Maumee Rotary Services Foundation in partnership with Metroparks Toledo is funding a three-phase project to make improvements to historic Locks 3 and 4 at Side Cut Metropark. The first phase, completed in last fall, is a Peace Garden at the base of Lock 4.

Michele Free, who served as Rotary Club of Maumee President in 2018-2019, said she was inspired by a visit to Chicago where she learned of a Peace Garden at the home of Paul Harris, founder of Rotary International.

World Peace is one the pillars of Rotary International. The Peace Garden is designed to create a serene environment with plants, seating and the sounds of water trickling over the rocks, where visitors can reflect and find peace in a noisy world.  

When the park system acquired the land to create Side Cut, the first Metropark, in 1930 it included four original locks that were once part of an extension, or “side cut,” connecting the Maimi & Erie Canal with Maumee City in the mid-1800s.

Maumee Rotary has been a longtime supporter of Side Cut. Just across the road from the Silver Lake Area is the Rotary Pavilion, a large picnic shelter that was a gift from the community service club.