Many may have seen the Freedom Rock, or one of its smaller counterparts, but may not know the story behind the movement.

Mural Artist and Painter of the Freedom Rock Ray Sorensen says that his inspiration for initially painting the boulder sitting next to Highway 25 came from watching the movie “Saving Private Ryan” in the winter of 1998-99. He explains that he found the opening scene so moving, that he wanted to do something to recognize and show appreciation to the men and women who have served in the military. So he contacted the local quarry, who owned the land the boulder was sitting on, explained what he wanted to do and asked if he could paint it.

Sorensen was told that he had permission, and he got to work, He tells Raccoon Valley Radio that he had only planned on painting it once, but had a change of heart when some veterans got in touch with him.

“It’s one of those things where it was a graffiti rock. It got painted over, and then local vets asked if I’d come out and paint the same thing again for the following Memorial Day. And rather than just do the same thing again, I thought, ‘I’m going to paint something completely different and come up with, like, it’s a completely different mural.’ And so that kind of started my yearly tradition of every May for Memorial Day, a different thank you and tribute to our men and women who serve.”

Sorensen mentions that he hadn’t originally thought that the Freedom Rock would continue this long, and had even thought about stopping at one point, but was convinced otherwise.

“So about five years into the original Freedom Rock, I had had the idea to stop doing it. And that kind of got out to a lot of the veterans and veterans groups, and I started getting calls from all over the country saying, ‘Please don’t quit. That’s one of the things we love to ride to. We appreciate what you do.’ And so I promised them then that as long as I could afford the paint to do it and the time to do it, that I would.”

When asked how long he now plans to continue to repaint the Freedom Rock, Sorensen reiterated his promise that as long as he could afford the paint and time, he would continue to do so. He mentioned that now he even hopes to keep it going long enough to pass the project down to his children, the oldest two of which have already started helping by painting some of the larger sections around the bottom of the rock, while he does the fine details on top.