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by Teresa Nicodemus
As professionals in the field of camp we make a difference. Like the
stars that punctuate the night sky with their shimmering lights, camp
staff hold a beacon of light for many children and adults. In big ways
and small ways, every day, camp professionals are enriching lives. Camping
Magazine endeavors to give you a glimpse of the power of making a difference
that the camp experience lends to those who answer the call. Although
countless volumes of Camping Magazine would be needed to tell the stories
of camp professionals who have made a difference, please enjoy the stories
of five camp professionals who join you in the journey, who are shining
examples of what it means to touch lives in a positive and profound way.
 Charles Butler
Retired from National Institute of Health, U.S. Department
of Health and Human Services as Supervisor of Recreation Therapy and
Coordinator of Recreation for Camp Fantastic, Winchester, Virginia
I've worked with children at camp for over forty years. My original
campers are now over forty years old. Many are providing similar camp
experiences for their own children. It's rewarding to know I made
a difference in their lives.
In the rolling acres of farm country along the eastern shore in Chestertown,
Maryland, a stone's throw from Chesapeake Bay, Charles Butler played
with his buddies and siblings as a child in the mid forties/early fifties. "I
had the space to be adventurous," says Butler. "We called
the rural areas ‘the woods'; now, they call it ‘parks.' We
had plenty of areas to go camping." The pristine wilderness that
surrounded his family home served as motivation for his love of the outdoors
and fostered in Butler an appreciation for the growth opportunities lent
by outdoor adventure. Hours of boyhood fun spent around campfires, investigating
creek beds, and appreciating the night sounds of woodsy evenings outdoors
at camp as a boy scout, all were factors in Butler's choice of
a career in the camp field.
In 1972, Butler began running day camp programs for the Washington,
D.C., Recreation Department, which served inner-city youth from the D.C.
area and children with special needs, including mental impairments and
physical disabilities. "There is such satisfaction in knowing you
are helping children with special needs who don't ordinarily have
opportunities to get outside and play," comments Butler. "I
contributed to the growth of these young children by helping them enjoy
life; these special times are needed sometimes much more than they are
for a child with normal abilities."
Butler remembers taking the inner-city youth on overnight trips and
witnessing the awe in the children who only knew the light and noise
of city life. "We
took the kids to wilderness areas throughout Maryland and Virginia and
gave them opportunities to get involved in the outdoors— to see the
darkness without the glow of city lights, to see the nocturnal animals,
and look up and see the stars. The kids even asked me what the stars were,
because they had never seen them before. I saw how much enjoyment they
got out of these trips, and I realized this is where I needed to concentrate
my career efforts."
Almost a decade later, Butler was asked to sit on a committee to create
a specialized camp for children with cancer and HIV under the auspices
of an organization called Special Love Inc. based in Winchester, Virginia.
One of the goals of the organization was to incorporate camp and the outdoors
into a unique camp program specifically for these special children. Butler
expanded his work with the organization from committee member to recreation
director for the newly formed Camp Fantastic, which celebrated its 25th
anniversary this year. He has been with the camp since its inception, master
minding the recreational programming for the varied camp sessions ranging
from one-week sessions for children with cancer and one-week sessions for
siblings of children with cancer to weekend camps for friends of children
with cancer and young adult camps, serving young adults eighteen or older,
who have completed cancer treatment or are currently undergoing treatment.
"A challenge as Camp Fantastic began was convincing the parents that
the camp was a safe place to go. It was easier to convince the child, but
often the parents believed their children were too frail. They were very
protective. We succeeded in educating the parents and children that camp
is fun, and they could participate safely," says Butler.
Butler is now ending his third year on the American Camp Association
(ACA) National Board and serves as conflict resolution chairperson and
vice president of ACA, Chesapeake. He remains very active as director
of recreation for Camp Fantastic.
 Dawn Ewing
Executive Director, Morry's Camp, White Plains, New
York
We always think it's the big stuff that makes an impact, but at
the end of the day, it's the little things that were important.
