Starting this fall, a new historical-writing course will be offered at Mancos High School that gives students the opportunity to record and document local history from those who have the strongest ties to it: longtime Mancos residents.

The course, an effort by the Mancos Valley Historical Society, will also help students develop their research, interviewing and writing skills, said Mancos High history teacher Emilie Benke.

"The way the class is set up, students interview people in the community to hear their stories and understand the firsthand history of Mancos, asking them things like how long they've been here, and documenting what their family has done here historically," said Benke. "They'll be completing interviews and writing articles that we'll eventually produce and turn into a full story."

Linda Simmons, president of the Mancos Valley Historical Society, said the course was the idea of fellow historical society member Ben Walcott and is inspired by the popular Foxfire project.

The Foxfire project came out as a journaling assignment for rural Georgia high school English class in the 1960s, to catalog the people and culture of the Southern Appalachian Mountains. It brought readers the lives of those who were born, lived their lives, and died there. It eventually turned into a long-standing series that has seen nearly 9 million copies in print and its 11 subsequent anthologies.

"We have really two goals: gather historical profile pieces and gather process pieces that have to do with documenting the way things were done back then - a 'how-to' almost," said Simmons.

She added that the course has been developed to be in line with the Colorado Standards required of districts, and in addition to the writing and interviewing, students will conduct oral presentations periodically on what they've learned.

At the end of the first semester, the Mancos Valley Historical Society is funding the compilation of all the stories and interviews into a book, which will be available to the public.

Benke says that about 10 students of varying grade-levels have signed up so far, and she is excited about the new course and its hands-on format.

"Right now we're still pretty small, but I expect that to change a little bit as more find out about it. I've seen a lot of excitement so far, I think they're getting really into it," she said.