HISTORY OF THE ESTABLISHMENT AND DEVELOPMENT OF
BERTHA BROCK PARK AS RELATED BY ALLAN M. WILLIAMS
TO THE BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS AUGUST 15, 1978

(Mr. Williams’ presentation was transcribed from the tape as near as possible word for word)

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There was a man by the name of Dan Henry, who was in charge of the right-of-ways beautification of roadsides and I (Williams) was working for the State Highway Department when I first came to the neighborhood, over at Lowell, and Ernie Williman was the resident agent here for the State Highway Department, situated in Ionia and he had the office in the Southeast corner of the Courthouse basement and we met friends over in Lowell that came to Ionia the same time we did and we used to go on picnics and we went on M-21, and went down into this Park that……this land that looked like it should be a nice place for a park.

The Board of County Road Commissioners, by virtue of their office, should also be County Park Commissioners, but I hesitated to make any move until this Dan Henry came to me and showed me a possibility; that is the State Highway Department was going to buy an extra 100’ of right-of-way on either side of the existing M-21 at that time and he came to me and he asked me if I was familiar with that land on the south side of M-21, right where they wanted to (have a) preserve the natural beauty along the roadside and I said we sure do, we’ve been down there on picnics and he said don’t you think that would make a nice park and I said yes I do. So he said the State is willing to pay $100 an acre for the land – it was owned by Frank Strong and he asked me to go and buy the land. He said they’re willing to pay $100 an acre, but I bought the land for $50 an acre and the State Highway took what they wanted from the County then – the County had the deed and sold it to them for $100 an acre, so the first 23 acres only cost the County about $660. That was back in 1931. And that was during the WPA days and it just came in right to build that Palmer Lodge and WPA labor was used in construction of the building and that’s why the building is faced the wrong way, because there wasn’t an access to the building from the South and it faces north and there was a pool down in front of the building and there was a summer house down on the first level below the Palmer Lodge is on, and the Lodge was built with WPA labor and I don’t think it cost the County anything. I can’t remember that there was any County money that went into that. I had charge of the WPA for the whole County at one time.

So that’s how it came about, the County Park, the first 23 acres was started and about a year or two later, Bill Schlernitzauer, leader of the Hunting & Fishing Club came to me one day and he said, Allan, do you think the Board of Supervisors, or the County, would give us, if we buy 40 acres of land from the Bellamy property, and turn it over to the County, if they would give us back a lease on 11 acres of it for our activities as a County Hunting and Fishing Club. So I said I’ll search out and see and I went to the Road Commission first and they approved and I came to the Board of Supervisors and they approved and that’s how the original County Park began. And the Hunting and Fishing Club bought that 40 acres and turned it over to the County and that was off the Bellamy property and the Board of Supervisors gave them a lease for 30 years and I guess they’ve renewed the lease since and I think they have to come to the Board of Supervisors and this Commission now and you also have charge of the County Parks, that is in a way, the land is held in the name of the County. And a few years later, Bill came to me again and said do you think the Board of Supervisors would accept another 40 acres off the Bellamy property and I said we can find out. So I came to the Board of County Road Commissioners first, that was my first responsibility, and then to the Board of Supervisors and they were in favor of it, so that Hunting and Fishing Club bought the second 40 acres and a little later they bought another 40 acres, but they didn’t turn all of the land over to the County. They turned part of it and held the part where the old Bellamy Mill used to be on the creek and there was a dam there on the land and the mill was there at the time and they held that in their own name and I think if you look at the map or go to the Register of Deeds you’ll find that they have a small piece of land down there in the corner of the third 40 acres.

Now, Mrs Bellamy (he meant to say Brock), I don’t think she ever set foot on any part of the land before it became a Park. But Fred Green came into the Board meeting one day, and …..the original Board consisted of Fred Green, Fred Knox and R. H. Hall, of Belding, and they were three good businessmen and Mrs. Brock was a Historian for the DAR Branch in Ionia County and she did a lot of promoting of memorials to people that were worthy and memorials were errected and she was responsible for that. But she never got near the County Park. I think the closest she got, was Fred Green would turn her over to me to answer some of her questions and help her out if I could. But she was looking for a couple of millstones in the old mill that used to be on Bellamy Creek about where M-21 crosses the creek and she was looking for these millstones that were used in the old Welch Mill and we never found them. I think they are probably under the grade of M-21. But that’s how I got to know Mrs. Brock. Anyway, he came into the Board meeting some years later, after the Park started to be developed….

But Fred Green walked into the Board meeting one day (the Road Commission) and suggested to the members that they name that Park for Mrs. Brock – just like that and they accepted his suggestion and that’s how the Park became the “Bertha Brock County Park”.

The County never appropriated any funds for the development of the Park and it was done with County Road machinery and the men donated their time. The ball diamond was graded by the men; the tennis courts were built by the men and that was all done free to the County. We never had an appropriation to the County for that Park, but it got developed through that method. It took a longer time probably, than if we’d gone at it, but we might have ruined the Park because we tried to keep it as a wildwood park and I had a man working for me, Frank Harkness, and he was quite a landscape gardener, and he’d learned this business over in England, so I trusted him to keep the Park and we never cut a tree out there unless we both agreed on it – trying to keep the Park as natural as possible and it’s a wildwood Park and people seem to enjoy it. It became very popular and later Frank Harkness……there was a 5% of the funds that were turned over to the Road Commission for roads, allowed for roadside parks, or parks, and that’s where the money came from to pay Frank Harkness, who built the caretakers house out there and there was a little store south of it that was made of stone and a trail that was natural to the area.

(The Lodge) I redrew the plans, the Boy Scouts were looking for a place to spend the weekend and you’ll notice a balcony there and that’s where the beds were and it was redesigned. The material we used, we took all the bark from the Belding Basket Company for years to use in the County Park and everything was covered like that overhead grate crossing there, the girders underneath the Bridge were covered with that bark so that you couldn’t see the shed. The bark on the house and other places in the park were…..

(Mr. Williams ended his discourse here and answered several questions from the Board. In summation he stated that the origin of the Ionia County Bertha Brock Park should be properly recorded for future history.)

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