When Huron Church Camp was at Kintail…
About 1939, John and Connie Graham were using a cottage on Lake Huron. As they strolled along the beach at Camp Kintail, they heard ‘covenanter’ singing coming from the camp. Curious, they went to the singing and were warmly welcomed by the Presbyterian staff.
They discovered that the camp was not used full-time, and a plot was hatched to have an Anglican camp in the vacant time. It was named Huron Church Camp from the onset, and staff contained many notables. Derwyn Jones was a cabin leader. Terry Findlay Sr. brought his toddler son, the future Metropolitan of Ontario. Bishop Todd Townshend remembers a photo that contained his grandfather’s picture.
Rev. William Craven
Happy even when crying…
Camp Huron in 1958
I was 11 years old in 1957 when I first went to Huron Church Camp. My friend Marnie and I were put on a Greyhound bus in London, ON with instructions for the driver to let us off on the highway at the road leading into the camp.
I had never been away from home overnight before except to my Grandparents home in the same city and to Marnie’s, so this was a great adventure. Fortunately there was a camp counsellor also on the bus and we were met at the end of the road to the camp. I remember the amazing idea that a church service could be held outside, sitting in the sand with the sun shining through the trees or that the minister would sit and talk to us as a friend and not just someone who stood behind a pulpit on Sunday mornings. We learned the “buddy system” when in the water, how to read a compass, hiked in the woods, and sang songs around the campfire at night. I made my first of many woven plastic friendship bracelets. Who could forget the drinking water with the taste of sulphur!
I can’t remember my cabin counsellor’s name but will never forget her kindness as she sat and talked to me while I cried many tears from homesickness. Homesick or not, HCC was such a wonderful experience that both Marnie and I went back in succeeding years. Even now whenever we get together we still laugh and talk over memories of that summer.
Diane Williamson