Welcome to the Beargrease
Education Team
Using the Beargrease Sled Dog Race as a teaching tool is highly motivating for students. Dogs and kids are a perfect match! The Beargrease can be used to learn about Minnesota geography, local history, language arts, social skills, the use of technology, and so much more.
It is my vision to collect lessons, projects, activities, and information which will help educators more easily use the Beargrease as a teaching tool. This will allow even more students to connect this local event with curriculum… which makes learning fun!
With your help we can “team up” to help connect the Beargrease with curriculum.
Every year, each Beargrease musher is sworn in as an official U.S. mail carrier, and take letters that you write to a post office at the end of the trail, just as John Beargrease did 100 years ago. We call this tradition “Trail Mail”.
Trail Mail carries on the tradition of John Beargrease. Commemorative envelopes are created by local artists for this historic event. When used to send mail via dog sled, it becomes treasured by the receiver and highly collectible.
How do I send Trail Mail?
- Purchase your John Beargrease Sled Dog Commemorative envelope(s).
- Write a letter to a relative, friend, or even yourself! Place the letter in the commemorative envelope and address it.
- Attach sufficient postage to the envelope and return it to the Beargrease office. (Beargrease Trail Mail, PO Box 16506, Duluth, MN 55816)
Where does Trail Mail go?
- Your commemorative envelope will be signed by a musher mail carrier and receive a stamped cancellation which reads “carried by dog sled.”
- Trail Mail will be distributed to musher mail carriers before leaving Duluth.
- Your mail will be carried by dog sled along the historic Beargrease trail to a predetermined pick-up point where they will then enter the regular mail stream!