More than 50 high school juniors and seniors from a social studies class at Sauk Prairie High School, Wis., visited the national offices of the Freedom From Religion Foundation in Madison on Dec. 7, 2005, as part of a field trip. Their teacher, Dan Halling, traditionally takes students on a field trip to visit a synagogue, a Buddhist retreat, a Russian Orthodox church, and other off-the-beaten-track religious centers. He asked to add the Foundation office to this year’s excursion.
Foundation co-president Dan Barker (center, kneeling) spoke to the students about secularism, freethought, and state/church separation, and took many questions. Dan also performed his tango, “Beware of Dogma,” on the piano in Freethought Hall’s (crowded!) reception room.
With him are students who volunteered to be photographed, along with their teacher (far left).
Incidentally, the town of Sauk City (now part of Sauk Prairie, Wis.) was a freethought conclave well into the 20th century. Its “Freethought Hall” is one of three extant Freethought Halls (owned by Unitarians) out of more than 30 such halls built by the German Frei Gemeinde immigrant freethinkers in the mid-1800s. High school graduations were traditionally held at the Sauk City Freethought Hall, and it is still fondly regarded in the community.
