Thomas M. Lynch

Age 67, and still marching to his own drummer right up until he died on March 21, 2011. Tom (aka "Mule") was the son of Homer and Lois Lynch of Detroit Lakes. He is survived by his brother and business partner Rick. Tom went to DL High School and lettered in football, basketball and baseball. After graduation, he attended UND and Moorhead State and was a member of the winningest basketball team in MSU history in 1966, the year he graduated. Then, it was off to Alaska where he taught shop on the Aleutian Island of Adak and a second year in Fairbanks. Tom had been a hunter and fisherman since his early teens and got his first bear while in Alaska. Tom had all the tools for teaching but it was not his calling. He loved his independence and found that being in business for himself would let him pursue his many sporting interests and the social whirl that he enjoyed so much in his twenties and thirties. Tom was everything from an accomplished woodworker to an auto mechanic. He could turn a block of black walnut into a presentation quality gunstock complete with hand checkering. He was an excellent taxidermist, a fine guitar player, and a Top Gun in trapshooting at the Becker County Sportsmanchr(39)s Club. In his youth, he loved working on his many Corvettes to make them go a little faster. Lets just say, "He could do it all". Tom and his brother Rick ran Shoreham Standard off and on through the 60chr(39)s and then turned the former Shoreham Grocery owned by his parents into "The Store" which rapidly became the place to go for pizza, beer and good times. The Store was a fixture in Shoreham from 1971 to 1985 and many of the good times for the lakes crowd started at the bar and around the pool table with its eternal lineup of quarters from challengers. Tom and Rick saw another business opportunity across the street in the mid 70chr(39)s and bought, remodeled and opened the Hotel Shoreham along with another partner, Dan Gunderson. They lived in the dining room by the fireplace through the winter while they converted it from a historic old shell to what was to become another successful enterprise with a full menu including pizza, beer and more good times. The Hotel Shoreham, just like The Store in itchr(39)s day, is where the lake crowd still comes for food, drink, and fun. He loved his cabin on the river with its solitude, moving water, and his ever present flock of mallards which he fed with many sacks of corn summer and winter. In the closing years of his life he focused much of his energy on spending time in the duck blinds, at the workbench in his garage, and working on Tragedy, his beloved 1975 El Camino which will be a legacy to speed and to one of the most stubborn of souls. Tom had a favorite line from the writings of a long lost duck hunter that he would like to share with you. "The true duck hunter never lived who didnchr(39)t know, while he was sitting in his boat waiting for the sun to rise, that he was close to the heart of things." Tom was a legend in the Shoreham area and shall remain so in the minds and hearts of his many friends, current and long ago, who had the good fortune to know him as the generous and loyal man he was. For those of us who knew him then and love him still, we believe a legend has passed.