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August 3, 2026
BOULDER JUNCTION – A volunteer role turned into statewide recognition for Dennis Duke, a member of the Boulder Junction Parks & Recreation board who received the Rising Star Award at the 2026 Wisconsin Governor’s Outdoor Industry Awards earlier this summer.
Per the Wisconsin Office of Outdoor Recreation, Duke – who joined the board in 2021 – helped lead projects that expanded Boulder Junction’s outdoor offerings, including an inclusive playground, expanded basketball court, new 18-hole disc golf course and The Glide, Wisconsin’s first outdoor skating ribbon.
The Glide earned a First Ascent Award for Innovation at last year’s awards ceremony.
“Through countless volunteer hours and tireless community leadership, he has helped shape the future of outdoor recreation in his community,” the Office of Outdoor Recreation stated. “His work demonstrates the extraordinary impact that dedicated volunteer leadership can have on a community’s outdoor assets and quality of life.”
Duke credited the broader Boulder Junction parks and recreation community for the award, describing the group as a “proactive” group always “pushing the envelope.”
“There are a lot of people, not just me, who are rising stars, if you will, because there are a lot of people who make this happen,” he said. “To me, last year’s award and this year’s serve as recognition that we are on target, and that’s rewarding.”
The initiatives
Duke said he and his fellow Boulder Junction Parks & Recreation board members work hard to brainstorm, research, raise funds, plan, oversee construction and maintain the town’s varied outdoor recreation options.
“It’s all volunteerism, and people committed to getting things done,” he said.
Duke said the board has seen a number of projects through to completion, including the new playground completed in 2023.
“We completely tore out our old playground and raised $330,000 and put in a new, accessible playground with all kinds of new equipment,” he said.
Other projects, Duke said, have included upgrading baseball diamonds, adding a “basically college-sized” basketball court and the disc golf course, which was completed last year.
The Glide, he said, has been one of the most unique attractions.
“It’s a 0.8-mile loop through the woods that we freeze down and groom with a Zamboni, and you can skate through the woods,” he said.
The skating ribbon is part of a winter park, which Duke said was developed to supplement winter tourism if/when conditions aren’t amenable for snowmobiling.
“If we get a bad snow year, it’s usually still cold, so we can still freeze water [for The Glide],” he said.
In warmer months, Duke said the disc golf course – built on land the town had purchased from the DNR – as well as the baseball diamonds, basketball court, tennis courts, skatepark and playground comprise an area known as “our sports and recreation park.”
“It’s all just there in one area,” he said. “It’s all by the town hall, so it’s convenient to everything. You’ve got bathrooms and pavilions already there, so all we had to do [for the disc golf course] was map out a course in the woods and then clean it out, fix it up and put some baskets in the ground.”
Such efforts can sound easy, Duke said, but the work can take months of volunteer effort.
Just as the winter park idea was developed to combat a drop in seasonal tourism beyond the town’s control, he said the sports and recreation park was developed – along with the area’s previous efforts to promote bicyclists – to counter any losses as regional fishing tourism declined for a number of reasons.
As part of the board’s five- and 10-year visions, Duke said they aim to provide outdoor options otherwise unavailable within a 50-mile radius around the town.
“It’s a focus on what we can do to keep ahead of the curve and continue to give people fun, unique things to do up here and have a reason to come to Boulder Junction or in this area and come visit us,” he said.
Even with all they’ve accomplished, Duke said the board’s ideas and motivation just keep coming.
“We’ve got some other projects, big and small, on the backburner that we’re working on right now,” he said, adding that a new event space is currently in the conceptualization phase.
The impact
Duke said the results of these initiatives aren’t just exciting – they’re also measurable.
The Boulder Junction Chamber of Commerce has recently utilized a geo-tracking service, he said, which helps quantify the impact of visitors to the area based on mobile phones.
During the eight weeks The Glide was open last winter, Duke said the data reported 25,000 unique visitors’ phones coming to town.
“That doesn’t include kids and things like that,” he said. “I’m saying we probably had more than 30,000 people through there in eight weeks.”
Based on the board’s formulations, Duke said this equated to “about $2 million of business based on ice loop alone.”
However, he said tourism dollars alone are not the only goal.
