Boy Scout Kyle Tuorto, 14, is on a mission: Build a museum walkway to become an Eagle Scout.
By ANGIE GREEN
Published May 26, 2003
PALM HARBOR - These are historic bricks with both a history and a future.
Over the past 85 years, they have been used in one of Palm Harbor's first roads, dug up, given to a history museum, stolen for use in a backyard patio and returned.
Now they have a new home, thanks to a Boy Scout on a mission.
Kyle Tuorto, 14, was up early Friday preparing to use the bricks to build a 58-foot-long walkway at the North Pinellas Historical Museum. Kyle, his dad and two construction workers dug up grass and dirt to ready the ground for the 924 bricks.
Kyle, who will be a freshman at East Lake High School in August, took on the project in his efforts to become an Eagle Scout. He enlisted the help of more than a dozen fellow Boy Scouts to spend Saturday laying limerock, sand and, of course, the bricks themselves.
Made in 1918, the reddish bricks were used for the original U.S. 19, now known as County Road 1. They were removed when the road was widened and rebuilt and given to the museum.
Kyle said he found out about the bricks by reading a newspaper article last May. The article said a Palm Harbor man was charged with stealing the bricks from a vacant lot next to the museum. Some of the stolen bricks were put into the man's patio and later returned so the museum could use them to build a much-needed walkway, but Kyle noticed there was no mention of who was to lay them.
So he called the museum director and asked if he could take on the project. The rest is history.
Along with the bricks from the old U.S. 19, Kyle is using bricks from a chimney that once existed on the museum. The museum is the former 1915 home of the late "Judge" Thomas William Hartley, an early Palm Harbor justice of the peace and citrus grove owner.
With the help of his Scout coordinator and parents, Kyle got all the materials donated. He went to Home Depot to learn the skills he needed for the project. All-American Concrete Inc. of Largo donated limerock and sand, Sunbelt Rentals of Oldsmar donated yard tools and a compactor and Townsend's Constructors Inc. of Clearwater provided two workers to help clear the 7-inch-deep walkway.
"I've learned two things from doing this," Kyle said on Friday. "To make sure you have your materials, and two, don't forget your aspirins."
He expected to need the aspirin for the second part of the project Saturday, when he supervised 16 scouts in laying the bricks properly.
"And I know there will be a lot of questions," he said after six hours of digging on Friday.
But he didn't mind.
His mind is on becoming an Eagle Scout, the Boy Scouts' highest honor. Picking up a stack of bricks to place them on blue plastic covering for the night, he jammed his finger.
"Ouch," he said, quietly. Then he reached down for more.