A career at camp caught Dawn Ewing by surprise during her freshman year
in college. A call from a friend whose sister directed a 4-H camp and
was in need of a camp counselor was the first step in a lifelong career
working with children in the camp setting. Ewing went to the interview,
accepted the offer, and was hooked. She served as a counselor, outdoor
program director, and CIT director of the camp before leaving to take
a park ranger position in Coral Springs, Florida, for a year. But the
camp calling never waned. Ewing applied at Camp Echo Lake, located in
the Adirondacks. She received a call from Morry Stein, director of the
camp, and the rest is history . . . within four days with a loaded Honda
Civic packed with belongings, Ewing was on the road to New York and the
mountain air of the Adirondacks and Camp Echo Lake. "I think I
didn't know I was going to grow up and work in the camp field.
My family inspired me to give back so I had that idea ingrained in me
from my childhood. I came from a family who gave of themselves and understood
that being part of the world was a privilege," says Ewing.
"I ended up spending the next ten years at Camp Echo Lake as the
associate director. I had the fortune of being around passionate people,
who challenged themselves, and mentors whose values were my values. They
believed in the value of good people. It was a rich environment, and
I was asked to contribute in a wonderful, intense way," explains
Ewing. "I was wrapped around other professionals who believed in
the magic of the camp experience as a place to grow and be challenged."
Morry Stein's dream was to make the camp experience available to
all children. During the week following the departure of Camp Echo Lake's
traditional campers, inner-city children were invited to come to camp.
"The very first summer I volunteered for this program, I was captured
by the ability to give back in a different way to a population of children
that did not have consistency in their young lives."
Morry Stein passed away suddenly and tragically in the fall of 1994.
His passing left a footprint in the camp industry according to Ewing.
"He was a role model. Someone who pushed you so hard but with the idea
that he believed you could do it. He gave people opportunities and believed
in them. Belief is a powerful thing. His dream was to build a camp program
that would be available to all children."
Morry's dream came true with the opening of Morry's Camp
in the summer of 1996. Ewing joined as co-executive director in the fall
of 1997 and became the executive director in the winter of 2000. Morry's
Camp is now entering its twelfth summer. "We are impacting this
wonderful group of at-risk children in a whole new way. We have an opportunity
to help these kids become their best selves. I am overwhelmed when I
see how camp is working, how the kids are contributing to their communities,
and then I realize the kids are doing the work. We aren't just
entertaining the kids; they are learning."
Ewing extended her dedication to the camp experience by serving as vice
president of the American Camp Association National Board from 2004 to
2007. Camp, says Ewing, enables you to see the cause and effect of what
happens when you take care of people. "It's a place where
people believe in you, challenge you, and catch you."
 Phil Lilienthal
Chief Executive Officer, Global Camps Africa
I keep discovering the incredible power of camp. We can change horrible
situations around the world with camp as the vehicle.
You could say Phil Lilienthal took the road less traveled, and it has
made all the difference . . . . As a young college student, Lilienthal
was the head of a major fund-raising event for students at his college.
That fateful evening he was responsible for hosting the guest speaker,
who happened to be James Robinson from Operation Crossroads Africa. "He
was the most compelling, spellbinding speaker I have ever heard," states
Lilienthal. "He was mesmerizing as he explained the broadly cultural
experience of working in Africa among the people there."
Inspired by Robinson and the notion of working and living in a less-developed
country, he joined the Peace Corps in 1965 after law school and traveled
with his wife to Ethiopia. He as a lawyer and his wife as a social worker,
they made residence in Addis Ababa in Ethiopia as Peace Corps volunteers.
Growing up with a camp heritage at Camp Winnebago in Fayette, Maine,
where his father was camp owner, Lilienthal came to Ethiopia with an
instinctual knowledge of camp life, which proved unwittingly to be advantageous
for the new challenge that lay ahead.
At the time, the emperor of Ethiopia Haile Selassie's granddaughter,
a highly educated woman, requested a summer camp be formed for the children
in the area. Lilienthal was the best fit with his extensive camp background.
As a result, the first children's camp in Ethiopia, Camp Langano,
was formed in July 1966 under Lilienthal's guidance. He ran the
camp for two years; the first year the camp served 60 children and 225
children were served the second year. Lilienthal then sought the well-known
YMCA organization to run the camp and maintain its organizational stability.
