Ken and Carrie Borah, owners of Wiegand’s Lake Park in Russell Township, have big ideas for the popular event center they purchased in May.
Ken and Carrie Borah, owners of Wiegand’s Lake Park in Russell Township, have big ideas for the popular event center they purchased in May.
An extended season, holiday events and expansion into more of the 104 acres on Kinsman Road glimmer in the future.
For the time being, they and their three children are busy learning how to manage the staff of about 40 employees to facilitate idyllic celebrations in the woods, be they weddings, showers, reunions or business outings.
“We have to learn the ropes,” said Ken Borah, adding, for now, they will make minimal changes to an operation nurtured by three generations of the Wiegand family.
The Borahs are not adrift in an unfamiliar sea.
Wendy Wiegand Pliml and business partner Bill Frantz are helping them transition.
“They’re working right beside us, teaching us 87 years of tradition,” Carrie Borah said. “I’m loving every step of it. It’s invigorating.”
For Pliml, training the new owners is a natural process — one she learned from her parents, Robert and Bianca Wiegand, who learned it from the park’s founders, Wilfred and Ella Wiegand.
“Each generation learned (the system) from the previous generation, then they made it their own,” Pliml said.
Since none of the Wiegand offspring were interested in continuing the tradition, she and Frantz decided in 2018 to sell the property.
“She really wanted to keep it a park, not break it up into yurts,” Carrie said.
The 48-acre park centers around the large lake made by the founders using draft horses and volunteer help. It includes a 1,250-square-foot dance hall built by Ella and Wilfred, baseball diamonds, two playgrounds, horseshoe pits, basketball courts, paddleboats, hiking and running trails, and more.
It’s no wonder Pliml and Frantz resisted having the park developed and were enthusiastic when local Realtor Jeff English introduced the Borahs to them.
“These guys just dropped out of heaven,” Pliml said. “They’re young, they’re smart, they get it.”
And their experience in the working world will help as they make the park their own, she said.
Ken, a mechanical engineer, is a partner in an engineering firm and Carrie’s background is in marketing. In addition, their three children — Annie, 18, Kyle, 17 and Joslyn, 14 — have been pitching in since the sale went through two weeks before opening day.
With a season that stretches until October, the Borahs have months to learn everything about Wiegand’s Lake Park, but they are still very much enamored of the atmosphere.
“What I love is to take a tour with Wendy,” Carrie said. “There’s so much rich history right here on this property. There’s not a bad view in the place.”
“We’re really blessed,” Ken added.
Much of the park’s history is available on its website, but Pliml tells people on the tour the giant pine tree there was her grandfather’s first Christmas tree and the ice cream stand came from Euclid Beach.
For the former owner, selling the park where she grew up is bittersweet.
“There’s good and bad. Everywhere, I see Dad,” she said.
Since she and Frantz took over the operation in 1987, they have trained and mentored hundreds of local teenagers who wanted summer jobs. Most seasons, they need about 40 workers to ensure guests have a great time, the grounds are impeccable and there is food available for the entire event, Carrie said.
Many teens come back to work several years and bring their friends, bothers and sisters to enjoy the camaraderie, the income and the chance to make new friends and learn new skills.
“The staff is family,” Pliml said. “When you read the reviews (of the park), visitors always remark on the staff, our kids.”
Once hired, teens sign up for hours whenever they can work, a system that is flexible and successful since the park isn’t usually open 12 hours a day.
“They want to work,” Carrie said.
“Who doesn’t want to work in a park or on a pond?” Ken added.
Frantz said the adults, including a few full-time employees who live on the property, act as surrogate parents to the staff.
Two of those adults are Michelle Mandau Wolf, who does the bookkeeping, scheduling and “whatever needs done,” Carrie said.
Adam Pliml, Wendy Pliml’s stepson, helps take care of the grounds and has taken Kyle under his wing, where the teen can learn the business from the ground up, she said.
While the event center closes down in October, the work will go on, Ken said.
He plans to review and upgrade the infrastructure of the operation and Carrie has plans for marketing the park and working on the booking system.
Right now, the park has some openings for events, an uncommon occurrence, Pliml said.
Once she and Frantz decided to sell, they felt obliged to let callers know the facility might not be open in a year, she said. Some were very disappointed.
“People were in tears,” she recalls.
So, now they are hoping to fill those holes in the schedule and make sure the dance hall, with its rustic ballroom and banquet hall, ring with music and laughter every weekend this summer.
But, after 53 years of “hard, hot, heavy and hustle,” Pliml admits she is looking forward to retiring, though she never gets tired of walking around the park.
Carrie isn’t letting Pliml wander off into the sunset.
“She’s going to be right here,” she said.
