General Craziness from Karoondinha Staff Alums

Just a little craziness with a few pictures of various Camp Karoondinha Staff Alumni. Enjoy.


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Red Candle - Part Three

The final (or is it?) installment of Dan's Red Candle story.

PART THREE

Part Two of The Red Candle

Here is Part Two of the Red Candle Story; but first --

I remember the morning after the original 'incident'. I did not stay in the cabin. I must have been staying down in the office. I remember Dan and Glenn (Courtney) relating the story of the weirdness going on in the cabin. It was at the bottom of the stairs off the dining hall alcove on the cabin side. It was obvious that they were shaken, but I was (and still am) a bit skeptical. They did have the chart from the weather station. Other than that, everything else is explainable as the product of over-active imaginations. You read the tale. You draw your own conclusions.

PART TWO

The Red Candle - Part One

After a little searching, the Red Candle Story has been found. Many thanks to Dan and Steve. Dan wrote the story. Steve has been archiving it. I placed the story on a seperate page for ease of viewing. Just follow the link and you'll be reading the tale after the jump.

PART ONE

My first computer crash

Sorry . . .

My computer crashed hard this morning.

I have been on the phone with Firedog and am slowly putting things back together.

I'll get back to posting as soon as possible.

Arthur Bernstien

This picture is from 1980. 1980 was the year of the baby blue hat with the yellow K. It was my first year as a staff member. To the right is Arthur Bernstien.

I remember Arthur from my first years as a camper. Arthur worked in the Dining Hall and was LOUD. And in my memory, he was mean. As a camper, I was afraid to take dishes to the dish window. He was this big looming figure in the kitchen who ate campers for lunch.

I was fearful of working at camp when I heard Arthur would be Handicraft Director. Was I surprised when I met him and found out how short he really was. As staff week proceeded, Steve Geist explained to me that Arthur actually stood on a milk crate when he worked behind the dish window.

The staff member on the left is Neil Raup. I do not really remember him that well. I remember that we used to sing 'Raup's Turkey Farm'. I think he was the Trading Post Manager.

The staff member in the middle is Andy English. Andy held many positions over the summers he was at camp. Of the three staff members in the picture, Andy is the only one I have heard from since the early eighties. When I came back to direct camp in the late nineties, Andy sent me some stuff from the FBI. He was an agent for the FBI. I believe he still is.

Any updates on these staff members would be appreciated.

Next Challange

Everyone in the 1989 staff picture has been identified. Thanks to those who helped. Here is the next challenge --

This is from 1981. In 1981 some genius decided that Thunderbird needed to be dug up for renovations. These renovations amounted to nothing more than lumbering out the woods behind Thunderbird. The downside to this was that campfires had to be held on the OA field. The OA field is great for Tap-Out Ceremonies (for those who want to be more politically correct, pretend I typed Call-Out Ceremony) but not so hot for traditional campfires.

The Theme for Cub Scout Camp evolved around the history of the American Indians. This was in the day when we still had Cub DAY Camp. It was an action packed DAY. And DAY Camp was held at the Council Camp; Not off-site.

Jerry Olsen was the Camp Director. The Staff hats were Red and White. It was my second year as a summer camp staff member. It was a veteran kitchen crew. Gary Barrett, Paul Hoffman, and myself were the mung men. Mark Scott was the cook. John Seal was the Steward.

To the picture. I won't even try to get the names down. I'm going to wait for John C. and, hopefully, others to post comments or mail me. I will note that you won't find many of the kitchen crew in the picture. We managed to skip out on many of the Campfires. It was a good summer.

Boy Scout Membership

Those of you who know me will probably know I believe the decision to allow women to serve as Boy Scout Leaders was the beginning of the downward trend in membership for the Boy Scouts of America. Since that decision was made, there have been other policy decisions that , I believe, have weakened the organization even further.

With the internet providing access to the Annual Reports for the National Organization, you can, with some digging, find the numbers. You have to look carefully. Other than 1999, the numbers are buried inside lots of text. Sometimes the numbers are 'more than' type numbers (ie. more than one million). There are discrepancies within reports. The 2005 report states early on that there were in excess of 5 million youth involved in the program. When you add up the numbers given later, even with rounding estimates up, the 5 million is at least half a million to high.

I couldn't find annual reports earlier than 1998 on the boy Scouts site. I did find some citations in other areas. President Richard Nixon accepted a report in 1973 that said there were 6 million Boy Scouts.

From the annual reports, you can see the decline in numbers. In 1998 (using the 1999 annual report) there were 3,383,439 youth involved in scouting. In 2005 it was reported that there were only 2,938,698. That is a drop of 444,741 youth members or a loss of 13 percent.

