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Posts Tagged ‘Ramona Palace’

How Many Times Am I Related to Her?

Posted in Adrian Zuidweg, Alice Paak DeKorn, Cora DeKorn Zuidweg, DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Michigan history, Netherlands history, Paak, Peek, Remine, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 19, 2018| 48 Comments »

This is Richard and Mary (Paak) Remine and their daughter Therese (1895-1980).

Mary or Maaike Paak was born in Lexmond, Netherlands on 29 July 1859. She is my 3rd great-aunt. Her sister Alice was my great-great-grandmother.

Richard Remine was the son of Gerrit Remine (Remijnse) who was born in Kapelle, Netherlands. Gerrit was my 4th great-uncle. Richard or Dick was born in Kalamazoo on 10 May 1857. 

How can that be? Does it make your head burst? OK, follow this.

Mary is the sister of my 2xgreat Alice.

Gerrit is the brother of Johanna Remine DeKorn. Johanna is my 3x great-grandmother, the mother of Richard DeKorn, grandmother of Cora DeKorn Zuidweg, great-grandmother of Adrian Zuidweg, and great-great-grandmother of my mother Janet.

So Mary was connected to Alice who married Richard DeKorn who was connected to Richard Remine!

I am related to both Mary and Richard, so I am related twice to their daughter Therese, as well as their two other children, Genevieve Tazelaar and Harold Remine.

Do you have double cousins like this in your family?

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Kalamazoo in Photos

Posted in Adrian Zuidweg, Alice Paak DeKorn, DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Joseph Peter DeKorn, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Leeuwenhoek, Michigan history, Netherlands history, Paak, Peek, Photography early 20th century, Remine, Richard DeKorn, Zuidweg, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 21, 2017| 26 Comments »

I dug into the bottom of a file drawer and pulled out a book I forgot that I had. It was put together by the Kalamazoo Gazette and featured photographs sent in by individuals of Kalamazoo from the past up to the early 1960s.

My grandfather, Adrian Zuidweg, is listed as one of the contributors, so I went through and tried to find the photos he might have sent in.

Definitely these two photos. The little boy in the check dress and straw hat is grandpa himself. And the little girl on the hammock is his cousin Alice Leeuwenhoek.

Those are the relatives sitting on the front porch. Gosh, I own that photo! I didn’t realize that was Richard Remine (though I can see right now that it is, of course, him)–or his children Therese, Harold, and Jane either. It would fit that the two little girls are Alice (next to her grandma Alice Paak) and Therese. With Harold behind the children. But Jane doesn’t really look old enough in this photo. According to my records, Jane was 14 years older than Therese. Something is off here. That big gap in age between Jane and Therese bothers me, and it always has. And if you recall when I wrote about Frank and Jane Tazelaar, I had been confused for awhile about if there had been 4 Remine children and 2 girls of similar names.  This photo must be somewhere around 1901, based on the assumed aged of the 3 little children. Jane was born in 1881 and is not 20 here!

The known people: back row is Aunt Jen DeKorn Leeuwenhoek, Richard DeKorn, Richard Remine. Front row is Lambertus (Lou) Leeuwenhoek, Alice Paak DeKorn, and then the little girl next to Alice definitely looks like Alice Leeuwenhoek, Jen and Lou’s daughter. It would seem plausible that the three other children belong to Richard Remine, but Jane could not have been that small.

What else? Here is Harold Remine big enough to go fishing at Long Lake. The other photo is not from my family, but it does show off a great collection of hats!

This is the Ladies Library building that Richard DeKorn was the mason contractor for.

But I don’t think that is one of our family photos.

One of these photos could have been taken by Joseph DeKorn and been submitted by Grandpa. It is very similar to the ones that I own.

Take a look at the captions for the downtown views. Does it make sense? It doesn’t make sense to me for some reason.

Most importantly, Grandpa autographed this book!

Here is a bonus photo. It isn’t from my family, but isn’t it a cool reminder of the kitschy business architecture popular in those days?

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What I Discovered in the Box of Unscanned Remine Photos

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Netherlands history, Paak, Peek, Photography late 19th century, Remine, Richard DeKorn, Zuidweg, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 11, 2016| 30 Comments »

More tintypes! In Mysterious Antique Photographs I shared a beautiful tintype that I own.

Yesterday I opened the box of unscanned Remine photos. I haven’t had time to scan so many photos–or to organize either–but I thought I should just start doing a few a day because when WILL I ever have the time?

And I discovered these beautiful tiny tintypes. The one on the other post is large and painted. These are only 2.25 x 3.5 inches in size–and unpainted.

