Each year, the Mary Reynolds Spirit of Clark Lake Award is bestowed on a deserving member of the community. Clark Lakers were asked to submit names in July and to place their votes in a sealed container at Doyle’s Market. Flip Reynolds announced the winner during the Raft-O-Rama awards ceremony this afternoon (Sun 8/7).
Mike McKay is the 2022 winner.
Clark Lakers know Mike through his substantial contributions to the community. As Flip Reynolds put it, those contributions have benefited Clark Lake through both his blood, sweat and tears and generous donations. Look around the community, and you will find Mike’s caring touch everywhere. In Mike’s Clark Lake story are insights on why he made Clark Lake his forever home.
In this video, Mike tells how viewing a wedding at Clark Lake inspired him to live here.
A brief shower occurred during the awards ceremony, but it was over quickly.
Not everyone knows the full story of how the Clark Lake Community Center found its way to the County Park at the east end of the lake. In the late 1990s, it looked like the Graziani cottage on Kentucky Point was about to meet the business end of a bulldozer. Clark Lakers were horrified. Mike was a major player in saving this historic structure. When it appeared the house could not be moved by land because of obstructions, he found a way to move it by barge down the lake. Once in the County Park, the house was restored. Twenty years later, Mike has been deeply involved in a second restoration of this original Clark Lake cottage, now over 124 years old.
Mike joined others in the community to tell Clark Lake’s story in this video, and what makes Clark Lake different.
Flip’s mother was Mary Reynolds. Flip says she quietly found ways to make the lake a better place. Mary was fun loving, and cheered everyone on at the lake. She loved Clark Lake, even in the depth of winter. In her final days, she continued to take part in the community. Her last Raft-O-Rama was in 1994. This photo shows Mary (right) with friends Bev Avis (middle) and Meredith Szostek (left).
Previous Spirit of Clark Lake award winners are Annette Fink, Dan Omo, Rick Belcher, Peggy Collins, Peggy’s late husband Tom, Peggy’s son John, Bill Bendele, Evelyn Menard, Bunty Adams, Louie & Michele Ambs, Bill Tuttle, Bev Avis, Loretto Baker, Don Fowler, R. Tucker Boyers, George Svinicki, Joanne Ambs, Ogden Adkins, John & Dotty Karkheck, Dick Cochran, Woody Newman, Ann Swain, Pat Dwyer, Jamie Mercer, Sam & Kathy Pease, and Meredith Szostek.
