St. Cloud State University alumni Marian Rengel ’76 ’80 and Mike Knaak ’75 have been honored with the 2025 Zapp Historian Award from the Stearns History Museum Board of Directors.
The Zapp Historian Award is presented annually in recognition of significant contributions to the preservation, interpretation or promotion of Stearns County history.
Rengel worked for the St. Cloud Times as a writer and editor for almost 30 years. In 2003, she was a founding member of the Minnesota Digital Library, which uses state funded grants to digitize and host archival materials online at no cost.
Knaak worked for nearly 40 years at the St. Cloud Times as an award-winning photographer and editor.
The couple have volunteered at Stearns History Museum in processing the St. Cloud Times Photograph Collection and also have volunteered with University Archives. Rengel previously served as an SCSU fixed term faculty, while Knaak was an adjunct professor.
“Thank you to Marian and Mike for your years of dedicated service to recording and archiving the visual history of the region,” Stearns History Museum said in a release. “(Their) continued work will benefit generations of Central Minnesota residents to come.”
