Posted: Jan. 11, 2010

Muskego — Archers, swimmers and hikers who enjoy the parks have all benefited from the work and dedication of Boy Scouts earning their wings as Eagle Scouts and all the volunteers who helped them do projects benefiting the parks in the last year or so.

But Waukesha County Park System manager Duane Grimm said it was the 12-foot tall archery tower and three targets that was the most ambitious Eagle Scout project he has seen in years.

"As far as my time with the parks, this is definitely the largest in terms of money and manpower," Grimm said of the archery range constructed in Muskego County Park, W20370 Janesville Road. Jacob Stern gathered an army of Scouts and soccer team friends who put in 675 hours on the project.

"I didn't realize it would be so hard," said Jacob, who is only an eighth-grader and already an Eagle Scout.

But he and the volunteers did an amazing job, Grimm said.

"Jacob was on top of the game," he said.

"It was very well built," Grimm said of the archery tower, adding that a number of parents made sure construction was done right.

"It will be a great asset to Muskego County Park," he said.

The county has archery ranges in Menomonee and Minooka parks and Grimm predicted the new range in Muskego will be popular.

"Our other archery ranges are well-used by people coming to sight in their bows and to practice," Grimm said.

The toughest part of the actual building that took place in September and October, the young Eagle Scout said, was digging the post holes. Not only was digging hard work with a hand augur and post-hole digger, but the site was unusually wet.

"We dug four feet down and the holes had three-and-a-half feet of water in them," Jacob said.

The moisture will probably shorten the life of the stand, which should be 20 to 25 years, he estimated.

Jacob, who lives in Pewaukee and is a member of Boy Scout Troop in Brookfield, obtained plans for the tower from the parks architect. But he modified the plans giving additional support.

Benches enhance beach

Over at the beach in Muskego County Park, swimmers soaked up the sunshine this summer on Atlantic City Boardwalk-style benches brought to them by Eagle Scout Nathan Lewandowski of Aud Mar Drive in Muskego.

He and 10 Scout volunteers put in 168 man hours to saw and nail together four wooden benches for the beach house.

Nathan said he was glad the Waukesha County Parks Department targeted beach house benches as a need, because he agreed with that.

"As a kid, I went to the beach all the time, and it was packed. Four is not nearly enough," said Nathan, who graduated from Muskego High School last year and is now a freshman at Michigan State University.

But these four are not just ordinary wooden benches. They are made of South American ipe, an extremely hard and dense wood, donated for the project by Timber Holdings of Milwaukee. It is as fireproof as concrete and extremely heavy, Nathan said.

"No one's going to take the benches and no one's going to carve on them," he said.

The hardest part of the building was being careful not to split the dense wood, he said. But the hardest part of the project was the people part.

"It was difficult to work around everyone's schedules," he said. But he learned a lot.

"I learned to be flexible and be patient and understanding and to be willing to sacrifice some of my time if it has to be on a day that works for everyone else," Nathan said. But it was all worth it.

"I'm glad to be able to do something special," he said.

Nathan belongs to Troop 141 that meets at Atonement Lutheran Church.

A walk over wetlands

Those who like to walk on the wild side can now ramble along the trail at the Engle Conservation Area in Muskego and still keep their feet dry, thanks to new Eagle Scout Austin Winkler. He and 11 other Scouts plus eight adults built a 32-foot boardwalk to take hikers across a wetland area. In addition, Austin built six nesting boxes for wood ducks. The project took about 210 hours.

Muskego city conservationist Tom Zagar recommended the projects, taking Austin to the trail in the spring of 2008.

"The trail was pretty much underwater," Austin remembered. But it had been a wet spring, he said.

The city actually sunk cement pylons into the wet soil so that the Scouts could attach the boardwalk with braces. Austin said his father helped with the design.

As challenging as construction was, the hardest part of the project was raising the $1,625 needed to do it, he said.

L.W. Meyer of Waukesha gave the Scouts the wood and hardware at wholesale prices, he said.

Austin said in his fundraising efforts he found that smaller local companies tend to give support, rather than the largest companies.

"That says a lot, because we thought the big companies would be more helpful," he said, noting that is too bad because sometimes smaller businesses fail because of the bigger competitors.

Although Austin did his Eagle Scout project in Muskego, he lives in New Berlin where he is a sophomore at Eisenhower High School.

Other young people who also did projects in Muskego in the past year or so to become Eagle Scouts included Kyle Pierce and Sam Weiss.