Because they are in the Remine box I can guess they might be Remines. Judging by the faces, I am ready to conclude they probably are Remines.

Because these girls and women were photographed full length (standing and seated), we can examine their entire outfits to try to guess a time period.

Therese was born in 1891. Could this photo be from around 1900?

I am having trouble identifying the correct information about Therese’s sisters. When I figure it out, this might help in identifying this tintype. For instance, if there were sisters born in 1880 and 1881 as might have been, this photo could, I suppose, be those sisters. If so, one of them is Genevieve Remine Tazelaar and the tintypes would be in the early 1890s.

I suppose the hair and collars could be 1900. But what about the fitted jackets with all the buttons? I can’t find anything like that in photos of 1900. Odd, too, that it would be a tintype if it was as late as 1900.

Here is the other tintype. I’m sorry it’s kind of crooked and uneven. It was difficult to scan it.

What about these outfits? They are not leg o’mutton sleeves, so does that rule out the 1890s?

I guess I am not very good at taking the nuances of change in fashion and extrapolating to what my relatives would have worn (generally a much more conservative version of the fashion).

The woman on our left looks a lot like Mary Paak Remine, Therese’s mother. She was born in 1859. But the woman doesn’t look terribly young in this photo. And then who would the other woman be? She looks NOTHING like the Paak sisters. She is not Mary’s mother because Jacoba Bassa had passed away long before this.

Were these photos taken in the Netherlands or the United States? The Remines were from Kapelle and the Paaks were from Lexmond. Notice the wallpaper/painted background. I’m pretty sure that these photos were taken in the same studio, perhaps near the same time period.

I’m afraid I have more questions now than I did before.

 

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Reminders to Self about the Remines

Posted in Adrian Zuidweg, Cora DeKorn Zuidweg, DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Jennie DeKorn Culver, Joseph Peter DeKorn, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Netherlands history, Remine, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 13, 2016| 37 Comments »

One of the branches of my family from the Netherlands was the Reminse branch.

On 26 August 1810, my 4th great-grandfather, Dirk Reminse, a bread baker, married Adriana Kriger (Krijger) in Kapelle, Zeeland, the Netherlands. Dirk was born 22 November 1786 in Kruiningen, Zeeland, Netherlands. At some point before his marriage he must have relocated to Kapelle, but Adriana also came from a different town. She was born 11 June 1787 in Biggekerke, Zeeland, Netherlands.

Houses on the Kerkplein (church square), Kapelle, Netherlands

The couple had the following children:
Gillis Remijinse 1811–1868

Jan Remijinse 1813–1837

Hendrika Remijinse 1814–1893

Johanna Remijinse 1817–1864

Johannis Remijinse 1819–1846

Adriaan Remijinse 1821–1849

Pieter Remijinse 1822–1830

Frans Remijinse 1823–1860

Gerard Remynse 1825–1910

Marinus Remijinse 1826–1863

Note the difference in the spelling of the surname. It is seen both ways. In this country it became REMINE.

Their daughter Johanna was born 15 July 1817 in Kapelle. She married Boudewijn DeKorne 21 May 1847 in Kapelle. Boudewijn had been born in Kapelle on 11 June 1816.

The couple had one daughter who died as an infant, then a son Richard and daughter Maria were born. Richard, my great-great grandfather, would end up being a well-known brick mason and contractor in Kalamazoo, Michigan, but first the family had to immigrate to the United States.

Johanna’s parents had both died. Dirk died 9 September 1840 in Kapelle. On 14 April 1845, Adriana passed away.

Boudewijn and Johanna arrived in this country in 1856 and first settled in Zeeland, Michigan. The following year their 4th and last child, Jennie was born. Jennie eventually became Jennie Culver who divorced her husband and moved to Seattle with her two teen daughters. I have posted about the magnificent photo album that belonged to one of Jennie’s daughters that a blog reader mailed to me.

Johanna Remijinse DeKorne was my last direct ancestor in the Remine line, although my grandfather stayed close to the family that continued that surname in Michigan.

I found a photograph of this branch of the family in the Netherlands. The photograph is not marked with a photography studio or any other identifying information. Someone, possibly my grandmother, wrote on the back “Remine family in Holland.” In order to figure out who is in the photograph I would need to know the approximate date of the photo. Since Johanna immigrated in 1857, this must be from a line of the family that ran parallel to her line. Would it be the family of one of her siblings?

I went back and examined the other Remine cousins in the United States. They stem from Johanna’s brother Gerard.  He seems to have immigrated to the United States between 1855 and 1857. Maybe he and his family even came over with his sister and hers? NOTE TO SELF: CHECK INTO THIS.

