Editor’s note: Each year, the Brown County Democrat celebrates some aspect of Brown County history in our Founders Day section. This year we’re writing about residents who are about 80 or older, who have incredible stories to share and who define “Brown County character” in some way or another. If you have a suggestion for a person to feature in the next Founders Day issue, send it to [email protected] or call us at 812-988-2221.
Wayne O’Hara Jr. still lives in the cabin his parents bought in 1959 and is remodeling it with hopes that one day it will be on the Indiana Register of Historic Sites and Structures.
O’Hara has done historic research on the cabin over the years. The original structure was built in 1850 and work has been done to maintain its structural and historical integrity. There are two homes on the property.
According to O’Hara, the cabin is where Richard Lieber, a German-American businessman who fathered the Indiana state parks system, came up with the idea for to create state parks in Indiana in about 1910.
Once their current remodel is done, O’Hara plans to register it with the state as a historic structure, he said.
O’Hara has been well-known in the county since the 1980s. He has worked as a commercial real estate broker in the area for years.
O’Hara joined the Marine Corps in the late 1950s, serving four years before he moved down to Brown County with his family and to work in Bloomington.
His parents, Wayne Sr. and Gladys O’Hara, had purchased a cabin on Jackson Branch Road in October of 1959. They had traveled down to Brown County from Indianapolis to visit friends, but when the opportunity arose to move south, they took it.
“They came down to visit them quite often and I guess fell in love with the whole country thing and they decided they wanted to buy a log cabin,” O’Hara said.
After moving to Brown County with his parents, he began dating his future wife, Karen, who lived in Indianapolis. O’Hara eventually moved to Indianapolis where the couple married and he began work with a telephone company.
In the service, he had worked on airborne fire control radar, which is where his love of electronics was inspired.
From the phone company, O’Hara then switched to Naval Avionics, the Navy’s overhaul center for Polaris Missile Guidance Systems for atomic missiles. He started doing real estate part-time then eventually made the switch to full-time.
“I really didn’t want to spend my career working for the government,” he said.
Wayne would bring his family down to visit his parents and siblings. In 1980, Wayne and Karen made the move to Brown County with their sons Craig and Dennis.
After the move, O’Hara began work on developing the West Hill Shopping Center in Columbus, where Jay C Food Store is on the west side.
“A couple of years later, I was done with the project, and had the option to go wherever I wanted to work,” O’Hara said. “But the kids had been here, so we thought we’d sell the house in Indianapolis and stay down here.”
O’Hara has driven to Indianapolis to work since 1983, being a real estate broker specializing in shopping centers and tenant representation.
Late businessman Andy Rogers lived up the road from O’Hara and he was Rogers’ broker for years.
“He trusted me,” he said.
O’Hara handled the sales of the Seasons Lodge and Conference Center from Rogers to Kevin Ault and the Brown County Inn to Barry Herring.
He also brokered the piece of the ground for the Brown County Music Center.
“I had to track down every piece of ground we could build that thing on,” he said.
Getting involved
Wayne and Karen ran the campground store at the Brown County State Park for eight years, taking it over after the Bonds.
Karen would figure out what they needed to carry and Wayne had to reconfigure the space to make it all fit, he said. “Eggs, bread and milk, even the basics took a lot of maneuvering,” he said. “We just figured out how to keep it stocked up all the time.”
Karen enjoyed talking to the campers and tourists, Wayne said. With campers that came back the same week every year, Wayne said Karen made a lot of friends in that position.
“When she quit that she had to get a job in town at a shop because she couldn’t not talk to tourists. She enjoyed that interaction,” he said. “She was a people person.”
Karen passed away nine years ago this February.
She loved the Brown County Humane Society, so every year on her birthday Wayne sends a check to them in her honor.
She was one of the founding members of the Fabulous 50 Giving Circle. The group of women meets once a year to donate $200 to a cause. At the gathering, each donor writes a cause she would like to support on a slip of paper and three slips are drawn from a basket to be contenders for that year’s donations. Then members make pitches to the group about why their nominee is deserving.
“She was one of the original members, so I keep that up for her,” he said.
Wayne reflected upon raising his sons in Brown County. He said there were a lot of “pluses and minuses” to raising them in the county, with the school system not as good as it is today, he said.
They’d been used to a stricter environment at Catholic school in Indianapolis then they were brought to a property with a creek and deep forests. “It gave them a place to play,” he said.
Both of his sons graduated from Brown County High School.
Wayne became involved with the schools in a multitude of ways, seeing that there was a need in certain areas.
Around 1985, he raised the money for the first six Pionex Computers in the schools. The schools did not have computers at that time.
He also started the Junior Achievement Program in Brown County.
The program was designed to give high school students their first taste of the business world. Students involved set up a business and design to make and market a certain product.
Students were in charge of all aspects of the company including research, supply ordering, bookkeeping, promotion and other business matters. Adults acted as advisors. Cummins Engine Foundation awarded Wayne with a onetime $500 grant to get the achievement program started here.
Now there’s a business education program in the schools.
“It was always fun,” Wayne said.
“I ran into a couple of students who were in that program after they got out of school and they always just went ‘Man, I learned so much in that class about business.’”
Wayne served as the president of the original board of directors for the Career Resource Center. After his term, he started attending all school board meetings.
“You can ask a lot of the school board members and they would say, ‘He watched us like a hawk,’” he said. “I agitate a lot, but somebody has to.”
“It was stuff I could do for the community I was familiar with. I simply tried to be an adjunct for bringing more opportunity if I could.”
Of all the factors to draw one in to staying in Brown County, Wayne said for him it was his family’s cabin.
“My brothers and sisters grew up there, my children grew up there,” he said. “I always loved it. … Why live in Indianapolis when I don’t have to?”
Wayne’s brother Michael also lived in Brown County and passed away in April. Michael was a Marine who was awarded three Purple Heart Medals and volunteered with many different veterans organizations.
Michael had worked to make sure the community never forgot his friend Larry C. Banks’ name. He and a committee of classmates were responsible for getting the Brown County High School gymnasium renamed in Banks’ honor. Banks was the only Brown County resident to be killed in combat in the Vietnam War.
Wayne described Brown County as unique and that it is changing.
The past, he said was a “little different” than it is today.
“It was a little slower,” he said. “Except in October. … That was back when traffic would be backed up on State Road 135 to Bean Blossom and to the interstate on State Road 46 East.”
“It’s changing, so is everything,” he said of the county now. “Change just happens. It doesn’t matter where you are, things will change.”
When asked if he planned on staying in the area, he said, “I’m putting new 36-inch doors in the cabin, if that tells you anything. Large enough to get the gurney in and out.”
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Age: 80
Place of birth: Indianapolis
Spouse: Karen O’Hara
Children: Craig Alan (passed in 2020) and Dennis Patrick
Parents: Wayne and Gladys O’Hara
Siblings: Michael, Patrick, Brian, Kitty Lu and Penny Sue
Occupations: Electronics; real estate
Hobby: Fishing, collecting spinning wheels and fountain pins. mushroom hunting.
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