By PHYLLIS ZORN

Staff writer

When David McMurray was moving things into storage in a garage he owns at the county lake, he found a photo album and scrapbook he knew was someone’s treasure.

“We found it sitting there on an old fireplace that was in the garage,” McMurray said. “It was just things that were left over inside the garage.”

It contains pictures of young children, people grouped in front of houses, women performing on a stage, images from a trip to Hawaii, birth announcements, an elementary school graduation certificate, service money, and assorted other memorabilia of a family.

The old garage where the scrapbook was found is at 71B Lakeshore Dr.

McMurray and his wife have owned the property since 2019 but didn’t use the garage. Now they own 72 Lakeshore Dr. and are storing things from another house where they lived at the lake.

He showed the scrapbook to his wife.

“My wife said, ‘Somebody needs it or ought to have it,’” McMurray said.

They talked to a longtime lake resident who gave them leads on people who used to own the property, but the McMurrays couldn’t locate the scrapbook owner.

Don Alcorn used to live in the house. He died in 2014.

“We couldn’t come up with anyone from the county,” McMurray said.

The McMurrays tried to reach a possible Alcorn family member, Billy Alcorn in Ramona, but his phone was not answered.

When the Record called the number McMurray provided for Don Alcorn’s brother, Billy, he was delighted to hear about McMurray’s find.

“I’ve got a granddaughter who is starting to do research on the family, and I know she’d love to have it,” Alcorn said.

Granddaughter Christiana Alcorn lives in Mulvane. She recently moved there from New Jersey.

Alcorn said the book disappeared after his brother died. He estimates the photos go back 70 years.

“I’m the last of that family,” Alcorn said. “My other brother passed away Aug. 4, and my sister passed away three years ago. We’ve got a half brother, but we are the last of the original family.”

Alcorn said Don sold the property to another lake resident, who allowed Don to live there as long as he wanted.

“I didn’t get a chance to go through everything when he passed away,” Billy Alcorn said. “I’m trying to round up all of the old, old pictures and give them to Christiana to help her research everything. It really tickles me to death to get them, and I know it will tickle her.”

Coincidentally, Alcorn is going through boxes left in a Ramona house that he had torn down and is trying to return those items to a Herington family who formerly owned that house.

“That can’t be replaced,” Alcorn said. “A person’s heritage shouldn’t be lost.”

Taking a trip down memory lane, Alcorn said his brother Don, who did many good things for people, was a bit of a scamp.

“He was known to take two busloads of people to Las Vegas and pay everything and not say anything about it, but if you had a dollar in your pocket, he could not stand it until he had it,” Alcorn said.

The brothers used to get up to orneriness when Don lived at the lake.

“We used to sit there on his front porch on July 4 and wait for people to go past and shoot cannons at them,” he said. “I had to be in my late 40s. We pulled a lot of stuff out there at the lake.”

He’s glad to know the memories will live on because of his granddaughter.

“I wanted to make sure there was somebody that would appreciate to carry on the family,” Alcorn said.

McMurray was glad to hear the scrapbook’s owner was found and planned to pick it up.

“I think that would be great,” McMurray said. “That was the whole purpose of doing that. There were so many things like marriages and family photos.”