Replinger Honored for Introducing Girls to Canoeing
16 Nov
Jean Replinger, photo from www.eober.org
The publisher of Bound for the Barrens has been honored for introducing girls to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness during the 1960s.
At the time she had the opportunity to take boys into the BWCA, and she asked the Outward Bound board if she could take a group of girls canoeing. According to a story by Karin Elton in the Marshall Independent, there was some skepticism.
“The board asked her why would girls want to have a wilderness experience? Do they want to be like men?” Elton wrote. But they relented and last month, Replinger and 12 women who were on those early trips were honored at an Outward Bound reunion in New York City. (Read the full story HERE).
Canoeing.com has long been inspired by Replinger because of her dedication to the Oberholtzer Foundation and her recent publication of his journal from a 1912 trip to Hudson Bay, Bound for the Barrens. You may have seen Canoeing.com coverage of that book this summer.
Replinger’s story was picked up by the Star Tribune, Minnesota Public Radio and even picked up by a few outlets as an obituary. Luckily, the Marshall Independent assures us that was a false alarm!
