Mt. Moosilauke (1935) - Summer Camps
". . . With this kind of traffic we squeezed the buildings and grounds work into our schedule whenever we could. Whenevers were scarce between the middle of July and late August. That was the high season for the boys' and girls' camps. They came up in groups of ten to thirty with or without reservations. When the weather was unusually good we could never be sure how many we might be having for dinner. Whoever was assistant cook would keep a tight watch on the summit ridge for unexpected parties. Sometimes less than an hour before serving time a figure would appear on the hump in the ridge which was called, with considerable exaggeration, the Middle Peak. Then another and another and another.
"Goofers on the ridge." (Goofers were anyone on the trails who were not hutmen.) "How many?" "Seven . . . twelve . . . sixteen. Put another gallon of water and more potatoes in the stew." "Girls or boys?" "Girls." There were compensations. Besides the important elementary fact of being girls, girls were better to have around than
boys because girls would set the tables, help clear them, help with the dishwashing and dish drying. Then we had time to hang around and be admired. We were good at this. (Women readers please note: this was in the dark ages before the enlightenment.)
Dishwashing and singing were inseparable. You could reckon the number of people we fed by the number of songs it took to do the dishes. With a full house and a responsive group of helpers we could get through a dozen songs with all the regular verses plus some improvised as we went along. By the end of a season the house was programmed with the vibrations of Casey Jones, Frankie and Johnny, The Blue Tail Fly, Bell Bottom Trousers, The Foggy Foggy Dew, Landlord Fill the Flowing Bowl, I Ain't Gonna Grieve My Lord No More, Muss I' Denn, Alouette, and, of course, Clementine.
As we warmed up in volume, if not in quality, other guests wandered in until the kitchen was sometimes so crowded it was difficult to move around. The camps had their songs, too. Some were clever and imaginative with familiar tunes so we could join in, using gibberish for words. Every group had its official camp song which they always had tosing. They were a total disaster for outsiders. They had different words but they all carried the same message: Camp Soo-Purr is the greatest, comeback next year and bring two friends. . . ."
From "A Home on a Hill" by Landon G. Rockwell, pp. 268-305, The Moosilaukee Reader (Vol.1). ©1999.
