The National Park Service might bring to mind rustic, wild places like Yellowstone or the Grand Canyon, but would you believe there’s also a connection to places like historical museums and automotive plants?

MotorCities National Heritage Area Partnership is affiliated with the National Park Service and is working to preserve and promote Michigan’s automotive and labor history and present-day impact on the state and the world. As part of that effort, MotorCities launched its Junior Ranger program June 9 at Grosse Pointe Academy in Grosse Pointe Farms as a way to engage young people with local automotive history. Junior Ranger programs are also offered through national parks.

“We are here in Michigan, telling the story of how this region put the world on wheels,” said MotorCities National Heritage Area Partnership and Program Director Brian Yopp. “And we also create educational programming.”

Yopp said the MotorCities Junior Ranger program has been in the works for the last 20 years — and then the start date, and the program itself, evolved as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, with more virtual options for participants.

Trevor Clor, a social studies teacher at Grosse Pointe Academy, is spearheading the program at his school, as this year’s seventh graders prepare to enter eighth grade in the fall. He said he’s asking his students to visit at least one of the MotorCities sites over the summer, and they’ll be sharing what they learned and saw in the classroom this fall. Students are asked to take a selfie at the site or sites they visit.

“This is to get them pumped up about their summer homework, which no one wants to do, but I think this will be fun,” Clor said.

Clor’s incoming eighth graders are asked each summer to visit “any culturally or historically significant location and tell us about it,” but this year, they’re focusing on Michigan.

Clor’s own passion for history was sparked by a Ken Burns documentary about the Civil War that he saw when he was 8 years old in 1990. His parents and grandparents supported that interest by taking a young Clor to see Civil War battlefields.

“The best way I learned was visiting places, seeing things, being there,” said Clor, who tries to instill that in his students by encouraging them to do the same.

As the first institution participating in the MotorCities’ Junior Ranger program, GPA students are paving the way for their peers.

“We’re going to help create some really cool content for the National Parks system,” Clor told his students.

Bob Sadler, communications manager for MotorCities National Heritage Area, said MotorCities is one of 55 National Heritage Areas in the nation — and the only one in Michigan — that’s affiliated with the National Park Service.

“Doing activities and visiting partner attractions is part of the Junior Ranger program,” Sadler said.

To become a Junior Ranger, students can visit MotorCities sites virtually and in person and complete the activities or tours of their choice. Sites are as close as the Edsel and Eleanor Ford House in Grosse Pointe Shores, the Ford Piquette Avenue Plant in Detroit, and the Detroit Historical Museum, but they also include sites in cities like Kalamazoo and Lansing.

“We’re just excited to be a part of your initiative and have our students learn about the MotorCities National Heritage (Area),” said Bridgette Murray, assistant head of school, middle school division head and middle school language arts teacher at Grosse Pointe Academy.

GPA has a long history of visiting National Parks with students — including an optional summer rafting trip at New River Gorge. Clor said eighth graders visit Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado toward the end of the school year.

Charlie Toyrangeay, 13, of Grosse Pointe Park — who’ll be in eighth grade at GPA this fall — took part in the rafting trip last summer because he thought it would be a great adventure.

“It was more thrill seeking,” Toyrangeay said. “There were a lot of things I did I hadn’t done before.”

He said he also made new friends. This summer, he said, he’s looking forward to visiting the Automotive Hall of Fame in Dearborn to learn more about the history of cars.

Although the Junior Ranger program can be run through a school — MotorCities hopes to visit additional classrooms this fall to encourage student participation — it’s open to any kids, even if their school isn’t organizing a Junior Ranger initiative.

“Kids can do this on their own with their parents,” Sadler said. “It doesn’t have to be affiliated with a class.”

So many metro Detroit families have personal connections to the auto industry, from grandparents and great-grandparents who might have been Rosie the Riveters or early union organizers, to people who work for an automotive company or supplier.

“Certainly, I want (the students) to gain an appreciation for the history of the area around them,” Yopp said. “I want them to talk to family members about their connections to the auto industry.”

As the industry grows more global and fewer metro Detroiters play a direct role in it, Yopp said the next generation “may not have that,” so it’s important for students to talk to their relatives and make those connections.

With high gas prices, more families might be considering “staycations” instead of traveling to far-flung places this summer. That doesn’t mean they can’t have fun and see new sights, however. The Junior Ranger program, and MotorCities sites, offer fascinating places to visit and explore that aren’t far away.

“This is kind of a great hometown tourist experience,” Sadler said.

Program organizers ask that anyone who shares their experience on social media use the hashtag #ExploreMotorCities.

For more about the Junior Ranger program, visit motorcities.org/junior-ranger.