He trained an Ethiopian YMCA staff person to take over the camp when
he departed. The camp ran successfully for seven years until the emperor
was deposed by a harsh dictatorship, which closed the camp.
Lilienthal continued his service in the Peace Corps in Washington D.C.,
the Philippines, and Thailand, and then home again to take ownership
of the family-owned Camp Winnebago from his father from 1974 to 2003.
Handing the camp ownership to his son, Andy, in 2003, he decided to "throw
his hat over the wall" as Lilienthal aptly describes: "If
you throw your hat over the wall, you have to climb over the wall and
get it. I had to start doing something about my camp idea. The first
hat I threw over meant that I started telling people about starting the
camp. The next hat was in May of 2003; I focused on finding an organizational
partner and the rest carried itself. I went to Kenya, Botswana, and South
Africa. I sent e-mails and inquiries. I found South Africa to be the
most willing and able to move the camp forward."
And so was born Camp Sizanani, which is a Zulu word for "help each
other." The camp stems from the U.S.-based, nonprofit corporation
Global Camps Africa founded by Lilienthal. The corporation's goal
is to provide a camp experience for children affected by HIV/AIDS in
developing countries. According to Global Camps Africa's (WorldCamps)
Web site, Camp Sizanani offers six camp sessions every year for a minimum
of ten days each. Boys' and girls' camps alternate, bringing
together 110 children each time. The children's ages range from
ten to fifteen years old. Global Camps Africa has opened two more camps
in March, Camp God's Golden Acre in the province of KwaZulu Natal,
which has the heaviest HIV infection rate, and another camp for children
from Limpopo Province.
"Winnebago offered a great camp experience every summer, but this
is a step beyond. I didn't feel like I was saving people's
lives there. In South Africa, we are the only game in town. There are
no kids in our group deciding what camp to go to. They are on the street
or at camp. It's only ten days. But, you feel that you are, perhaps,
doing something for these kids that they could never have on their own,"
says Lilienthal. "It is a thrilling, once-in-a-lifetime experience,
and we have a new group each time. It is highly emotional at least six
times every year when camp is in session."
 Lou L Tate
President of Tate School of Discovery and Owner of Tate
Day Camp in Knoxville, Tennessee
We had a camper who refused to speak at school or anywhere
outside the home. The first summer she came to camp, she started to speak.
Camp and the wonderful people you find there can enrich your life.
In 1968, Lou L Tate began pondering. As an elementary and kindergarten
teacher with two little girls at home, she was in a quandary. She needed
to find a quality place for them while she was teaching—but where?
Leaders are often born from taking positive action, and so with big dreams
and a determined heart, Tate decided to start her own school. The Tate
School of Discovery began as kindergarten classes held in three rooms
in Erin Presbyterian Church in Knoxville, Tennessee, where Tate was a
member. "We built an educational wing at the church, but I didn't
have much money. I bought school furniture on credit . . . I remember
the man I purchased the furniture from telling me ‘you look honest' and
without further discussion let me purchase the furniture on terms. In exchange
for providing the furniture, the church let me rent the rooms for free.
My family and I drove around in our station wagon, putting out flyers
about our new school. We started the year with a full house," says
Tate.
Tate built the school on several long-standing principles: to create
a school where children were not only encouraged to learn, but also
to develop a sense of responsibility, self-motivation, and compassion.
The school became known in the area for its high academic standards,
traditional values, and low teacher-pupil ratio. The small school outgrew
its original three rooms and relocated on a scenic fifty-acre farm
nestled among unspoiled wooded areas. Currently, the school caters
to 200 students from preschool to the fifth grade.
The expansive farm location of the school created the perfect setting
for a camp. The inspiration for the camp came fifteen years later after
the establishment of the school. Those same tenets of building the values
of responsibility, self-motivation, and compassion among children spilled
over into the creation of Tate's Day Camp. "Someone came to
me with the idea of starting a small summer camp on the property. I agreed
and began to watch the program. I decided the quality of the program
could be greatly improved. I wanted to run the camp myself. My biggest
help in growing and improving the camp was the American Camp Association
(ACA) conference in Nashville. I met wonderful people and learned so
much," states Tate. "I was so inspired I decided to serve on the ACA,
Heart of the South board."
