Findley State Park

After the cows were milked, my parents used to take my brothers and me to “Findley Forest,” a park just two miles from our home.  We had time to go swimming for maybe 30 minutes before the life guard closed down the small beach; then we’d get ice cream.  I also went to Girl Scout Day Camp at Findley, and camping with my Girl Scout troop.  On summer Sunday mornings, I’d also go there for breakfast cookouts with my friend Sally and her family . 

Now it's called  “Findley State Park” and Jim and I go walking there when we are in Ohio.  It’s a great place with 838 acres plus a big lake and 16 miles of hiking trails.

My mom told me the land for the park was donated to the state of Ohio by Judge Guy Findley and that Judge Findley was a student of my grandmother, Grace Stine Burge (my dad’s mom), who taught school in Sullivan, Ohio.  I did some research and read that Judge Findley graduated from Sullivan High School, so that fits because Grandma taught at Sullivan. 

I also read that Guy Findley was a Lorain County prosecuting attorney from 1917 to 1920 and later a Lorain County Common Pleas Judge. Because he felt area forests were disappearing, he donated farmland that is now Findley State Park, with the intent that it be maintained as a forest. The Division of Forestry planted nearly half a million trees on the property with help from the Civilian Conservation Corps.  Apparently Judge Findley also actually planted trees along country roads himself, and became the president of the Ohio Forestry Association and the vice president of the American Forestry Association.  He died in 1958, and his ashes were sprinkled over the park that bears his name.

We didn't camp at Findley State Park, but since it's so close to my mom's we did go there to dump our black and gray water tanks shortly after we got to Ohio.  Mom -- who's always up for something fun -- went along with us.

Hiking at Findley State Park.  Cooper got his leg caught in the bridge you see on the trail, so Jim avoided it on the way back.

A view through the trees of Findley Lake, where my parents took me and my brothers swimming and where we took swimming lessons. An earthen dam completed in 1956 created the lake.