Why did the families remain close? Johanna’s son Richard’s wife Alice’s sister Mary married Richard Remine, son of Johanna’s brother Gerard! What does that make them? First cousin’s by marriage?

So the photo can’t be of Gerard’s family. That leaves eight other siblings to check into. And the children of all these siblings . . . . NOTE TO SELF: MORE WORK NEEDED HERE

CAN YOU GUESS A TIME PERIOD FOR THIS PHOTO?

 

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Tennyson’s Words for Henry Waruf’s Funeral

Posted in Alice Paak DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Netherlands history, Paak, Peek, Photography early 20th century, Photography late 19th century, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on October 5, 2015| 9 Comments »

In a post called “Who Was Hank Waruf, Kalamazoo Gunsmith?” I wrote about the husband of my great-great-grandmother’s sister, Carrie (Paak) Waruf. The couple owned the resort Ramona Palace and Ramona Park, as well as many cottages and their own home, at Long Lake in Portage, Michigan.

In my files I found the brochure for Henry Waruf’s (Walraven) funeral.

 

Henry Waruf’s wife Carrie and my GGGrandmother Alice Paak DeKorn had a sister named Mary. One of Mary’s daughters was Genevieve. She was married to Frank Tazalaar. Here are Henry and Frank together (with a little dog).

 

I get the impression from some of our photos that Hank Waruf was a man other men wanted to hang around .

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I’ve written about the place and the people here:

Ramona Palace, View from the Lake

What Went On at Ramona Palace

Online Generosity and Family History

Paak-a-boo

A Re-telling of Ramona: The Park with a Literary Name

The Report from My Detectives

Living by Long Lake, Portage, Michigan

All the Peek Girls

The Park with a Literary Name

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Who Was Hank Waruf, Kalamazoo Gunsmith?

Posted in Alice Paak DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Netherlands history, Paak, Peek, Photography early 20th century, Photography late 19th century, Remine, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 29, 2015| 7 Comments »

Henry (Hank) Waruf and his wife Carrie (Paak) Waruf owned the resort Ramona Palace and Ramona Park, as well as many cottages and their own home, at Long Lake in Portage, Michigan.

Since Carrie is one of the Paak sisters, and her sister Alice Paak DeKorn was my great-great-grandmother, I’ve focused more on the Paaks. But Henry Waruf is a very interesting character in Kalamazoo’s early history.

Adri van Gessel was so kind to do some research on the Waruf family. Henry himself appeared to be a bit of a dead end because the name Waruf seemed to come out of nowhere. But Adri broke through that brick wall and discovered Henry’s origins.

Who Was Hank?

Henry was born Hendrik Walraven on September 7, 1863 at Kloetinge, the Netherlands. Apparently Koetinge is part of Goes. Big shock there since the majority of my mom’s ancestors seem to have come from Goes.

He was married on June 2, 1882 at Kalamazoo (MI) to Cornelia Peek (Carrie Paak), daughter of Teunis Peek and Jacoba Bassa.  Cornelia was born on May 8, 1862 at Lexmond and died in January 1957 at Kalamazoo (MI).  Henry died on November 29, 1945 at Orlando (FL).

I don’t know if Henry was on vacation in Florida, living there part of the year, or if the couple (who had no children) had moved there and Carrie went back to Kalamazoo after his death. I could try to research this through city directories, phone books, etc. The research I have done was mainly through newspapers, and I discovered that, although Henry (or Hank) usually spelled his last name “Waruf,” sometimes it shows up as “Warruf.” Still, it looks to me as if Joseph is the one who changed the family surname to Warruf/Waruf in the United States from the original Walraven.

Henry had one sister,  Maria Walraven, born March 3, 1866 at Goes, but she died before 1870 in the Netherlands.

Henry and Maria were born to Joseph Walraven (Joseph Warruf), son of Hendrikus Walraven and Elisabetha Resch, who was born on October 13, 1837 at Goes, died on December 11, 1910 at Kalamazoo (MI).

Joseph was married on May 21, 1863 at Goes to Melanie de Munck (Mary), daughter of Jan de Munck and Maria Joseph Bataille.  Melanie was born on October 16, 1840 at Goes and died on March 18, 1914 at Kalamazoo (MI). Joseph, Melanie, and Henry immigrated to the U.S. in 1868, when Henry was 5 years old.

A Bataille Connection

Notice the name Bataille. I’ve previously written about a Bataille ancestor in these posts:

An Update on the Bataille Family

A Familial Occupation

How Did Etaples, France, Show Up in My Family Tree?

