Decatur County Freedom Rock

This painted boulder is part of one of Iowa's most heartfelt folk-art projects, the Freedom Rock Tour. It began in nineteen ninety-nine when a Greenfield teenager named Ray Sorensen, nicknamed Bubba, watched the film Saving Private Ryan and decided to thank veterans in his own way. He covered a twelve-foot rock with patriotic scenes for Memorial Day, then repainted it every year after.

In twenty thirteen he set out to paint one Freedom Rock in each of Iowa's ninety-nine counties. Every rock is unique, profiling veterans and heroes chosen by a local committee. This is Decatur County's. Sorensen finished all ninety-nine by twenty twenty-one, then added a one-hundredth, turning a string of roadside boulders into a statewide tribute carried out one county at a time.