MINSTER — Public park restrooms can be dingy places.
Even when park staff maintains them well, they are usually not what can be referred to as cheerful spaces.
That’s not the case anymore, however, in Four Seasons Park in Minster, thanks to Katherine Perryman, 18, of Minster. The Ambassador Scout in Girl Scout Troop 20259 recently earned her Gold Award, scouting’s highest honor, by sprucing up the four restroom buildings there.
“We called our project, Take Me Out to the Ballpark,” Perryman said recently. “We noticed that the bathrooms didn’t look too good. The parks are beautiful, but not the bathrooms.” With help from fellow scouts, family members, friends and members of Minster softball teams, Perryman repainted the interiors of all eight restrooms and then decorated the walls with murals and inspirational quotes.
“We got the idea from a ballpark that I played travel ball at,” she said. The pictures correspond to where the restrooms are placed in the park.
“By the pond, there’s a picture of a boy fishing,” she said. Others feature baseball and softball themes. The restrooms near the children’s playground sport pictures of cat pawprints and flowers.
Before the pictures could be painted, the walls had to be primed and painted white. The village of Minster provided the primer and white paint. A grant by the Journeyman’s Club of Minster supported purchase of other materials needed for the project.
To create the murals, Perryman, a senior at Minster High School, with help from her mother projected photographs onto the walls and traced the designs. She spent more than 80 hours painting herself, providing leadership to her volunteers and documenting the process. In all, the project took well over 200 manhours from October 2016 to October 2017 to complete.
“The town was having floors done, so we had to get it done before the winter,” Perryman said.
She was presented with the Gold Award in a ceremony in Dayton, March 4.
“I think I’m the only one in my troop who did a (Gold Award) project. It’s great to look at what we did in such a small amount of time,” she said.
Village Administrator Don Harrod was impressed by what Perryman accomplished.
“The artistic work she did — it’s really kind of neat that they had that kind of talent to do that. It makes a big improvement to our restroom facilities. It really brightens everything up and makes it look a lot better,” he said. “It means a lot in terms of what it says: they want to give back to the community. It’s great for us, because it makes Four Seasons Park a better place to use for parents and kids.”
