Sunday, November 22, 2020
It occurred to me that some of you may not know the whole story about the cabin and how Ron allowed the tradition to continue all these years.
Ron and I bought the cabin in 1974 and moved our May Long tradition at the Caribou Landing to the Sand Beach Cabin.
A few years later Ron showed up on May Long and surprised all the guys with free Tee shirts with the famous logo on it. Around that time, he also introduced a log book which became instrumental in providing us all with that 25 year anniversary book on all the May Longs. Something I think all of us will cherish for years to come.
But that is not the biggest thing he did for this incredible tradition which has brought friend from all over Canada and the USA to Sand Beach for the annual May Long.
Early in the 1980's Ron's wife left him and it was because of all the time he spent at the cabin. So, he lost interest in coming to the cabin and wanted to sell it. That was at a time when we could have sold it.
He had a guy who offered us 30,000 dollars. I did not want to sell but at the time I was still going to school at Wayne State University and was in no condition to raise 15,000 dollars (Ron's share of the 30,000) to buy Ron out.
Scraping together what I could I came up with 8,000 dollars. I offered it to Ron telling him I really wanted to keep the place and hoped he would settle for that. I also drew up a contract (a friend of John and Keith was a lawyer and did this for a pittance) which said if I sold the cabin in the next 20 years, I would give Ron half of the proceeds. This was to assure him I would not take advantage of his generosity if he chose to sell to me at the reduced price.
AS you all must be aware, he did sell to me for that reduced amount. So, this incredible tradition which we have was kept alive because Ron chose friendship over money.
Ron did show up for a few more May Longs, one being the 25 anniversary, and I know everyone enjoyed his company. But I just wanted you all to know how Ron was so instrumental in setting up this incredible tradition (Log book, Tee shirts) and what he did to allow this tradition to continue going on 40 years later.
Thank you, Ron Thomsen,
