CURT GOWDY STATE PARK — The world is not always a kind place to be.
But there is a place where kindness is always welcome. That place isn’t somewhere over the rainbow. It’s right here in Wyoming, in the Little House at Curt Gowdy State Park.
Devoted to bringing kindness back, Little House was built by Cheryl Gowdy to honor her father at his namesake park, passing on the lessons she learned from her own father to other children.
Little House has been operating for just a year, but it has already become a giant wishing well, where many children have made thousands of sincere wishes for world kindness.
Cheryl was back over Labor Day weekend for the first time since the grand opening of Little House last year in June, and she was positively beaming as she took in all that’s been accomplished by this little dream home. The Little House, built through the Curt Gowdy State Park Family Fund, is a center within the park that puts on children’s programming and activities for kids ages 3 to 12 that helps them deal with their emotions and act with kindness.
Attendance at Little House has exceeded 1,000 people each of the two years of its operation, Laramie District Interpretive Ranger Carlo Migliaccio told Cowboy State Daily. Those numbers count only children who have participated in Little House’s programs, not all the children who have visited the center.
While they’re at Little House, the children have several opportunities to make as many wishes as they want for a kinder world. There’s a wishing box, there are wishing flowers on the wall, and there are wishing quilt blocks. The latter get tied into blankets and donated to dogs in animal shelters and soon, to homeless people as well.
That means thousands of wishes for kindness have already been made at Little House.
That had Cheryl beaming as she greeted new children arriving at Little House for its last day of the season.
“I have so much going on in my heart today,” she told Cowboy State Daily, gesturing toward one wall where flowers with kindness petals were placed.
Each petal has a sincere kindness wish written inside. When the child is finished, they’re asked to place the flower on the wall, making a sincere kindness wish as they do so. The wish doesn’t have to be vocalized, it can be silent. The key is only placing the flower on the wall when the child feels the wish in their heart.
“We are not just arts and crafts,” Cheryl said. “We are here to inspire children to fall in love with kindness.
“Kindness is love and love is kindness. That’s the branding.”
More Improvements Are Planned
Little House is just the beginning of ideas Cheryl has for the park, which she sees as important to her father’s legacy.
“My dad grew up in Cheyenne,” she told Cowboy State Daily. “And he was a wonderful person, and he grew up fishing.”
Gowdy, a famous Boston and national sportscaster, always loved Wyoming, Cheryl said, and counted it as one of the proudest days in his life when Wyoming named Curt Gowdy State Park after him in 1972.
“It has two beautiful lakes, hiking trails, camping, boating, fishing and plenty of beauty,” Gowdy said at the time. “It has everything I love. What greater honor can a man receive?”
Ever since then, the Gowdy family has been instrumental in adding amenities to the park so that it remains a pace where families and friends can enjoy both the great outdoors and each other.
Those amenities included an 8,700-square-foot visitor’s center opened in 2014, which includes an exhibit area, a multipurpose room, staff offices and coin-operated showers for park visitors that are open 24/7.
Gowdy told Cowboy State Daily she hopes to continue adding improvements to the park, and that she spent some time talking with the new Director of Wyoming State Parks, Historic Sites, and Trails Dave Glenn about continuing the effort she began when current Wyoming transportation director Darin Westby held the position. She told Cowboy State Daily she’s been assured the improvements she’s pushed for are still considered important.
Little House at Curt Gowdy State Park. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
Cheryl Gowdy talking to children at Little House while Richard Dixon, Little House's architect, holds up a plaque made for Little House. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
Each kindness flower on the wall was created by a child who visited Little House. The flowers are placed on the wall with a sincere wish for kindness in the heart of each child. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
Cheryl Gowdy watches as children build a pretend log fire in Little House. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
Cheryl Gowdy surrounded by children talks about Little House and its mission to spread kindness in the world. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
Cheryl Gowdy poses with Wendy Zynda. Her father knew Cheryl's father Curt Gowdy. Zynda's father and Gowdy worked together to help bring youth baseball to Cheyenne. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
The kindness wishing box is one of the places where children can place their wishes for kindness at Little House. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
Cheryl Gowdy draws with some of the children visiting Little House while architect Richard Dixon looks on. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
Cheryl Gowdy holds up a kindness quilt. Each block has artwork and a kindness wish from a child who visited Little House. The heartwarming quilts will be given to homeless pets, and soon, homeless people as well. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
Cheryl Gowdy talks about a plaque she had made for Little House. She plans to take a photo of the plaque and frame it for her mother Jerre Gowdy's 100th birthday next month. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily)
It's Somebody’s Birthday Soon
One of the other things Cheryl did while she was at Little House recently was show off a brand-new plaque dedicating Little House to Curt and Jerre Gowdy, along with the message, “Kindness is love, Love is Kindness.”
“This is going in the house and then I’m photographing it and giving it to my mom (Jerre) for her 100th birthday,” Cheryl said.
Jerre made the trip to Wyoming when Little House opened and talked to Cowboy State Daily about how much Little House meant to her.
She’d had a dream the morning of the grand opening, of Little House standing strong under a big blue sky. The building has been built of beetle-killed pinewood that is so strong, architect Richard Dixon told Cowboy state Daily last year, it will essentially last forever.
I hope that it will welcome all the people for a long time, Jerre Gowdy said then, and that it will always bring them great joy.
Saturday, that joy was coming out all over. It was in the smiles of children coloring wish flowers and writing wish notes to put in the Little House wishing box.
And it was there in Cheryl’s squeals of delight as each new child entered Little House. She could not contain herself.
“Oh, hi guys!” she would exclaim each time, practically squealing like a child herself. “Welcome to Little House!”
The very second there was a small group of children to gather around, Gowdy couldn’t wait to take them to a table filled with everything needed to blow “kindness bubbles” out to the park and into the world.
“Everything about love is being kind,” she told them. “And that’s why I built Little House, for you guys, because I love you so much. And I want you always to know that kindness is real.”
At first, it was just Cheryl and the children blowing “kindness wishes up to the rainbows,” but soon, even the adults were getting in on the act. For just a little while, wind carried the bubbles far, far away, making little rainbows in the afternoon sun, as well as smiles on the faces of everyone who saw them.
Where exactly all those bubbles landed is hard to say. Somewhere over the rainbow perhaps.
But one thing is certain. The happiness that lived inside each of those bubbles was not carried only by wind that day. Hearts carried that happiness out into the world as well, and this world could definitely use a little more of that.
Contact Renee Jean at renee@cowboystatedaily.com
Renée Jean can be reached at renee@cowboystatedaily.com.
