Alberta Creek RV Park

The past four Sundays I have enjoyed eating breakfast at the Alberta Creek Café. Hopefully I'll get to eat there a couple of more times before the café takes a break for wither, starting the 1st of December. It will also be closed on Thanksgiving Day. The planned schedule is to re-open on March 15, 2003.

For me, there is just something alluring about Alberta Creek. I always sit in a booth next to the windows. Memoires if years-gone-by flood my mind as I gaze out over the water. The wooded hillside to the north is where my father, Arch McWilliams planned to build a home for his wife and six children. He had started cutting trees and clearing out a building site just before he was killed 61 years ago during the construction of the railroad bridge. That site, 5 acres just south of the Last Acres area, was then sold by my mother, Alice (McCuan) McWilliams for $25.00 per acre. She then bought 110 acres about a mile west for $3.00 per acre.

The wisdom of a widow with six little tots was not realized by some of us children until we were parents and/or grandparents. I almost drowned in the lake when I was a very small child and lonely recently did I find out that my two sisters had similar experiences. If we had built a house and lived within a stone's throw of the lake, we might not all six be alive today. I am so thankful that we moved away from the shoreline when we did.

I recently received an email about two brothers who were at odds with each other. Even thought they lived on adjoining property they were not on speaking terms. There was a deep ditch between the two houses, but the chasm between the brothers was even greater. The bitterness became so strong that one brother bought enough lumber to build a tall privacy fence so he would never have to look at his brother again. He hired a carpenter to erect the fence. When he came home from a vacation, he found that instead of a fence, the carpenter had built a bridge between the two houses. His brother was there to greet him and apologized for all that he had said and done to cause them to drift apart. Reconciliation was realized between the two and they then enjoyed life again. (I know about another carpenter who builds bridges.)

I'm so thankful that I don't need or want a fence to separate me from my siblings. We all call Oklahoma our home and we keep the email circuits busy, just keeping in touch.

Among the exciting new things that are happening at Alberta Creek is the construction of a 35-unit RV Park. This has been in the planning stage for a long time and now a bulldozer is on site and the ground is being prepared for the Park. This will be good news to those who like to camp in the area.

I have a good friend, A.M. (Pete) Jamison of Ranger, Texas who has been coming to Alberta Creek for about 25 years. Now, he will have a place to park his trailer. I first met Pete when he was camped at the Alberta Creek Pavilion. His favorite method of fishing is using a float tube and a 9-foot fly rod. The reel is loaded with 40-pound monofilament line and a huge shrimp is dropped around the large underwater limestone boulders. In 1982 the lake was about 13 feet about normal and Pete caught two 42-pound catfish. He caught three others that weighted 21, 22, and 23. That is also when he caught my attention. I have been fishing with him early every year in June since that time. If you've seen two old men out on the lake in float tubes, wearing long-sleeved shirts, straw hats and sunshades, and sun-block smeared all over their noses and ears, you've probably seen the afore mentioned duo. Those five fish weighted a total of 150 pounds and I took a picture of Pete and his catch. The picture appeared in The Daily Ardmorite and I don't think that anyone believed that he caught the fish on a fly rod. Our best day's catch this past June was 18 channel cats that weighed 58 pounds.

Pete will be here soon and we will be deer hunting on some of the land that was purchased for $3.00 per acre. Thank you Mother for your foresight.

L.V. Little is busy with his new development to the south of Alberta Creek. He stopped today long enough to tell me about a unique tree. I think it is an oak and an elm that have intertwined and grown together and now appears as one tree. Maybe it is a Siamese twin tree. (Speaking of twins, my twin grandchildren are doing great.)

I'm making an update to this original article. Dated September 24, 2010. On June 10 of this year Pete Jamison and his wife Barbra were camped in the RV park. He and I were fishing near Sand Point in our float tubes when I had a mild stroke. It didn't affect my speech, but it did make my left had almost useless. Needless to say, that was the end of our fishing. Mary Loyce drove me to TMC Rehab in Denison, TX for several weeks on Monday, Thursday and Friday. For the past few weeks I have been walking daily and exercising my hand regularly.

I'm believing in God for a 110% recovery

Willis Moody McWilliams