Inspiration Point Wayside Rest

The Inspiration Point Wayside Rest was one of thousands of infrastructure projects completed during the Great Depression by New Deal Agencies. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt created the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) through Executive Order 6106-A in April 1933, and the CCC had over 60 camps in Minnesota by the following August. Fourteen more were operated in coordination with the Minnesota Conservation Department (now the Minnesota DNR) to address drought and erosion control in southeast Minnesota. This included Camp SCS-7 / PE-91 / 751 in Lanesboro, which was responsible for the construction of Inspiration Point Wayside Rest in 1934 according to the Fillmore County Historical Society. Gemini Research claims the property was instead built by workers paid by the Federal/State Emergency Relief Administration (FERA/SERA). Inspiration Point was one of the first rest areas Arthur R. Nichols designed under commission of the Minnesota Highway Department. The wayside rest is located atop Duschee Hill, one of the largest hills in the region, and its surrounding terrain consists of pronounced hills and ravines. Predominant local land uses include natural oak and hardwood forests – which were incorporated into the site's original design – as well as tilled fields and pastureland. == Restoration efforts ==

In the early 2010s, MnDOT conducted condition assessments and background research on Inspiration Point in preparation for a National Register of Historic Places listing application. The renovation focused mostly on restoring the masonry of the stone walls and on clearing the buckthorn that had obscured the Point's views of the surrounding valley. == References ==