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Street signs to honor three founders of Community Park




BROWN CITY — Three founding members of Brown City Community Park will be honored with street signs for their years of dedication.

Ron Campbell along with the late Jack Marion and Raymond Witmer will be recognized with the signs that name the three roads within the park.

“It took me by surprise,” Campell said. “I was humbled by it. We didn’t do it for recognition; we did it because we loved doing it. We needed to do it and the kids needed a place to play, and it just blossomed.”

The Brown City Council heard at its March 25 meeting that the park board approved the request from Doug Muxlow and plans to install the signs this spring.

Under the plan, the road from the McMorran Street entrance south to the curve north of the pond will be called Jack Marion, from the Cade Road entrance east to the curve will be Raymond Witmer, and north between the pavilions will be Ron Campbell.

Muxlow said he spent nearly 20 years on the park board at the request of Witmer. He and other contributors will pay for the signs and the cost to install them.

“I think too often we lose historical perspective with time and do not often enough recognize those that have historical significance in our communities,” said Muxlow, a lifelong resident who played and coached Little League.

“In a small community like ours, we need to be loyal and not afraid to acknowledge those that have made a difference,” Muxlow continued. “We need to take care of our own. Many people get involved and play a role for a while, but only a few make a career out of making a difference.”

Campbell, 82, is the current chairman of the Brown City Park Board and has been a member for nearly 50 years after joining in 1971. He worked in the family Gulf Oil distribution business and later served as Brown City’s assessor until working 20 years with the Lapeer County Equalization Department, his last eight as director.

Campbell said he was serving as Brown City Rotary Club president and Little League coach in 1970-71 when the club helped construct the bathrooms at the McMorran Street entrance of the park, established on Jan. 17, 1968.

“It’s been a great ride,” Campbell said. “We had a lot of help and over the years we had many, many great people involved. It’s impossible to name them all.

“Jack Marion was the one who started the whole thing, and Ray Witmer organized so many projects over there like the picnic tables, it’s unbelievable.”

Marion is remembered as the creative mind that stood at the entrance overlooking an open field and envisioned a community park. He founded Marion’s Studio’s in 1963 in Brown City and passed away in 2001 at age 73.

Witmer, who sat at the park board table for nearly 50 years, spent hundreds of hours fixing, building and adding extras to the park. The 1939 Brown City High School graduate spent his entire career as a dairy farmer and carpenter and passed away in 2013 at age 91.

“It was a labor of love,” Campbell added. “I wish the other two guys were here. They would have appreciated it, too.”

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