By Ron Hayes
BRINY BREEZES — Rental spaces in the former dairy farm called Briny Breezes were going for $3 a week when Dorothy McNeice’s father first parked his travel trailer there in October 1938. She was 10.
In 1958, when winter residents bought the land, she was 31.
When the seasonal mobile home park was incorporated on March 19, 1963, she was 35.
And on April 3, when she died peacefully at her summer home in Norton Shores, Michigan, she was 98.
Dorothy McNeice was a part of Briny Breezes’ history long before the town became a town, and much of that history lives today because she preserved it.
“When I retired in 2014, I found myself in charge of the Briny Breezes Library,” remembers library director Donna Clarke. “I was facing a mountainous pile of ragtag scrapbooks. Several of us worked on identifying and organizing the photos and stories of Briny history, and Dorothy saved us when she helped put together stories and dates.”
Most years, Mrs. McNeice would share her memories at community events, supplemented by information she learned from her mother, Ellene, who died at 102 in 2000.
In 2011, Mrs. McNeice wrote her family memories in longhand and gathered photographs to illustrate them. Her daughter-in-law, Valerie McNeice, edited the material into “Looking Back In Time,” a Briny Breezes history in the town library.
“She made Briny history come alive,” Clarke said, “and those scrapbooks are a legacy we can enjoy for years.”
Mrs. McNeice’s love of the past did not keep her from living in the present. She was a member of the town’s hobby club. She collected seashells. She loved the Big Band music of Glenn Miller and Benny Goodman, and the movies of Doris Day.
In 2013, Mrs. McNeice was asked what made her laugh.
“Just being with people and reminiscing can make me laugh,” she replied. “We look at each other and say, ‘Did we really do all that?’ and we laugh.”
Janet Naughton, a professor of American history at Palm Beach State College and an authority on county history, met Mrs. McNeice in 2000 during an all-class reunion at Boynton Beach’s Schoolhouse Museum.
“She was a lovely, energetic and genuinely positive woman who clearly loved both life and history,” Naughton recalls. “She had a remarkable memory for small details and didn’t just care about the past. She actively preserved it.
“She shared stories with me about growing up with her sister, Helen, collecting sea beans, shells and coconuts, and selling them along A1A to tourists. She told those stories with a sparkle in her eyes. She truly lived in paradise and loved coming down each year to return to the sea.”
Dorothy Jane Mann was born on Nov. 11, 1927, in Highland Park, Michigan. She graduated high school in Port Huron and attended Port Huron Junior College.
On Sept. 16, 1950, she and James Mark McNeice were married in Port Huron, and the couple settled in Norton Shores, Michigan, where they raised three sons and she served as a city clerk for 15 years, retiring in 1984.
James McNeice died in 1997 after 47 years of marriage.
Her favorite quote came from that font of endless wisdom, Anonymous, who said, “If we celebrate the years behind us, they become steppingstones of strength and joy for the years ahead.”
Dorothy McNeice celebrated Briny Breezes’ past, and the writings and photographs she leaves behind are steppingstones to the years ahead.
She is survived by her sons, James II (Cindy), Gregory (Vicky), and Michael (Valerie); her grandchildren, Mark, Amber, Heather, Brandon, Niki, JD, Tiffany, Ashton and Alexa; and 21 great-grandchildren.
A graveside service will be held at Norton Cemetery.
Memorial contributions can be made to St. Mark Lutheran Church in Norton Shores, Michigan, or the Muskegon Rescue Mission.
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