People in Phillips have a special reason to hope our September weather stays warmer than average.
After years of planning and $200,000 of fundraising, volunteers finally opened an outdoor splash pad late last month.
It started as the dream of Kristen Harper, a young mother in Phillips, who thought of the splash pad as a way to play with her kids in warm weather.
Harper helped make the splash pad at Elk Lake Park happen. It has no standing water, but has fixtures that squirt and spray like at a waterpark.
I think people have an expectation that sometimes, in a small community, and in the Northwoods, you can't have nice things, and I think we proved them wrong.
“There are splash pads pretty prominently in the southern part of the state, but they’re not quite as common up in the Northwoods, so we thought making something unique to us would become an attraction,” Harper said.
Harper said, after the Aug. 20 opening, Phillips has welcomed people from all over to enjoy the splash pad.
It’s her example of going big in a small town.
“People can’t believe how nice it is. I think people have an expectation that sometimes, in a small community, and in the Northwoods, you can’t have nice things, and I think we proved them wrong,” Harper said. “We can have nice things and people will use them.”
The splash pad will stay open as long as the weather stays warm enough, and will reopen next May.