“Everything we do relative to outdoor recreation is not only focused on the tourists but it’s focused on the people who live in the area, too,” he said. “Everything we’ve done affects them as well… All the things we’re doing are a benefit to the community because the local residents can enjoy them just as much – or all the time more so than the tourists.”
A 69-and-a-half-year-old Rising Star
Passionate as he is for Boulder Junction, Duke said he did not live in the area full-time until he retired.
Though he grew up in Indiana and spent a good portion of his career working in Massachusetts, he said his family has a connection to the Boulder Junction area dating back 90 years.
“My dad came here in the ’30s with his dad,” he said, “and then when I was growing up, we came up to this area and… visited Boulder Junction all the time.”
Duke said his parents enjoyed the area so much that they built their retirement home “just up the road,” and he regularly brought his own children to Boulder Junction.
“We’ve all loved it,” he said. “And, heck, when we were in Massachusetts, we drove all the way here for vacations. We were on the coast of Maine and the coast of Massachusetts and Vermont, New Hampshire, etc., and we drove 1,400 miles to go to Wisconsin.”
When he retired, Duke said he decided to move to Boulder Junction and purchase a motel to run.
During the eight years when he ran the motel (which he has since sold), he said he gained a great deal of insights into visitors’ tourism motivations.
These insights, Duke said, along with his appreciation for the area, have fueled his involvement with Boulder Junction Parks & Recreation.
“I just enjoy it,” he said. “My personality is… I like to think of ideas and then carry them through. Basically, I have an easy ability to envision things and to know where we ought to take things, and that’s just my nature.”
Duke also said he likes to “fight the battles” necessary for progress, particularly for the town he loves.
His palpable passion was singled out when it came time for nominations for the 2026 Wisconsin Governor’s Outdoor Industry Awards, though he said he can only guess who nominated him.
Though he does “drive some things,” Duke said the Rising Star Award is the result of “a team effort.”
“I got the Rising Star Award at [age] 69 and a half,” he laughed, “but it’s not me alone doing it.”
Duke said he credits the entire Boulder Junction volunteer community, while commending the cooperation of the DNR.
He said he gains some personal enjoyment from the parks and recreation work – “it’s just fun, keeps me out of trouble” – however, his greatest joy is witnessing how others appreciate Boulder Junction’s outdoor options.
“Seeing their reaction is all the reward you need,” he said.
A brighter spotlight
With Boulder Junction’s barely-four-digit population, Duke said he appreciates the increased attention these awards have brought the town.
“Anything you want to do in the outdoors, you can do from Boulder Junction, because we’re kind of at the crossroads of a lot of things in this area,” he said. “Mountain bike or ski, water ski or fish or tube or hike or bike or ATV – you can do all that stuff from here… It’s a great little town.”
A single visit to Boulder Junction, Duke said, is all it takes for someone to get hooked.
“I always say ‘give us a try,’ because if you come here, you’ll fall in love with it like I did 60 years ago,” he said.
As much as he welcomes the extra attention for Boulder Junction, Duke said there’s one result the board does not want from the spotlight: a stoplight.
“We joke about the fact that if we ever have to put a stoplight in our town, we’ve missed the mark – we’ve gone the wrong direction or we’ve done something wrong,” he said. “We don’t want a stoplight.”
The 2026 Wisconsin Governor’s Outdoor Industry Awards
Per outdoorrecreation.wi.gov, the Wisconsin Governor’s Outdoor Industry Awards were established in 2025 to “recognize achievements that strengthen communities, drive economic impact and elevate Wisconsin’s reputation as a premier outdoor recreation destination.”
This year’s winners include:
- Destination of the Year: Mt. Telemark Village
- Outdoor Business of the Year: Hayward Power Sports
- Trailblazer Award: Tim White, Visit Wausau
- Big Tent Award: BIPOC Birding Club of Wisconsin
- First Ascent for Innovation Award: Westbury Bank Aquapark in Regner Park
- Rising Star Award: Dennis Duke, Boulder Junction Parks & Recreation
- Tandem Award for Collaboration: The North Country National Scenic Trail Partnership in Iron County
The Business News will cover Trailblazer Award winner Tim White of Visit Wausau in next month’s issue.