Specifically, Cub Scouts went from 2,171,987 to 1,745324 in the same period. This is a drop of 426,663 Cubs; a 20 percent drop. Boy Scouts went from 1,023,442 to 943,426; a loss of 80,016 or 8 percent.

People will argue that the total available youth have dropped as well. I will look for specific data, but I doubt that the population of youth in America has dropped as quickly as the number involved in the Boy Scouts.

Demographically, the National Office reports that the program is holding on to Scouts longer than before. This would actually inflate the numbers of Boy Scouts. That is, it means fewer new Boy Scouts are registering than indicated by the 8 percent decrease.

The area of largest growth is in Adult membership. Why? I have a theory, but will save it for later.

I am sure there are many reasons for the decrease in membership. It does not have to do with any one factor. The positive side, there will be room for growth in the future.

Resources --

1998 - Cub Scouts = 2.17 million+; Boy Scouting = more than one million; venturing = 188075; Total = 4757184; from 1998 Annual Report.

1998 - Cub Scouts = 2171987; Boy Scouts = 1023442; Venture = 188010; Total = 3383439; from 1999 Annual Report.

1999 - Cub Scouts = 2181013; Boy Scouts = 1028353; Venture = 202486; Total = 3411853; from 1999 Annual Report.

2001 - Cub Scouts = 2043478; Boy Scouts = 1005592; Venture = 276434; Total (calculated from prior numbers) = 3325504; from 2001 Annual Report.

2002 - Cub Scouts = more than two million; Boy Scouts = more than one million; Venture = 315296; Therefore, total should be more than 3315296 but less than 43315296 (from Membership section of 2002 Annual Report); which does not jive with the "excess of 5 million youth" reported in the opening paragraph of the Letter to the Speaker of the House of Representatives from the same report.

2005 - Cub Scouts = 1745324; Boy Scouts = 943426; Venture = 249948; Total (calculated from prior numbers) = 2938698; from 2005 Annual Report.

Even more Pirates

Not everyone who worked at camp went on to great things - but most did!

Brian 'Sly' Slavinski (I know I probably hosed the spelling) is an engineer for the government, Lance Lyons served in the coast guard and on the Border Patrol, Aaron Golumbfskie (spelling again) is a chemical engineer (?), Chris Herman is a police officer. I do not know what happened to Eric Heberlig (Red Shirt in middle) but I am sure he did not grow up to be a pirate.

Again, any info on where these scouters are or what they are up to can be added to post comments or e-mailed to kurteeck@gmail.com.

Staff member ID'ed

Thanks to James Bartlett. He identified Troy Shade on the Staff Picture!

The Real High Seas Adventurers

Brian Shaffer, John Connolly, and myself are pictured by 'The Rock by the Lake'. All three of us spent time in the navy. Ths picture would have been taken while I was home on leave for my brothers wedding. Brian was involved in fire fighting for the navy (I think). John had served on board the Samual Gompers. I was, at the time, stationed onboard the USS Truxtun.

In July of 2003 the Gompers, also known as Fat Sam, was sunk while being used as a target for naval exercises. The Truxtun was decommissioned in 1995.

I know John is living in the Lancaster area. I am not sure where Shaffer is nowdays.

Many members of the Camp Staff went on to serve their country. I will post more on this later.

Oh Captain my Captain

The Leader of the Royal Fleet (and Camp Program Director) was Dan Daneker. He is with his royal wife (actually Dee Given, the business manager) in this pic. In the background is a young Eric Startzel (If I remember, he was too young to be a staff member).

Dan, like myself, has still not really 'grown up'. I think that may be a characteristic of a great Boy Scout Camp Leader. The leadership and staff have as much fun as the campers; sometimes more. Dan was always 'on' as a Camp Staff member and was a key reason for our success as a Camp Staff.

Dan is married and has two children. He is a science teacher at the Conastoga Middle School in Lancaster County.

On Pirates

In 1990 the theme was "Pirates". We may have had some fancy title, but there was no doubt that we were involved in high seas hi-jinx. How much trouble would we get into if we ran things the way we did - the right way - in the 80's?

Start with the camera angle --



These pictures were taken from the roof of the dining hall. Not only was the photographer on the roof, but I recall that, on occasion, we would set up a hose team on the roof to spray down on the water balloon battle.

And how dare we have a water balloon battle!!! A bird or a turtle might try and eat some of the latex balloons and choke to death. And what about the environmental impact!

And how dare we advocate kidnapping, sword play, and rebellion? What were we thinking?

