RYAN & PEGGY LUNDQUIST FAMILY

Ryan and Peggy chose to establish their home in Osceola following college and a short stint in Des Moines. Peggy reflects on "olden days" when people didn't travel far from their birthplace, and feels she must belong to that era. They live just across the street from Clarke County Hospital, where she was born in December 1977.

Both Ryan and Peggy received their early education in Clarke Community Schools, and have wonderful memories of those years and teachers. Miss Korporal, whom they both had in fourth and fifth grades, made an impression of them, and Ryan told, "One of my favorite courses was math taught by Frank Riley. He definitely left a lasting memory. During my seventh and eighth grades, sometimes when I was walking down the hall, I would hear Frank say something really loud. I was scared that in tenth and eleventh grades, I might have to take math classes from Frank Riley.

"I did and it turned out, as long kids got their work done, he wasn't too hard after all. He didn't stand up front like lots of teachers. He walked up and down the aisles and occasionally he knocked on one of our desks, 'Mr. Lundquist, will you do Number 12?' I would get up and be real nervous, not feeling 100% sure I had done my problem right.

"I had a chance to get back at Mr. Riley about two years ago. He vacations with my in-laws in Florence, Arizona, and for his retirement his kids gave him a golf bag with new clubs. I took him out to the practice range. He pulled off the plastic covers and warmed up a little. The next day, one of the guys in our foursome couldn't play so I called Frank and asked if he wanted to join us. He goes, `Oh, heavens, Ryan, I haven't played golf in a long time. I hit balls the other day for the first time in 20-some years. I don't think I could play on a golf course.' I said, 'Oh, come on. It won't be that bad.' The whole way there he was so nervous! He wouldn't talk. I said, 'What's the matter, Frank?' He said, 'I've never been this nervous in all my life.' I told him, 'This makes up for all those times you asked me to go to the chalk board.'

"Frank was really helpful throughout my education. His math classes helped in college, along with industrial tech courses taught by Marvin McCann and Fred Wise."

Peggy really liked school and all her teachers but in addition to Miss Korporal, she recalled, "Deb Adams. I loved her and to this day I think she is wonderful. I had Sue Body and Mike Boldon. Pretty much everybody I had was wonderful. Probably in high school, I would mention the whole math department, John Huenemann, Sandye Kelso, and Frank Riley."

In the fall of 1995, Ryan was selected to be Homecoming King along with Peggy, who was Homecoming Queen. They had always known each other and were friends of friends, but they began dating after that event, and in the spring of '96, they went to the Prom together. They recall it was Peggy who convinced Ryan to go out for musicals. "We were going to do "Huckleberry Finn," and there weren't enough boys, so a mutual friend called Ryan." He was persuaded by several promises: He wouldn't have to sing at all; and he could lip-sync the chorus. "It turned out he had a big singing part, and had to sing a solo — a ballad. He had fun," but Ryan declared he would not be signing up to do any more ballads.

While they were in high school, Ryan began to show an interest in volunteering. He recalled, "I have a lot of pride in our town and visions of what it could be. I spent quite a bit of my time volunteering in different projects. I helped J.B. Hamilton on an erosion control project when I was 14 or 15. I spent one of my spring breaks helping on the golf course when they were having some erosion control issues so we put in some wire cages filled with rocks, called Gabian baskets, as retaining walls. I spent my entire spring break doing that. The city put in a new sewer line and they needed to protect it. There was some erosion on one of the creek banks that goes through the golf course so we helped line the edge of the bank with rocks to help decrease the erosion.

"I might have inherited some of my awareness of the need to invest time and assistance in the community and people from my grandfather, Ed Lundquist, who has helped lots of young businessmen. Contractor Bud Jones has expressed his gratitude to Ed. Rex McBroom is another. He has built 116 homes in and outside Osceola. Ed was helpful in establishing a concrete plant here, and Tim Nelson and Mike Sitzman have mentioned how helpful Ed has been to them. There are many others. I would like to build that kind of reputation."

