Lion Hunt once more

If you look closely at this photo, at left, you'll see me sitting on a chair on a table - leading Camp Wawayanda in the "Lion Hunt." "I'm NOT scared!" (The photo was taken by Dan Weir, our Director of Camping Services.)

gathering of Wawayanda directors

Most or perhaps all of the Wawayanda Directors who were in attendance at the reunion, from left to right: Bob Eddings, Dave Haight, Deb Singer Hanna, Al Filreis (that's me), Eileen Barnes Hahn, Helen Cornman, Dan Weir, and (tall guy in the back) Dave King.

cool cap

Jim Vaughan, President-elect of the Frost Valley Board of Trustees, was here on Sunday to help out during the first session's check-in. He saw Kam Kobeissi's Wawayanda-patch cap and fell for it completely. Kam went in search for a new hat that fit Jim, and there ya go. Happy Jim poses with Kam, our fabulous Hird Director.

opening campfire

Last night's Camp Wawayanda opening campfire at CIT Point.

perfect spot

Wawayanda held its closing campfire Thursday evening at a perfect location - at the eastern edge of Big Tree Field. I took this photo just before the proceedings got underway.

the family

Steve Cornman (camper & CIT, '70s) --> Helen Cornman (camper, counselor, VC, director, '80s) --> Dan Weir (counselor, VC, director, late 90s/'00s). I've remarked here and there in this blog over the months and years about this FV family. Happily, since I like them all. I'm particularly a fan of Dan this morning, after his superb presentation yesterday to the FV Board of Trustees who met for our annual at-camp meeting, under a tent set up at Reflection Pond. Dan's younger sister Liz is in camp this session, so Dan's family gathered at the beginning of the session. That's when the photo here was taken.

Elsewhere in this blog:

[] Helen Cornman & David Sunshine

[] legacies

[] Wawayanda in good hands

vintage Wawayanda staff shirt

We found a vintage Wawayanda staff shirt in the archives - and John Butler was eager to try it on. Love that orange-and-white canoe-on-lake motif. Don't you?

happy 50th, Frost Valley!

This afternoon an all-camp program celebrated 50 years since Wawayanda moved to Frost Valley. It was a big birthday bash. The afternoon began with a giant gathering on the Castle lawn, culminating in the perfect formation of a "5" by Wawayanda and an "0" by Hird. Phyllis Gherardi Caputo stood on a van parked in the horse field across the road and caught the whole business on film. Here's one of her shots. "The kids were crazy," says Phyllis, "Everyone was cheering. It was really fun."

old songs

I've been leading old camp songs here and there. I've done "Father Abraham" and "Deep & Wide" at Camp Wawayanda's opening campfires, and "The Hoola Hop" (old-style) too, and led the younger kids in a revival of the "Waddat-'n-chew" cheer. At the most recent opening campfire for Camp Hird that camp's director, John Butler, and I did a rousing version of "Look on the Sunny Side." I hope to post a video of that in a few days.

Here's a photo of me at the most recent opening campfire, leading "Deep & Wide." The photo captures me apparently at the moment when I'm doing the widest of wides.

legacies

Here's Dan Weir, our terrific Director of Wawayanda, with his parents. Steve Cornman, a former camper (Steve was a camper here when I was a director--which makes me feel frighteningly old), is at right.

Dan's aunt Helen Cornman threatens to visit for a few days later this summer. We hope so.

hears the music, feels the hope

Our old friend Rick Wormeli just recently discovered this blog. He wrote me an email filled with characteristic enthusiasm and below you see part of that. Rick came to us via Carolyn Shelburne (I believe) from Virginia. He was or quickly became the Totem VC and in a few years was the camp director of the younger of the two camps, Camp Wawayanda, the second or third summer (if I remember rightly) that Hird was the older and Wawayanda the younger (split by age rather than sex, in other words). Rick was a beloved showman, often wore costumes, spoke to us through puppets, and went into a funny mode where his limbs were limber and clownish (like the Scarecrow in Oz). The little kids adored him. Here's Rick:

I’m laughing at the Rick Wormeli doll idea. It would need 8 limbs, each with multiple rotating joints and uber-flexibility to resemble the current live version, but wow, what a great thing to put on a skateboard (or mountain board as I see FV has) and send shooting down a steep slope with lots of twists and turns! We’d have to put a little computer chip recording of “Hula Hop” or “Here at Wawayanda and Henry Hird” that play when you raise its arm…maybe some cabin lists as well?