We were thinking "If I were 10 years old; what would I love to do"?




It is hot in August. Water balloons are cool! Pirates are icons. Everybody knows they are the bad guys. A ten year old knows that you can count on a buried treasure if there are pirates. Buried treasure means maps. Perfect for Cub Scouts and Webelos.

We were Pirates!! Aaarrr!!!

Before Jack Sparrow and the Pirates of the Black Pearl, we were Pirates!


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Susquehanna Council

Camp Karoondinha is the summer camp of the Susquehanna Council.

I thought it would be a good idea to check out the council website. You can too, by clicking the graphic above. I found the site to be mediocre. I don't have real high standards, but I thought the site had a weak navigation, needed to be updated in many areas (Camp particularly, but other areas seem to be stagnate), and was lacking an up-to-date news letter. On the positive side, the council web site did have a current and updateable calender of events and some on-line training resources.

The area I found most interesting was the Order of the Arrow section of the site. It had several pages of informative and historical information. A history of both Camp Karoondinha and Camp Kline are posted. There is information on past Lodge Chiefs, Tiadaghton Lodge, and FAQ's about the Order of the Arrow. If for no other reason, check out this part of the council web site.

Sadly, the histories presented about both camps addresses the physical histories of the camps. When was the camp founded, who donated how much money to build which buildings, etc. are detailed in the histories. This has further encouraged me to work on this blog, for it is not the buildings that make our experiences at camp memorable; it is the Camp Staff.

1989 Camp Staff Photo

Camp Staff from 1989. Thanks to James Bartlett, Dan Daneker, and John Connolly for filling in the gaps in my memory. My memory is not as good as some others (like John C. aka Otter).

First Row (L to R) - Eric Startzel, Brent Criswell, Tim Bowers, Steve Wyant, Sam Stahl, James 'Fly' Rider, Dave Whitnack, and Troy Shade.

Second Row - Dan Daneker, Murray Roberts, Eric Heberlig, Carl 'Butch' Stamm, John Connolly, Mark Reeder, Steve Schreffler, Les 'Cookie' Spencer, Dan Carney, Bob Guttman, Doug Spotts, and Kurt Eck.

Third Row - Mike Whipple, Aaron Golumbfskie, Jamie Wright, Jim Bob Walton, Matt "Chewie" Charnosky, Todd Snyder, Brian Shaffer, Corey Eckrich, Dave Campbell, Jerry Hugar, Jerry Rupert, Casey Popp, Brad Campbell, Jon Wyant, Lance Lyons, and Mike Persing.

I use to be skinny!

One of the disturbing things that has happened to me since I started digging through the old camp memorabilia is recognizing how fat I am now. Or, more politely, I used to be skinny!

I have noticed that the reports on the news are correct -- at least in the micro-cosm of Boy Scout Camp. We are getting fatter. I don't mean fatter as we get older. I mean, the kids in the pictures from the nineties are bigger than those in the eighties. At least it looks that way. As more pictures get posted, you will be able to decide for yourself.

Paul Snook (in the middle) was my sumer camp 'dad'. Alan Franz (on the left) was the Order of the Arrow Quartermaster. This picture was taken at the National Jamboree. I could use some help with the date. I could also use an update on Alan. I know he did a 'globe trek' a few years ago. Any leads on Alan?

Camp K Staff 1989

Camp K Staff
Originally uploaded by kurteeck.

I put the picture on 'flickr' with tags. I tried to get everyones names. There are still a few people whose names I could not remember. Help out if you can.

Getting Started

A while ago - the beggining of December - I received an e-mail from Jon Sawicki (aka Father Jon). He had apparently done a search on the web (Googled 'camp k'?) and found a hit for a post on my blog 'ECKSCLAMATIONS'.

I was immediately excited becuase it meant someone besides my mom had looked at my Blog. Then, as I thought about it over the Holidays, I realised that there might be an audiance for posts about my camp experiences. Others have attempted to create camp web sites (The KSA comes to mind) and they do not seem to have staying power. Maybe they needed to be simpler or more accessible. I do not know.

It seems like it might be time to start a site for posting pictures and stories from my experiences at Camp Karoondinha, Camp Kline, and other Scouting events. I hope that I can actually start to develop a routine group of viewers and contributors. It would be nice to know that the effort is being put to some use other than exercising my limited computer skills. I'd like to share as well. Hopefully others will contribute.

Many of us who have had experiences as staff members have gone on to accomplish great things. I would also like to spotlight individuals periodically.

So, here it is. An attempt at a blog about growing up a Boy Scout.