Ryan continues: After graduation in 1996, Peggy and I went on to Iowa State together. I originally started in Mechanical Engineering because I liked math, but in the back of my mind I'd always had an interest in architecture. I ran across some classmates who were into Landscape Architecture and I didn't know anything about it. I thought it was just planting plants and stuff like that. I sat down with some of the professors of Landscape Architecture, did some orientation courses, and switched over. It was a five-year degree and I graduated in 2001.

Peggy saw their high school experience from another perspective: "Ryan and I didn't really run in the same circles. I loved band. I was kind of goofy and had no problem with that. I was a what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of person. Ryan was too, but he was more of a pretty boy — a popular kid. He played football so that made a difference. I liked him because both of us grew up going to the Methodist Church and he helped the ladies put away the dishes. That was a side of him I liked. He said he liked me because I put him in his place. I was the only girl that didn't laugh at all of his jokes. If it wasn't funny, I didn't laugh.

"I played trombone in band. I wanted to play trumpet, but I had braces when they were handing out instruments. They thought the trombone would work better. It turned out fine, and I was kind of good at it. I was so little when I started, I couldn't reach the slide out all of the way. I was first chair but I haven't played it since graduation day. The trombone is still downstairs, though.

"Both Ryan and I spent five years at Iowa State earning our degree. Each of us were 'off track.' Ryan started in Mechanical Engineering and took more math and science type stuff, then had to come back and play catch-up in the design type things when he changed to Landscape Architecture. I don't know why I signed up first for geology. About a week into it I wondered what I was doing, so I changed to graphic design. The Design college puts students on a track, and those who get off track have to wait a whole year to earn their degree. I didn't really mind We had a nice little community of friends so it was fun. Ryan and I had classes in the same building, so we saw each other, and saw each other's friends."

Ryan was the one who told of Peggy's set-back in their freshman year. "It kind of helped mature us, or at least it brought us together a little bit more seriously. In October, Dr. Bassir discovered she had thyroid cancer. That made things more realistic. We had only been dating a few months, were just starting college which was stressful enough, then this happened."

Peggy said, "First they found the tumor and took out half of it just as a lumpectomy type thing, because they didn't think it was cancer. They do a preliminary test while the patient is still in surgery. If it is cancer, they remove it. It was negative, so they stitched me back up and sent me home from the hospital. We stopped to eat on the way home, and while there I got a phone call from my wonderful surgeon, Dr. Moormon. This was before cell phones, so when there was a call, they brought the phone to the table.

"The other test had come back and it was positive. We had to go right back to the hospital and that was traumatic, maybe more so for my parents than for me. As I think about it now that I am a parent, I think it would be harder to have a child have cancer than your own self. We went back, and it all happened pretty fast. Two days later they had me back in surgery and took out the other half of my thyroid, then I had treatments awhile later. I feel very fortunate that chemo doesn't do anything for that particular cancer so I had radiation. In those days a thyroid patient had to go off thyroid medicine for six weeks before treatments. That was really hard.

"But I only missed a week of school so they had me in and out quickly. I just wanted to get back to life. I know Mom wanted me to stay home longer so she could take care of me. I didn't want that. I had just started school and wanted to get on with it. I didn't want my problem to change anything. Now I have no thyroid, and I get along fine. I take medicine and that's it. I have to do a full body test in November to make sure the cancer hasn't come back. Then I'll be good for 10 years, so that is pretty good."

Ryan and Peggy were married August 11, 2001, just after they graduated from Iowa State. The wedding took place at the Osceola United Methodist Church, at 6:00 in the evening. Making out the guest list was hard. They were both from the same town and the same church. There were all the friends from high school and college. They pared the list down to almost 600 people, some who came to the church, and 500 came to the reception at Lakeside Casino.

Ryan told, "We lived in Des Moines for two years, in the western part of the Beaverdale area. I received a job with Herbert, Lewis, Kruse, and Blunck, an architecture firm which was just starting to collaborate. They had architects, landscape architects, and interior designers. I was in one of the largest hiring classes. I think we had about 21 interns and the firm only had 26 to 28 people, so they almost doubled in size with the incoming class. It was pretty interesting and I worked for them for almost two years."

