An endowment established to cement and further the legacy of the late Bob Torstenson continues to make a wide-ranging positive impact on elk and elk country. To date, the Torstenson Family Endowment generated more than $7.7 million applied to the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation’s conservation mission.
The Torstenson Youth Conservation Education Center is a 750-acre facility east of Pecatonica, Illinois, along the Pecatonica River, and recently hosted a dozen young boys and girls (age 10-17) to learn about firearms, firearm safety, hunting and conservation. The youngsters worked with dogs in search of pheasants.
One impressed reporter/onlooker wrote this: “I took from last Saturday and my research of Mr. Torstenson this lesson: Hunting and fishing are predicated on hard work and giving back in the hopes of conservation and a better tomorrow.”
More than 5,000 boys and girls visit the center annually.