Willow Leaves June 28

Class Reunion Memories Twenty-one members of the Willow Mills High School Class of ’59 met June 19 to celebrate 40 years on their own, and to remember the passing of two of their classmates. The festivities were held on the school grounds at Elsie hewitt Elementary where most of the class, their spouses, and their children have attended school. The twenty-one classmates who met accounted for all but five of the graduating class. Rachel and Jack Gibson sent their best wishes from their home in Southern California. Robert Biehl was in town and met class members at the Dowsing Rod late Saturday night. But he kept the vow he made that night 40 years ago when after graduation he set the football field on fire, that as long as Coach Lapinski was alive, he would never come back to the school. Lapinski, now age 66, retired from teaching and coaching last year. Lapinski was the class sponsor and attended the reunion. The last classmates not attending were the first two of the class to have graduated to a new life. Dan o'Brien died in Viet Nam in 1969. Dolly Johnson died of cancer last year. With spouses, children, and grandchildren, over 120 people showed up at the family picnic Saturday afternoon. Thirty-eight class members and spouses attended the “sock hop” that evening and showed they could still do “The Twist.”	Accident on River Road The stretch of South River Road west of town known as “The Devil’s Backbone” claimed another victim late Saturday night as a car sped off the road and into the muddy waters. Miraculously the driver and two passengers—all teens whose names have been withheld pending investigation—escaped with relatively minor injuries. All three were treated in the emergency room at Wabash General and were released. Sheriff’s deputies say all three have stated that something or someone suddenly stepped into the road ahead of them. The driver swerved to miss the person or animal and went over the steep embankment. The Sheriff’s office cites many inconsistencies in the stories and credits them to too many sensational movies. Results of breathalizer tests and blood-alcohol tests conducted at the hospital have not been released.
Mystery Camper Eludes Capture Ted Anderson has indicated that no further developments have occurred in the case of the mysterious camper. Sheriff’s deputies concur that they have no new leads. Last month Anderson reported finding a fresh campsite on his property with evidence that it had been in use for a good part of the spring. Since then, there has been no sign of further use of the camp, nor have neighbors reported anything suspicious. “Must have been a gypsy just passing through,” said Anderson. “Or he could have moved to someone else’s woodlot and hasn’t been discovered yet.” That may be, but we have to ask: “Where else could he find beach-front property like yours, Ted?”

Welcome to The Lake in Stringtown

Milo Stoneburner’s son Milt always had bright ideas. One of them was letting folks camp out by the Lake on the farm. It was one of his favorite things to do when he was a kid, and his brother Robert joined him in convincing Milo to let them take a stab at renting camping spaces on the north side of the Lake.

To encourage the use of the property, they came up with the idea of a permanent lease for your private campsite. They used the farm tractor after their chores all one summer to clear a network of muddy trails through the woods on that side, and then they staked out camping lots similar to what they’d seen at the Pokagon State Park.

Then they went about seeking people to rent the lots on a long-term basis. What they got was different than what they expected. The years after the second world war saw a big change in how people worked and how they spent their money. The first one to buy a fifty year lease was a soldier with his severance pay in his pocket.

The boys thought they had hit paydirt when they deposited that first $50 in the bank and signed the fifty year lease for $20 per year. Why land was only good for about $250 an acre in the woods. They would have that much in ten years with continued income for 40 years after that. And it was only a fraction of an acre. They’d be rich.

Over the next couple years they sold fifteen of the leases on about six acres of land. They were not prepared, however, for the fact that none of the people who bought intended to camp there. From that first 18-foot Airstream that got parked out there, to the two-bedroom mobile, to the series of tarpaper shacks, the people who moved in came to stay.

They ran electric to their homes, dug wells, and polluted the Lake with their septic systems. In 1965, when Milt sold off the acreage that would become Willow Grove at $600 an acre, he still thought he’d made a good deal on the permaleases. But when the developer sold the Willow Grove lots for $2,000 each (half acre lots) he started having second thoughts.

He tried to have everyone evicted, but a short court fight proved the permalease valid and binding. Then he went about a zoning fight, but for all his efforts, existing structures and land use were grandfathered in. It was finally apparent that Stringtown was there to stay.

Now Robert had a different view of things than his brother Milt. Probably because while Milt was taking over the family business and the homestead, Robert had taken one of the permaleases himself and built a little cabin near the Lake where he continued to live for many years. Unbeknownst to Milt, the fights against invalidating the leases and rezoning were funded by his brother Robert.

Milo died in 1989 and Milt followed to an early grave in 1990. Robert was left a controlling interest in the permaleased properties. He did what seemed perfectly logical to himself. He surveyed the lots and deeded them to the leaseholders just ten years before the first lease would expire. What had been a long-term temporary arrangement became a permanent fixture in Willow Mills. Stringtown is here to stay.

So why is it called Stringtown?

The original settlers didn’t bother to have the power company come out and run power lines for them. They tapped into a transformer at the road and ran their own power line out to the Lake. From there each person who setup a house or trailer strung a line from his neighbor’s to get power. By the time the power company figured out what was going on five years later, the whole place was strung together like a spider web, and folks started calling it Stringtown.

They all did get legal power eventually, but it took several years to get all the pikers hooked up properly. And two years ago, the company discovered there was still one cabin that was getting its power from a neighbor’s connection.