By: Rebecca Hudson
Murray County News Staffwriter
Nearly fifty years ago, in 1972, the idea of developing the End-o-line Park was sparked by Colleen Illg Tollefson and 4-H leader Louise Gervais. As a young girl of 16, Colleen Tollefson had a hand in founding the park that has grown into a flourishing tourist attraction located in Currie, Minnesota.
Tollefson was the guest speaker Sunday afternoon at the Murray County Historical Society’s annual meeting and spoke on the importance of history and how great a connection history shares with tourism. In her extensive work with tourism within the state of Minnesota, she developed the tag line: “Take Home a Story” based on the concept of inspiration, experiences, and good memories. “There is no more important audience than your hometown audience,” she told those gathered for the historic society annual meeting.
Back in the fledgling days of the railroad park in Currie, Tollefson took on as a personal 4-H project a cleanup of the existing park. She shared that simply asking the Chicago/Northwestern railroad resulted in an offer of $1.00 to purchase the train for the newly developing End-O-Line Park with the only stipulation being that it had to be moved across the road to where it now sits. As the project began to take shape and grow, the Currie Booster club came on board followed by the County. “It was the passion of many people that made it grow into what it is today,” she said.
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