Playground feature honors Dylan

Dylan Groene would be proud.

Following a dedication ceremony Friday for a new piece of playground equipment at Fernan Elementary School in his honor, a group of kids tested the “wall ball,” running around the concrete court, slamming rubber balls against the brick wall, yelling and having fun.

“That’s what I want right here,” said Bill Bailey, the North Carolina man who spearheaded the fundraising effort, as a rubber ball flew over his head.

Known by his teachers and classmates for his love of playground games, Dylan was 9 when he and his sister, Shasta, were kidnapped from their home in Wolf Lodge Bay in May 2005. His remains were found in a remote campground in the Montana wilderness.

Bailey said he saw Dylan’s picture on the national news and was struck by how much he resembled his own son.

“I had to do something,” he said.

A fifth-grade class at Fernan had already donated $1,000 for a wall ball court, and school officials hoped to raise the money over the next few years through donations from future fifth-grade classes and the parent-teacher organization. So when Bailey called asking what could serve as a good memorial for Dylan, school officials suggested wall ball, citing Dylan’s love for recess.

“I said, ‘Bingo. Let us help you,’ ” Bailey said.

A truck driver for the Coca-Cola Company, Bailey said he worked extra hours to earn money to donate and posted messages in Internet forums to get more donations. Melody Turner, a parent of a Fernan fifth-grader last year, led the local fundraising efforts. Walls like the one at Fernan typically cost about $16,000, said Steve Briggs, business manager for Coeur d’Alene School District.

“This wall definitely makes a statement on the playground. Dylan did too,” said Fernan Principal Lana Hamilton, calling Dylan “a boy who loved the playground and loved to play hard.”

The outpouring of donations from around the county and even the world brought in more than the cost of the court, Hamilton said. School officials plan to add picnic tables and send the remaining money to Lakes Middle School for a memorial for Slade Groene, who was killed along with his mother, Brenda Groene, and her boyfriend, Mark McKenzie, the night Dylan and Shasta were taken.

Many at Friday’s ceremony said it was great to finally have something nice by which to remember Dylan.

“He did like to play,” said third-grade teacher Tim Marks, Dylan’s last teacher at Fernan.

“You only wish it wasn’t necessary,” said Edie Brooks, vice chairwoman of the Coeur d’Alene School District Board of Trustees.

Bailey said he had never been west of Texas before traveling to Coeur d’Alene for the ceremony, but the connection he felt to the case made the trip necessary.

“It still gets me,” he said. “I’m a big old linebacker man, and I still got a little misty-eyed when I was looking at some of his schoolwork” with school officials.

Bailey said someone from Greece even called asking how he could donate to the cause.

“Dylan’s story touched a lot of people,” he said.

Bailey turned to Claire Wardian, a soon-to-be fifth-grader at Fernan who had been in each of Dylan’s classes since kindergarten, and asked her to make good use of Dylan’s memorial.

“I want you to laugh and play hard and have a good time, OK?” he said.

Claire smiled and said she would.