The Council Room

[Pat Freeland]

First of all, my publicly expressed regrets at not being a more frequent visitor of this site, which is really a treasure. I am proud of MHF, I call him Michael (the whole family did), everyone else knows him as Mike. Anyway the site is well engineered and a great tunnel back through time to our days in the sun.

I was reminiscing recently about how, before Christmas, my thoughts of camp were of the previous season, then suddenly, after the holidays were over, I thought of the upcoming season with eager anticipation.

There are two exceptions, in 1955 I had no previous seasons to ponder, so I spent most of my time in dread of what was to come. Packing my trunk was drudgery, thinking of leaving was heartbreaking. When the dread day arrived I was packed aboard a train with Pop Henderson in Paoli, Pa and off we chugged. I decided that I would climb into my pullman bunk when we left Grand Central Depot and have a good cry. After the swirl of the depot with some redcap saying Winnie-okie, we boarded the sleeper and Pop boomed out "Freeland, upper two". I stumbled through the other kids and climbed up - already beginning to tear up. To my utter chagrin someone was already in the bunk. His name - Garret Vreeland, his attitude - hardly conducive to my keeping a stiff upper lip (though I did). It turned out that it was MY bunk and off he went. Strangely I don't remember whether I had my cry or not.

I spent all of 1955 terminally homesick. I even missed my little brother. Dick Seal was my councilor and was probably a decent guy but we weren't exactly buddies. To be honest, I recovered from my mal de maison about two days before the end of camp. I returned the following summer a mite reluctant, but had a decent four week stay despite a broken pinky. Mr. Scheirer and the J-7 crew made it more pleasant than the previous year and after I left I really missed camp. I skipped 1957 (fishing in Colorado) and then had an ethereally happy 1958 in Sloc's S-1 as an aide. From there it was clear sailing.

The only other time the mid-year turn of vision didn't occur, of course, was after the November 1975 letter written in black instead of blue, when the closing of camp was announced. I often wonder what the farewell banquet would have been like in '75 if we had known.

That knobby-kneed, immature varmint with a Pa Dutch accent went on to many happy summers as head councilor, campfire guy, head of the waterfront etc. Now after all those years I am a knobby-kneed immature varmint in Pennsylvania, but with a beard, balding pate and without the Dutch accent.
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Living with wife Vicki happily retired after we moved back to Cornwall, Pa.

[Jim Culleton]

Great write up on your first year at Wyanoke! Larry's and my first year was '56 and yes the homesickness hit me too which lasted most of the summer. But it did get easier as the weeks passed and as we settled in. Sleeping in a tent for 8 weeks was an experience in and of itself, as was swimming totally in the nude with the other kids

I do remember my first meal in the main dining hall with Jimmy Moulton as councilor. It was tough fighting back the homesickness tears as John Heald, who was sitting next to me, was trying to do the same thing. We couldn't look at each other for fear of starting a deluge! We certainly didn't want to appear "weak" in front of the others so we kept a stiff upper lip as best as possible! To this day I remember the circular, blue and yellow tables that the Jrs. and Srs. sat at as a tent. For some reason I was not too wild about the color scheme chosen for those tables.

Thankfully I never dropped a tray on the way back from the "slide", but certainly remember the round of applause that erupted when a poor soul did drop one of those oblong stainless steel trays!

Such great memories!
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'56 - J-9 J. Moulton
'57 - J-11 J. Moulton
'58 - J-4 E. Web Dann, S. Hood
'59 - S-6 P. Leavitt
'60 - S-2 F. Avantaggio
'61 - JA-1 RK Irons
'62 - C-9 JC with P. Freeland
'63 - C-1 JC with S. Borger
'64 - C-6 Councilor

[Bob Kennington]