Peggy worked at Cooper Smith and Company, a graphic design firm. "It was fun," she said, "but the hours were long, and it was too much pressure for me. So I quit that job and worked with Easter Seals in adult disabilities for awhile, which was really fun. Once I became pregnant with Dylan, our oldest, I started doing day care in our home in Des Moines."

Ryan picked up, "At that time my uncle Jim was willing to sell out his half of the family business, Highway Lumber, and after many discussions with my grandfather, Ed, we came to the conclusion that it might be a good move for me to come here and take over half of the business. We discussed it from several angles. I wanted to be involved in community projects, and we knew there were opportunities in Osceola. We like to be a part of what is happening in the community, which is more difficult in a city. And we wanted to raise our kids here instead of in a large school system. Both of us are family oriented and we wanted and wanted our children to be close to their grandparents, and know their relatives.

"We moved to Osceola in the fall of 2003, and lived with Peggy's parents for a couple months until we found this house, and moved in. We still have 'honey, do' items all over the place. We own a building supply store but all of our home improvement projects are finished. Peggy wants to start a public ad campaign 'Please help encourage my husband to finish his honey,do list.'

Once I bought out my uncle's half of Highway Lumber, we began looking at either expanding the old Highway Lumber on North Main, or buying the building owned by the Development Corporation, near the interstate. We kind of stumbled upon that. We thought it would be a good place. It seemed like the community was moving out toward the western edge of town. I was nervous that my grandfather would be displeased with me, since Highway Lumber has been on the north side of town for 50+ odd years. But he was very supportive of us.

We moved the business in 2005, which was Calhoun's birth year. So the summer we were moving the business over there, Cal was being born, it was so hectic! Peggy gave her opinion: "I am never moving again. I don't care what we do, I will never move that store again." We only had a couple days to get things done. Ryan's sister, Amy, who probably weighs a hundred pounds, and I tried to move these things that were 20 times our weight, dropping them on our toes. It was pretty bad, but we all survived, which is the best part of the story."

All the employees put in lots of hours moving. We had help from George Paul. J.B. Hamilton was temporary with us at the time but he helped — Sue Wilder, Peggy's folks. So many people! For a week or so we had stuff at both locations and luckily we had someone at each, so if a customer wanted something we might say, "We'll meet you at the other yard." Mike Sitzman, who has the Thrift Store at the old location, says we still have some stuff there. He jokes that if we don't come get it they are going to throw it out. But it has been good for that store as part of Cross Ministries to go into the old Highway Lumber. They have made very good use of the buildings.

But most exciting of all is being part of the team in the Arbor Valley Lake Development. In Ryan's words, "It is kind of weird how things come back full circle. I had an interest in all that is happening in this lake project back in high school. And here I am working again with J.B. Hamilton, who has been thinking in these terms for 15 to 20 years. In this project, he, Paula (McClaflin), Bud (Jones), (my Dad) Alan, and I have put in many hours bringing Arbor Valley to life. Barker Lemar is the engineer. We are making sure we can get the end product to work, not taking any shortcuts, and getting things done on time. In her free time, Peggy helped create the web site for Arbor Valley Lake. Kathy of Barker Lemar came up with "Arbor Valley Lake" and Peggy designed the logo. What she has done with that is pretty incredible.

"We have jumped through a lot of hoops to make sure everything is running smoothly. A lot of cooperation has gone into it, a lot of communication between the DNR (Department ofNatural Resources), the Army Corps of Engineers, our local engineers, adjacent land owners and all. It's been quite a process in which we've learned a lot. We would definitely do it again." The last remark was accompanied by a glance at Peggy, who might not be quite as sure. "It would be a lot easier doing it the second time, knowing all we have gone through.

"We have taken a lot of steps back throughout the process. We would get so far and then someone would say, 'We need to look at A, B, and C,' so we would step back and accomplish those things and then move forward. Actually, the construction process was the easiest part. All the initial paper and design work involved a lot of time and patience.