Hank Went into Business

As I mentioned, “Hank” (Henry) and Carrie (Cornelia) were married in 1882, when he was 19 and she was 20. By 1885, he was advertising a business selling guns in the Kalamazoo Gazette, where it’s noted that he took over the gun shop of W. Blanchard.

Sept 17, 1885 Click the link and scroll to the bottom for the ad. By September 1886, Hank added “gunsmith” to his name on the ads.

I was astonished to discover, in an 1897 Polk Directory, that Henry Waruf owned the gun shop in partnership with Richard “Ro-mine” who I take to be Richard Remine. Richard “Dick” Remine was Hank’s brother-in-law. He was married to Carrie’s sister, Mary, another sister of my great-great-grandmother. Richard was born in 1857 and so was six years older than Hank. I’ve written before that the person who inherited the Long Lake resort was Therese Remine, Richard’s daughter. So there might have been another reason that she was the sole inheritor of that property–because her father had been in business with Waruf. How long were they partners? I am going to guess that Waruf was the true businessman of the two–and an ambitious man.

 

Richard Remine

Hank Was a Man of Many Talents

Hank shows up often in the Gazette, and I was able to see that he became a talented shooter, a prize-winning breeder of English Spaniels (no wonder my grandfather’s family always had this breed of dogs), and a collector of real estate. He reported regularly to the State Board of Fish Commissioners on the fish in Long Lake.

Here is an article where he literally won all the prizes at a shoot. Sept 7, 1899. There are many articles about the shoots he attended and referreed. He also represented Kalamazoo at a state shoot in Bay City.

The award-winning dogs owned by Henry show up in publications by the American Kennel Club, The Field Dog Stud Book, and The Fanciers’ Journal. I traced the beginnings of this sideline to a Gazette article that mentions that Hank was going into the business of raising hunting dogs and had brought in a fine pointer from Lowell with a pedigree going “way back.”  Click the link for the article–right side about 1/3 down.Feb 28, 1899.

In 1919, there is a newspaper article about the houses that Waruf was selling. These houses were all on the north side of Kalamazoo. I know that he also owned all the cottages near the resort at Long Lake, so he was used to being a landlord. I wonder if he had been renting out all these houses or if he was flipping them. I suspect he had been renting the houses. Here is the article. April 2, 1919

Finally, on August 30, 1904, Kalamazoo Gazette published a cute story. A Gazette reporter climbed the water tower at the asylum. This is the tower that my great-great-grandfather Richard DeKorn built (click here). From that vantage point he was able to see all the way to Gull Lake in one direction and Long Lake in another. He mentions a great many notable people and what he claims he saw them doing at the time. About Waruf, he wrote, “‘Hank’ Waruf shining up his guns at Long Lake for the duck season.” The details in the article conjure up a Breughel painting, so I find it a little impossible, but definitely amusing. Here is the article: Aug 30, 1904

 

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Here are some images I have previously published on The Family Kalamazoo:

Carrie (Paak) and Henry Waruf

Home of Hank and Carrie Waruf, Sprinkle Road

Home of Hank and Carrie Waruf, Sprinkle Road

I’ve written about the place and the people here:

Ramona Palace, View from the Lake

What Went On at Ramona Palace

Online Generosity and Family History

Paak-a-boo

A Re-telling of Ramona: The Park with a Literary Name

The Report from My Detectives

Living by Long Lake, Portage, Michigan

All the Peek Girls

The Park with a Literary Name

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Ramona Palace, View from the Lake

Posted in Adrian Zuidweg, Cora DeKorn Zuidweg, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Paak, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 20, 2014| 12 Comments »

In a previous post called What Went On at Ramona Palace, the photograph that was marked Ramona that actually was the Summer Home Place sparked the question if the Ramona pavilion had windows on the lake side. By the sixties, when I saw it, the lake windows either didn’t exist or had been blocked off behind the bandstand.

The other day my father found a postcard of the Ramona pavilion–a view from the lake. Clearly, the structure was built with windows facing the lake.

 

On the left side of this photograph are the windows at the end of the building that face the lake. The bandstand was just inside those windows. And see the steps leading down to the lake? They would lead you right into the . . . bottomless drop-off! That was such a scary part of the lake by the sixties! I imagined all kinds of underwater beasts living in that mysterious section of the lake.

The property was originally owned by Henry and Carrie (Paak) Waruf. Carrie was my great-great-grandmother’s sister.  What do you think is the material of his hat in this photo?

This is a photograph marked “Hank Waruf (cigar in mouth). He’s definitely much older in this photo than the one above.

