The new cover for the reprint edition of Norma Stevens’ history of Buchanan, “The Real McCoy: The Story of a Creek and Its Town,” will be graced by a photo of the creek taken by Shelley Morgan O’Bryant, a former Buchanan resident who now lives in Bristol, Ind.
O’Bryant won first place in “The Real McCoy Cover Art Contest” sponsored by the book’s new publisher, Cosmic Visionary Music & Books (CVMB), of San Diego.

Second place went to Toni Lacey-Verdon, of Chicago, whose son lives in Buchanan. Her painting, “Spirit of McCoy’s Creek” is featured on the new, four-color back cover of the paperback reprint.

Thomas P. Fehlner won third place in the contest for his watercolor, “Fishing McCoy’s.” He plans to donate it for auction to support McCoy’s Creek Trail at the Friends’ annual dinner-dance in October.

The trail has also been named beneficiary of a donation by CVMB. For every copy of the reprinted book that sells, CVMB will donate $1 to the trail’s endowment fund, or nearly 40 percent of its net profit.

“This is a memorial to my mother, the book’s author, Norma Stevens. She would absolutely love the fact that this trail has been developed, as I’m sure she’d be thrilled with all the attention McCoy’s Creek has gotten since 1967, when she made her first pleas to rescue the poor neglected little waterway,” said publisher Lianne (Stevens) Downey, president of CVMB. Her mother died in 2008 in Colorado Springs, where she had moved with her (late) husband, Earl Stevens, to be near their grandchildren.

Honorable mentions in the contest went to Julie Williams, for her photographic “mash-up” of the creek and mill, and to Emma Lysy for her photograph capturing a still and  peaceful image of the creek.

About the book, Downey explained, “While I was growing up on the outskirts of Buchanan, the creek seemed like nothing more than a trash-filled drainage ditch running mostly under the streets. We knew nothing of its history or importance to the town.

“Then my mother started delving into the archives at the Berrien County Record, where she worked,” she said. “After school, she’d drag me off to endless musty museums to research its history. She wrote about what she discovered in her weekly ‘Inklings’ column, and finally developed those columns into the book.

“It was printed by the Berrien County Record originally in 1975, using the old metal type of the day, with a cloth-bound hardcover,” she said. “I still have the metal plate used for the cover title, and the original cover negative.”

As for the cover-art contest, Downey said she and her co-publisher husband, Joseph, came up with the idea to encourage local artists to participate in the reprint.

She enlisted her oldest brother, Mike Stevens, a playwright and poet who lives in Colorado Springs, to write the back cover copy, and her older sister, Linda Jo Hunter, also an author and artist living in Washington state, to help judge the cover contest. Her brother Bill Stevens, who lives in Wisconsin and has often returned to Buchanan with his musical group, EnRoute Music, has promised to play for any book-related event taking place in the future.

O’Bryant’s photograph, titled “Bridge Far,” was taken during one of her forays to photograph the creek at the suggestion of McCoy’s Creek Trail founder Richard Proud.

O’Bryant said she readily agreed, having grown up with McCoy’s Creek “in my backyard.”

Downey says the books will be on sale at the Pears Mills gift shop and from the Friends of McCoy’s Creek Trail, as well as from online booksellers and by special order in bookstores.