This year for our 48th annual Gala, Wildlife Prairie Park is aiming to raise $250,000—one thousand dollars for every year of America’s 250th celebration. Our theme, Red, White, and Bling, honors both our nation’s milestone and the nearly five decades of wonder and wildness the Park has brought to Illinois.
Long before the Park became the beloved destination it is today, Bill Rutherford stood on an abandoned strip mine and imagined something entirely different. He dreamed of a place where families could connect with native wildlife, where prairie grasses could return, and where children could explore the landscape as it once was. That bold vision became Wildlife Prairie Park, and generations now experience nature because of his extraordinary idea.
This year’s gala brings history to life as Joe Wiegand performs as President Theodore Roosevelt, sharing stories from the life of the first conservation pioneer.
Join us as we celebrate America’s 250 years and Wildlife Prairie Park’s 48th anniversary. Your support helps continue Rutherford’s dream and ensures the Wildlife Prairie Park thrives for the next generation, and the next 250 years to come.
Wildlife Prairie Park is a community asset that makes Central Illinois a great place to live. Help us strengthen the Park and continue our mission of providing unique educational and recreational experiences for children and adults that inspire lifelong learning about conservation.
Wildlife Prairie Park occasionally takes photographs or video of participants for promoting/advertising our programs, services, events, activities, and facilities in our brochures, website, social media, and other promotional materials. By entering Wildlife Prairie Park or registering for, participating in or attending the Park’s programs, events, or other activities, the participant (or parent/guardian of a minor participant) irrevocably agrees to the use and distribution by Wildlife Prairie Park of his or her image (or of his minor child/ward) in photographs, video recordings, and any other electronic reproductions of such programs, events and activities for any purpose without inspection or approval and without compensation, rights to royalties or any other consideration now and in the future.
