Chris Craft Runabout

My father used to be on the Lake Patrol of Big Spirit when I was a little girl. He was a high school math teacher during the school year, but in the summer, he drove one of these beauties around the lake. I always loved sitting on that upholstered box covering the inboard. I can still hear the voracious sound of that engine.

He bought an old school bus, converted it to an "RV", and this became his "home away from home" during the summer months. Every week he would bring one of his four children up to the lake. We lived in "The Jewel" and hung with the local kids at the boat launch near the Lake Patrol shack.

Lots has changed around here since those days. The small summer cottages that dotted the lakeshore have been supplanted by McMansions built on every square foot of land anywhere near the water. Everyone talks about the water quality of the Iowa Great Lakes, but they don't seem to make that important connection between impaired water and draining the wetlands and/or building right up to the edge of the water. Everyone wants their little piece of property on the lake, but it is always the other guy causing the problem. Enough said.