More posts about Ramona:

The Park with a Literary Name
A Re-telling of Ramona: The Park with a Literary Name
What Went On at Ramona Palace

 

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More Ramona, Long Lake

Posted in Adrian Zuidweg, Cora DeKorn Zuidweg, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Paak, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on July 30, 2014| 11 Comments »

When my father ran Ramona Park, he used to sit on a ticket taker stool to admit dance patrons. He still had the stool until recently.

 

The other day, he gave it to Paula Taylor, who is writing a history of Ramona and Long Lake.

 

 

 

Update on why the Ramona/Long Lake photos say Vicksburg:

Maggie Snyder for Vicksburg Historical Society says this:

Vicksburg never included Ramona Park, which was at Long Lake. However, at that time Portage as a town was much smaller than Vicksburg, so it would have been the closest “big” town. Also, the Grand Rapids & Indiana Railroad had a flag stop at Ramona Park, and their closest depot was in Vicksburg.

On another note: here are a couple of online articles about Long Lake:

Long Lake: from sinking houses to sea serpents

Portage Couple Has Spent a Lifetime on Long Lake

 

More posts about Ramona:

The Park with a Literary Name
A Re-telling of Ramona: The Park with a Literary Name

 

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What Went On at Ramona Palace

Posted in Adrian Zuidweg, Cora DeKorn Zuidweg, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Paak, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 23, 2014| 27 Comments »

When I was a kid my father used to bring me (and sometimes my friend, Jill, a reader of this blog) to Ramona Park. We explored and played while he worked–maintaining and refurbishing the pavilion, the grounds, and the shore of Long Lake that ran along the property.

I’ve written before about this park, located in Portage, Michigan here:

The Park with a Literary Name
A Re-telling of Ramona: The Park with a Literary Name

I remember trying to imagine what the pavilion, which was called Ramona Palace, was like back in its heyday, when people came to listen to live music and dance in the ballroom.

Notice that this old photograph locates the park in Vicksburg, but it is now Portage, Michigan. This is the ballroom as I remember it–big and empty.  The lake was just outside those windows.

A while back I was contacted by Shawna (Smith) Raymond about those days. Her grandfather, Eddie Smith, and his Big Band used to play at Ramona Palace.

Eddie Smith and the Revelers courtesy of Shawna (Smith) Raymond

Eddie Smith and the Revelers
courtesy of Shawna (Smith) Raymond

Shawna passed on a story from her aunt about those days.

When Mom, whose name was Margene, would walk into the Ramona Palace ballroom where Dad was playing, he’d always stop whatever song they were playing and play ‘My Little Margie.’

Shawna’s aunt has a framed collage of the sheet music to “My Little Margie” and Shawna’s grandfather’s conducting baton. According to Wikipedia:

“Margie“, also known as “My Little Margie“, is a 1920 popular song composed in collaboration by vaudeville performer and pianist Con Conrad and ragtime pianist J. Russel Robinson, a member of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band. Lyrics were written by Benny Davis, a vaudeville performer and songwriter. The song was introduced by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band in 1920 as Victor 78, 18717-A, in a medley paired with “Singin’ the Blues”. The B side was “Palesteena”.The Rega Dance Orchestra recorded the song in October, 1920 for Okeh Records, 4211. The ODJB recorded their instrumental version on December 1, 1920. The song was published in 1920 and was named after the five-year-old daughter of singer and songwriter Eddie Cantor. Cantor is credited with popularizing the song with his 1921 recording that stayed at the top of the pop charts for five weeks.

Here is a Benny Goodman version from 1938:

 

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A Re-telling of Ramona: The Park with a Literary Name

Posted in Adrian Zuidweg, Cora DeKorn Zuidweg, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Paak, Remine, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 11, 2014| 14 Comments »

Last year, I published a post about a park that once belonged to family members and that had an inpact on me when I was growing up. Ramona Park, on Long Lake, outside of Kalamazoo, Michigan, featured a pavilion called Ramona Palace.  Ramona was named after the “Indian Princess” in Helen Hunt Jackson’s popular novel Ramona, which was published in 1884.

When I was growing up, the property was owned by a relative named Therese Remine.  Therese’s mother was Mary Paak (Peek), the sister of my great great grandmother, Alice Paak DeKorn.

Therese had inherited the property from Henry and Carrie Waruf, who had owned it for years.

Here are some photos of the pavilion and property that I inherited from the Waruf/Remine family:

Although these photos were taken before my time, not that much had changed by the time I hung out there–except that things had slowed down considerably. There were fewer picnic tables and fewer people.

You see that long dock in the 3rd photo? It’s so long it needs to be called a pier, I think! I don’t remember that either.

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