On a family vacation to Eli, Minnesota in 1970, the potential of a pier business was realized. William Paulson, along with his parents, Walter and Betty Paulson, and two of his sons, William and Rick, were enrolled in a fishing competition. While standing on a creaking and cracking old dock for 12 hours, Bill thought to himself, "there has to be a better way."       As he and his family were packing up their things that night in Minnesota, Bill spotted a man across the lake driving an old Chevrolet pick up truck into the water. He then saw the man get out of his truck and attach what looked like the frame of an old crane sitting in the water to the front of the pier.  With this, the man got back in his truck and backed out of the water pulling a removable dock out with him. Bill, after seeing this, and knowing in his mind that there had to be a better way of building piers, drove over and talked to the man in the wet overalls with the pick up truck.      It turned out that the man was a retired farmer, and in his retirement enjoyed a private business of building docks for residential applications.  Bill told his elder, "I like what you're doing with these removable docks and I think you have a good product. Would you mind if I started building and selling piers like this in Wisconsin?"  The man obliged, and through a gentleman's agreement the rights were given to Bill.  Thus, out of the shimmer of the setting sun that day in 1970, Port-A-Pier was born.