READING ALONG THE TRAIL: Ansh Rana, behind the wheelbarrow, recently installed a “StoryWalk” at Marquand Park’s Rhododendron Trail with a group of helpers.

By Anne Levin

To earn the rank of Eagle Scout, members of the Boys Scouts and Girl Scouts of America must pass through seven rankings, complete an extensive service project, and survive a lengthy review process. Only a small percentage make it all the way through.

Among those working to achieve this distinction is Ansh Rana, a senior at South Brunswick High School and a member of Boy Scout Troop 90 in Kendall Park. Rana has based his Eagle Scout project at Princeton’s Marquand Park, a place he visited frequently as a child. “StoryWalk,” which displays pages from the children’s book Tap the Magic Tree by Christie Matheson along the park’s Rhododendron Trail, will have its official debut with a ribbon-cutting on Saturday, January 14 at 11 a.m.

“I’ve always loved reading,” Rana said. “This was a way to combine that with the experience of the outdoors, which is what the project is about.”

A scout since elementary school, Rana began thinking about the Eagle Scout project a few years ago. “During COVID, I was on a hike with my parents, and I saw it [a ‘StoryWalk’] at another park,” he said. “Then this past summer, I was at Marquand Park, and I was brainstorming. And it just came to me.” 

“StoryWalk” trails are located in all 50 states and 12 countries. The project, which was created by Anne Ferguson of Montpelier, Vermont, and developed in collaboration with the Kellogg-Hubbard Library, gives children and adults a way to simultaneously enjoy reading and the outdoors. Pages from a book are laminated and put in display frames at intervals along a nature trail.

Marquand Park board members supported Rana’s idea. He credits them, and volunteers from Troop 90, for assisting with the project. Scouts and adults helped him build, assemble, and install the 11 display frames along the trail and place the pages of Tap the Magic Tree into the frames.

The plan is for a new book to be displayed each season. “The park suggested the book they wanted for the first one,” Rana said. “The signs are replaceable. So when they decide to change the story, they can easily swap it out.”

Young readers can experience the entire story as they walk the Rhododendron Trail, which is in the native woods of the 17-acre park, a historic preserve of trees and woodlands. Marquand Park and Arboretum was originally the landscaped garden of a 19th century estate. Some trees in the park are the largest of their kind in New Jersey. The Marquand Park Foundation was established in 1954 and supports planting and special maintenance programs to preserve the park for the public to enjoy.

While the official opening is Saturday, the “StoryWalk” is already attracting young visitors. “Some of the board members told me kids have already gone through and loved it,” said Rana. “That was nice to hear.”