Many of the children who are students at the school attend the day camp
in the summer. According to Tate, children come from all over the area
of Knoxville and beyond. The camp offers week-long day camp sessions
for ten weeks during the summer. "We encourage everyone to come to two
consecutive sessions to take full advantage of the programs. The campers
come back year after year, as campers, as CITs, and then they are off
to college and come back to be our counselors."
Camp is all about people coming together, says Tate. "You can have
the most beautiful campus, equipment, etc., but it comes down to the
counselors, director, office staff, and campers. It's about relationships
and wonderful people coming together."
 Timothy Wilson
Senior Advisor, Director Emeritus of International Camp,
and Director Emeritus of Center for Coexistence, Seeds of Peace, Otisfield,
Maine
At camp, kids, adults, and camp staff become a community of people with
different religions and ethnicities and they learn to work together.
Dr. Joel Bloom, director of Camp Powhatan, a boys camp in Otisfield,
Maine, saw great potential in the young, twenty-year-old Timothy Wilson,
who came to camp to apply for a counselor position at his Jewish camp
in 1960. "I'm a black American," says Wilson, "and
to be a counselor at a Jewish camp was a little unheard of back then.
But challenging convention was part of who Joel was. He encouraged me
to get to know the camp's head counselor, Lou Grummond, who had
run the camp from the 20s through the 60s. Both of these gentlemen were
great role models for me as a young man. I remember sitting on the porch
in 1962 with Joel and Lou. I was at a crossroads, and we talked about
why camping was so important to a young man. I soaked up the philosophy
of Joel and Lou, which has been a part of my life and which I have shared
with my campers and counselors."
From 1962 to 1965, Wilson joined the Peace Corps in Thailand. By 1966,
Wilson was married and heading back to Maine to teach history and coach
football and wrestling at a local high school. In the summers, he returned
to Camp Powhatan to run the boating and waterfront programs and to eventually
take over the head counselor position from 1968 to 1973. "A myriad
of people inspired me to enter the camp field. I enjoy young people so
it was a natural extension to my career, and I started camping when I
was six years old, attending the original James Welden Johnson Camps
in West Virginia in 1957 as a sixteen-year-old counselor. I was big.
They thought I was a college student," Wilson remembers.
Wilson also recalls attending one of the first integrated counselor
trainings for all camps in the area at Prince George's Forest in Virginia
in 1956. Both white and black counselors convened for training. "We
worked together, and we forgot who we were at the time."
After leaving Camp Powhatan, Wilson had a distinguished career with
appointments by three Maine governors, holding posts as the chair of
the Maine Human Rights Commission, state ombudsman, and associate commissioner
of programming for the Department of Mental Health, Retardation, and
Corrections, as well as director of the State Offices of Community Services
Civil Emergency Preparedness, and Energy. Camp remained a large part
of the heart of Wilson's career.
And twenty years later, in 1993, his camp career came full circle back
to the Maine countryside and back to Camp Powhatan, where the camp was
extending its camp sessions to accommodate a new camp program, Seeds
of Peace. Robert Toll, a former Powhatan camper and a board member of
Seeds of Peace, purchased the camp grounds in 1994 and leased it to Seeds
of Peace International in 1997 where Wilson would have a distinctive
presence as director of the International Camp and of the Seeds of Peace
Center for Coexistence in Jerusalem until retiring in 2006.
From serving forty-six Israeli, Palestinian, and Egyptian teenagers
in 1993 to a leadership network of 3,000 young people from several conflict
regions, Seeds of Peace continues to thrive in its dedication to empowering
young leaders.
"For me, Seeds of Peace is special because the support staff come
from the neighborhood. The kitchen staff are students from the local
high school. It is a camp that supports the surrounding community and
the community supports the camp," says Wilson. "When delegation
leaders visit, they meet the local people and get a sense of the best
of the U.S. Not just the kids but the adults as well have an opportunity
to feel like an integral part of the camp and town community."
Originally published in the 2007 July/August
issue of Camping Magazine. |
