A tribute to Uncle Bill Overkamp..

On Wednesday morning April 3, 1996 my Uncle Bill passed away quietly in his home in West Olive, MI. Uncle Bill was a hunter. He was not a famous hunter of the kind we all read about in our outdoor magazines, nor was he a meat hunter. He did not have to bring home a deer, or bear every year to prove his skill. But, he loved the hunt.

He was born 30 August, 1915 in Douglas Michigan. He served this country proudly during the second world war, and when his service was over he married his love, my father's sister Antonella (Butch) Bakker. Of that union came three sons, William (Billy), Tracy (Meatball/Meatsie), and Mark (Marker). Mark is the cousin that is my age, so we got into alot of s--t togeather when we were younger.

As I drove to his funeral, (some 430 miles from my home in Chatham) I had some time to reflect on the lessons that I took from my relationship to my uncle. Uncle Bill did not teach me my love for the bow.. That came from my father. But many of my earliest, if not fondest, memories of camping and hunting experiences linked directly to my Uncle Bill and his boys. I remember the occasions when our family would camp with Uncle Bill and Aunt Butch in the Ludington area. When I was coming up, and became old enough to carry a gun in the deer woods, my father and I would go from Holland to the annual hunting camp that was held in the Baldwin swamp area in the Lower Peninsula. A whole group of us including 4 adults and 6 sons would spend a few days in a cabin in the Baldwin area. It was there that I took my first deer, learned penny ante poker, how easily I could get lost, and how to find my way out of a swamp. That group of men would place us boys in likely places to spot deer, and then work very hard to move the deer in front of us.

Anyway, as I drove I thought about how Uncle Bill, Uncle Fred, Uncle Erny, and my pops had initiated a whole new generation of hunters. Even after the group had split into their own separate groups as it grew, the tradition continued and the stories and the lessons learned passed on. I'm lucky I still have my father to help teach the lessons to my children and grandchildren. Billy, Tracy, and Mark have to pick up the torch and carry on. I know that in their future camps they will still have, and reflect on all the wonderful memories they have made.