Thanks for doing the Alumni blog. I just found it tonight, and I read every entry, including the over 9-minute video, “Hope You Had the Time of Your Life.” What a rush of nostalgia and true joy! I’m sorry to hear about Chuck, though, and Oran, too, and heck, John Ketcham as well! Afua looks great. I remember many long nights working with her when she was on staff. She was one of the highlights that summer. I can’t believe your Ben and Pete and Claudia’s Brad are on staff – this blows my mind!

This was sure cool to catch up and get Frost Valley pumping through my system again. I can hear the music – share the warmth – find the laughter – and feel the hope. What a worthy spring from which to drink! I look forward to your future posts.

what we say we will do

Thanks to Bud Cox, who has kept many of the old camp newsletters. Here's an item from the Wawayanda Wasp issue of 1962, a note in anticipation of a great summer for '63:

What we say we will do – we will do, is not just a slogan at Wawayanda. All of us are victims of exaggerated advertising in the purchase of commodities, and kids are more often the most disappointed when something does not live up to what we expected.

Looking forward to going to camp is almost as much fun as being there. In the process of dreaming, great expectations develop. It is the earnest desire of each member of the staff to meet these expectations and to give that boy or girl all he or she hoped for.

With a full camp and a long waiting list, we do not need to “advertise the camp” with exaggerated promotional materials. We want you as parents to find the experience your son or daughter will have, better then you expected. We the staff have a tradition of 63 years of operation to live up to, and indeed each of us intend to make 1963 the best ever.

Lake Wawayanda in 1876

Lake Wawayanda in the northwest corner of New Jersey was the site of the original Camp Wawayanda beginning in 1901. Here is the same lake as it was depicted in a painting by Jasper Francis Cropsey done in 1876. Several people who know the lake suggest that the painting is highly romanticized - painted by Cropsey to befit the dramatic natural aesthetic of the mid-19th century Hudson River School. Notice for instance how high and looming the mountains are in the background here; well, the actual scene has no peaks quite so dramatic. Perhaps there's a convergence here: the Hudson River School painters focused many of their landscape paintings on the Catskill Mountains - dramatic scenes yet rounded "soft" mountains, that blue-green mountain-forest color we all know and love so well. What I like, then, is that the Catskills aesthetic trained its eye on Lake Wawayanda, conceptually tying together this New Jersey site to its future in the mountains to the north.

9 Wawayanda directors in one place at one time

At the 2001 reunion we celebrated the 100th year of Wawayanda camping, which began of course in 1901. There was a moment when we realized we had seven former Camp Wawayanda directors in the dining hall at the same time. There were a total of nine Wawayanda directors at the reunion, but neither Jim Ewen nor Mike Ketcham had yet arrived at that moment...and maybe ten if Steve Purkis was there, as I think he was, and if Steve had been a Wawayanda--as distinct from Hird--Director. Well we present seven gathered up front and led the 400 former staff attending the reunion in a surprisingly emotional rendition of "Happy Birthday" sung to Wawayanda itself. Emotional...because...perhaps because Wawayanda had always taken time to sing happy birthday to us and now we were returning the favor. Then of course there was the Hula Hop and then the "Order of the Oar." The gathering was given a choice of which director to toss into the air 100 times: Dave King, Rick Wormeli, or Al Filreis. King won the vote, I'm sure, but would have refused to be thrown up 100 times, lest he throw up his lunch on us, so the fiction was that I received the greatest applause and hence I became surely the person tossed into the air the greatest number of times at any single "Order of the Oar" affair. A hundred times is a lot, I can tell you now from firsthand experience, and, to be sure, the people tossing me were not holding back. I rose eight feet into the air...

The directors were, from left to right: Dave King (director in the 1960s and here & there in the early 70s), Digger Shortt (also in 1960s), Rick Wormeli (directed in late 1980s), Al Filreis (director in the 1970s and 80s), Dave Allen ("the amazing Dave!"--1980s), Bobby Hettler (early to mid-1970s), and Eileen Barnes (1990s).