MARQUETTE -- Marquette residents were shocked Wednesday by an act of vandalism at picnic rocks.

Sometime between Sunday evening and Monday afternoon someone painted the phrase "beat your wife" on the rocks at picnic rocks beach.

The rock is usually painted by Marquette high school seniors with the number of their graduating year.

Phyllis loonsfoot of the Marquette women's center received a call from a concerned citizen at about 4:30 p.m. yesterday and promptly reported the vandalism to the city police.

"It's just devastating, said Phyllis Loonsfoot, Director of the Marquette Women's Center, "one of my biggest concerns was this is not the message this community wants to have out there and I just imagine how someone who's being victimized, having seen that how that would make them feel."

The Marquette city dive team, with the aid of the park and recreation department, rowed out to the rock at about 1 p.m. and peeled the offensive phrase off.

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A rock in Lake Superior, that is traditionally a subject of competition between graduating classes at Marquette Senior High School, has been defaced with a not-so-good message.

Phyllis Loonsfoot, Director of the Women's Center/Harbor House, called Upper Michigan's Source this morning to inform us of this message.

Loonsfoot wrote on her Facebook page:

'A call came in at the Women's Center this afternoon (Tuesday) from a woman expressing concern about the words painted on the main rock at Picnic Rocks where high school students paint their year of graduation annually.

The words painted on the rock right now are "BEAT YOUR WIFE".  Hard to fathom that in May of 2011 those words are boldly written for all community members to read.

We have all heard the saying "it takes a village to raise a child".

The Women's Center believes that it takes a community to end domestic and sexual violence. Please copy, paste and repost this to show your support of ending domestic and sexual violence in our community.

The Women's Center and Harbor House need community support to end these crimes. Survivors and their children deserve our support and our help.

Call the Women's Center at 225-1346 ext. 113 for information about program services and what you can do as a community member.  Thank you!' (Loonsfoot)

We will have more on this story as it becomes available.