September 24, 2015
Dear Friends,
Hello from Camp Hagan, Shawnee-on-Delaware, Pennsylvania – an all-girls “camp with character,” spanning the years 1937 to 1970, owned and administered by the Lutheran Ministerium of Pennsylvania. With much gratitude for our time together as campers and staff, and with deep reverence for the land on which these stories were birthed, a group of us, ranging in age from our 60’s to our 80’s, have preserved here our Hagan childhood memories and experiences that in many ways helped to shape our values and beliefs, and the people we have become. Friendships that were born at Camp Hagan long ago continue some 50 years later. The stories and photographs in this time capsule represent and serve as windows into our most authentic selves.
During our years at Camp Hagan, the print of newspapers focused on major political, religious, and social paradigm shifts. World War II, The Cold War, Apollo 11’s Walk on the Moon, the Vietnam Conflict, the assassination of President John Kennedy, Vatican II, birth control, the Civil Rights Movement, the Women’s Movement and the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. were just a few signs of the times.
Yet during those very same years at this Lutheran Church summer camp, banked between a river and mountains, dotted by tall pine trees and an altar in the woods, our Hagan world was happily and visibly simpler. Our open-air wood cabins, housing twelve girls and a counselor, were lit by candles, not electricity. We all learned the language of bugle calls that signaled our meals, our play, and our rest. We participated in morning flag raising and evening Vespers, beginning our day with focus, nearing the end of our day with quiet. At night when we walked back to our cabins from evening entertainment, we would be transfixed by shooting stars, and later fall asleep listening to a summer rain against our shutters.
Hagan was a liberal arts camp that made room for the differences among us. The brown uniforms that we all wore helped to neutralize our backgrounds and home lives, our family incomes and religious leanings. Girls were given daily structured classes and opportunities through departmental specialties:
- Developing each-to-her-own creative potential through Arts and Crafts;
- Gaining self-confidence by creating sets, writing plays, or performing on stage during evening Entertainment;
- Building a sense of fair play while working as a competitive team through Athletics;
- Learning to tie knots, build a fire, and use an axe and knife safely through Pioneering;
- Taking swimming lessons from beginners level through Life Saving Certification in Aquatics;
- Navigating the currents of the Delaware River by rowing flat bottom wooden boats, and paddling canvas covered canoes nearby and on longer trips in Boating and Canoeing;
- Identifying trees and leaves, birds and snakes, all suddenly transformed from the so called common and ordinary scenery of the outdoor environment into deep moments of recognition, perhaps revelations of sorts, of the interdependence of life through Nature; and,
- Participating in daily devotions and chapel services, connecting us to something larger than our individual selves, as we were free to catch glimpses of new truths in the silences, in the listening, in the waiting, in the lives of others, and in our meeting through Religion.
Camp Hagan was a place of formation. Girls learned how to be courageous; girls learned how to give comfort; girls set in motion moments of innocent fun; girls became introspective during times of silence; and girls sang songs at meals, on hikes, and at campfires, in harmony. Girls were free to do and be their best. Inspired by others to have confidence in themselves, girls were nurtured by older campers and counselors. The give and take of listening conferred respect, and respect earned trust. At Hagan, listening and respect and trust underscored the power of conversations, creating bonds of lasting friendship.
As campers and staff, we were all in our own ways on a journey of leaving home, and in the presence and support of community, to come to more fully realize our abilities and limitations, and the power of self-determination. For some, Hagan was quite literally a refuge, for others a playground, still others a testing ground. The river, the mountains, the playing fields, the cabins, and the chapel became imprinted on each one of us. We were raised and raised up by this place and its landscapes. We were also nurtured by others – some campers, some staff, some younger, some older. But above all else, we were caring companions, in relationship to one another, often seeing something of ourselves in our sisters, even beyond the reach of circumstance.
Protected by this beautiful and sacred land, and with deep respect and reverence for the Lenni Lenape whose home this was, we commended this Hagan Time Capsule to its care. Now it is in your hands. In remembrance of a time gone by, take our words and photographs into your world as an affirmation of what can transpire when young girls are placed in an environment of friendship, learning support, the natural world, and an intrinsic understanding that God exists in all things.
Through our shared camp experiences we discovered for ourselves new truths in the light of a candle’s flame, in the melody of an old familiar hymn, in our faces, and in the silence and sanctuary of the outdoor chapel. Through the lens of our adult perspective, we leave you these stories, trusting that our legacies may inspire future generations to reflect upon their own memories and moments of mystery.
With Hagan love, “this is goodnight and not goodbye.”