June 24 – The American Association for State and Local History recently selected a Joplin bicentennial project for teens as the recipient of the History in Progress Award and the Award of Excellence.
In 2023, Joplin celebrated its 150th anniversary with a year-long program of events, including Iconic Joplin, which involved young people aged 12 to 16 in local history by challenging them to build monuments from Lego. The program ran from December 2022 to June 2023, with teen teams working together to build six monuments: Bonnie and Clyde’s Hideout, Crystal Cave, Joplin Public Library, Grand Falls, Olivia Apartments Building and Union Depot.
The three host organizations for Iconic Joplin were the Joplin Public Library, Joplin History & Mineral Museum and Creative Learning Alliance. Teams met with historians, Lego experts, architects and contractors. They also enjoyed private behind-the-scenes tours of their selected sights.
This year, AASLH presented 47 national awards honoring people, projects, exhibitions and publications.
The History in Progress Award is presented at the discretion of the AASLH Awards Committee. It is an additional accolade for an Award of Excellence winner whose nomination is inspirational, demonstrates exceptional knowledge and/or is exceptionally enterprising in the areas of financing, partnerships, collaborations, creative problem solving, unusual project design or inclusivity.
A Lego rendition of the historic Olivia Apartments building, where firefighters work to extinguish a fire on the roof, received the People’s Choice Award at the finals of the Landmark Builds Iconic Joplin competition.
The Creativity Award for Most Innovative Design was presented to the team that built Grand Falls, which used light to simulate moving water in the falls, the largest continuously flowing waterfalls in Missouri.
The engineering award for best use of Lego to create a landmark was won by a team that created the Crystal Cave.
The storytelling award went to the team that built Bonnie and Clyde’s hideout.
The AASLH awards program was initiated in 1945 to establish and encourage standards of excellence in the collection, preservation, and interpretation of state and local history in the United States.
