Boat Launch Dedicated To Fallen Soldier
October 9, 2008
ECO Staff – Laure Cioffi, senior journalist
WAMPUM – Chuck Bevington knows his brother loved nothing more than fishing.
“He fished every chance he got. It was his whole passion,” Bevington of Ellport said of his younger brother, Allan.
So Saturday’s dedication of the boat launch site on River Road, about a half-mile from Route 288, named for Sgt. Allan Bevington will be bittersweet for Chuck Bevington.
“I’m happy it’s going to be named after him, but I’d gladly give it up to have him back,” Chuck Bevington said.
Sgt. Allan Bevington, 22, was killed Sept. 21, 2006, by an improvised explosive device while serving in the U.S. Army in Iraq.
Chuck Bevington said every time his younger brother was home on leave he would go fishing. So to know that Lawrence County’s only public access boat launch along the Beaver River is named after Allan is a befitting honor.
Chuck Bevington has been working to raise money for the boat launch for the last 14 months with a $20,000 donation coming from the Lawrence County Conservation District and the rest of the $45,000 cost coming from private donations.
“So many people just got behind it,” Chuck Bevington said. “A lot of sportsmen donated to get access to the river, others donated because it was a tribute to a fallen soldier.”
Bevington said 98 percent of the donations came from the Ellwood City/Lawrence County area.
Bevington said the actual boat launch is being built by U.S. Army volunteers and will be done later this year or early next year. Currently there is a parking lot and an area for shoreline fishing, he said.
The Allan Bevington Launch will be part of a water trail in Lawrence County with public fishing access along the Beaver, Mahoning and Shenango rivers.
Doniele Andrus, the shared Greenways and Environmental Planner for Lawrence and Beaver counties, said the Lawrence County Greenways Plan calls for a total of eight public access boat launches to be built. Another built by Wild Waterways Conservancy at Rock Point where the Connoquenessing Creek and Beaver River meet is also being dedicated Saturday, she said.
Lawrence County currently has four other public access boat launches owned by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission along the Shenango, Mahoning and Neshannock rivers. The Bevington Launch will be the only public access on the Beaver River north of New Brighton.
Bevington said he hopes to add more landscaping and buy property adjacent to the current site for future improvements to the launch site.
(Laure Cioffi can be reached at LaureCioffi@EllwoodCity.org)
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