"One of the biggest emphases we had to take into account is preservation of habitats — a major one has been bats. Every couple years a professor from Cornell College comes over and does bat counts. They put on radio collars or some kind of tracking devise so that they can actually locate where the bats go throughout the area. They located one of the bats on Phase I of our plan, where some of the homes are supposed to go, so we have to be careful, when people start to build, they won't disturb the habitat.

"Bud, J.B., and Alan from the "git-go" were thinking of the environmentally friendly development before the notion of 'green' became popular in the last two or three years. They were already making headway. Barker Lemar was instrumental in that, along with the Army Corps of Engineers and DNR, because they were making tougher rules and regulations for this type of development to encourage more environmentally friendly designs. We took a lot of steps to make sure we are controlling run-off that goes into the lake, controlling filtration and chemical run-off so we can improve the water-flow. They also planted 15- or 16,000 trees. Actually we did a tree-count last month and discovered some of the upland species weren't surviving, so this fall we will have to go back to do a re-plant in certain areas.

"One of the best features of the project as far as the environmental aspect is concerned, is a 15-acre wetland we created by the interstate. Driving by it, travelers can see standing water just south of the rest area. It has already been established by Bud, Alan, and J.B.. There are wetland grasses and some snapping turtles, different species of cranes, and small fish they are feeding on. Quite a bit of wildlife has been attracted. This is a branch of Whitebreast Creek. As it comes up and overflows, it goes into this area and builds up as wetland. It also takes water off the interstate coming from the south, and tries to filter out some of the run-off. It is pretty neat to walk down there. There is a little trail with turtles, songbirds, and other different birds swooping down. It is pretty interesting.

"The entire shoreline of the lake acts as a berm, which creates about an eight-foot walking trail all along the lake. It also helps as water comes down the hillside. It gets trapped on the back side of the berm and has to go down through a pea-gravel trench where it filters out the silt and chemicals, and discharges it into the lake. What we are trying to do is increase the time it takes for a raindrop to travel from point A to point B.

"A lot of what was done over the last 50 years tabled everything. There is a totally new concept than was the practice in the 50s and 60s, when the Civil Engineers would regard areas that collected water, "Lets get it off sight as quickly as we can." In those cases, as rain fell, it didn't have a chance to soak in. We could have been using more pervious surfaces on driveways, roofs, etc. to slow the water's travel. In clay soil, the use of chemicals washed down our watersheds. Now through education, there has been a paradigm shift in their thinking. The goal has become figuring out how to design parking lots, for instance, so they have bio-swales. Water collects in these areas where it has a chance to be absorbed into the ground, or plants pick up the moisture, so it isn't draining into storm sewers.

"There is a lot more collaboration between civil engineers and landscape architects to try to slow down the water — putting in buffer strips and more pervious surfaces. That is kind of the synopsis of the project. We are trying to direct the water and improve our small bit of the eco-system on the map, which hopefully, if we get more of these projects going, will help the larger picture. In architecture, they are beginning to come up with grass roofs, and everybody is tying all together our need to better manage our storm water runoff.

"It is mind boggling to look at the size of the project and then at a map, how big the watershed is. It goes to Lake Red Rock and moves on to the Mississippi River and on down further. It is a matter of all of us upstream trying to decrease the chemical runoff floatation stuff to help people downstream. That is actually what the Army Corps of Engineers is trying to do. They know it is a daunting task to look at the entire watershed so they are looking at small projects to say, "What can we do with smaller projects that eventually will help the overall picture of the watershed?"

"We are encouraging Arbor Valley Lake homeowners to decrease the amount of impervious surface, and collect water in rain barrels to use it for irrigating their lawn and things like that. We are trying to put in more environmental aspects in the homeowners' properties. This is a project I have seen interest in from a professional design standpoint as well as from my foimer high school and even college classmates.

"As far as we know, in respect to the Army Corps of Engineers, this is one of the first midwest environmental lake developments, where we are actually working on a large picture to control the quality of our lake and other environmental things we have done. They have been excited about it. A lot of people think this has a short time-frame but it has taken quite awhile to acquire the land, get easements from adjacent land owners, work with the engineers, with Army Corps of Engineers, DNR — there was quite a dance before we could even break ground."

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Last Revised December 1, 2014