INSIDE THIS ISSUE Business & Professional................................B2-3 Classifieds ..........................................................B11 Community Calendar .................................B14-15 Dining & Entertainment.................................B4-5 Healthy Times...............................................A10-11 Library Times.....................................................A18 Youth..............................................................A17-18
A Serving Southwest Allen County & Roanoke
See our ad on pg. A7 September 7, 2012
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Trails effort comes full circle with memorial park By Valerie Gough vgough@kpcnews.net
They say from great tragedy comes great triumph. Perhaps it’s just something people say to comfort those in times of crisis. But in Aboite Township, an entire community can say it with conviction and know it to be true. Just days after 9/11, Ronald Repka lost his life when he was hit by a car while cycling on a country road in southwest Allen County. ” … When we all couldn’t have been any more numb, we found out that Ron Repka was struck by a speeding motorist. The whole community was completely jolted by this and that is what spurred us into action,” said Lynn Reecer, the former president and co-founder of Aboite New Trails. Repka was a husband, a father of two boys, a son and friend to many. He was an outdoor enthusiast and the “picture of health,” Reecer said. He was also one of her husband, Mark’s, longtime friends, having met in seventh grade. They attended Indiana University together and Repka was one of the first people Reecer met her freshman year. It’s also where Repka would meet his
Courtesy photo
Gwen Hague shows off her new Harley-Davidson 2012 Softail Deluxe after winning a nationwide contest sponsored by the bike maker. More than 90,000 entries were received.
Woman wins Harley contest Photo by Valerie Gough
Homestead Road Park has been renamed the Ronald G. Repka Memorial Park, honoring a man whose fatal cycling accident in 2001 spurred the creation of Aboite New Trails in 2002. wife, Sharon. “He was just a full-of-life person. When he walked in the room, he had such a presence. He was always smiling, always laughing, always joking and he just attracted people. People loved to be around him,” Reecer recalled. The couples eventually married
and after college, reconnected in Fort Wayne where their children became friends. The kids loved to ride bikes to and from each other’s homes, but Reecer said it was just too dangerous without sidewalks in their neighborhoods. See PARK, page A14
By Nichole Hacha-Thomas nthomas@kpcnews.net
When Aboite-area resident Gwen Hague received a call from her local Lucky Harley-Davidson dealer, she thought the staff was calling to tell her a T-shirt she ordered had arrived. She was shocked when she called back to find out she’d won a nationwide H-D1 on One National Sweepstakes sponsored by the bike maker. “It was kind of funny, because we go over to Lucky’s See HARLEY, page A18
Locals volunteers at PGA event By Nichole Hacha-Thomas nthomas@kpcnews.net
Will Jewelers Announcement
Courtesy photo
A caddie from the Fort Wayne Country Club helps at an event held at Crooked Stick Golf Course in Clay. Students who take part in a caddie program across the state can be eligible to earn an Evans scholarship, which provides room, board and tuition at either Indiana University or Purdue University. FWCC has had several Evans scholars in the past. golfers split a purse totaling $8 million and vie for the remaining 30 spots in the PGA Tour playoff finale. The tournament historically has been held
in Chicago, but Robinson said, it has been moved around the past few years. This is the first time since See PGA, page A19
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Golf’s biggest names touched down in the Hoosier state Sept. 3 for the BMW Championship, the third of four FedEx Cup playoff tournaments on the PGA Tour. More than 2,600 volunteers from across the state worked the event when golfers from Tiger Woods to Phil Mickelson teed off at Crooked Stick Golf Club in Carmel, hosted by the Western Golf Association. At least two of those volunteers are from the Fort Wayne area. Both Todd Firestone, golf professional at the Fort Wayne Country Club, and Dick Robinson, the club’s WGA representative, will marshal hole nine during the event on Sept. 9. “We will be assigned to the hole, a par five hole, and I imagine we will be responsible for the on-site observation,” Robinson said. The event will see 70