A Place of Love

     When asked to write an article for this blog, I thought it was going to be easy. I was wrong. After four years of working for Shiloh, I feel like there are hundreds of stories I could tell, all of which are meaningful to me, and all of which give a small taste of the many things that Shiloh does for its campers and its staff. And that’s where the difficulty comes in. What story can I tell to sum up what Camp Shiloh has meant to me?
      I’ve settled in on the story of a camper that I had in my cabin in the summer of 2008. I didn’t go into that summer expecting to be a cabin counselor. I had started off filling the position of Youth Counseling Director, but when third session rolled around, a counselor was needed in one of the cabins, so I got to re-enter the world of cabin counselors for a week and a half. This ended up being one of the most challenging sessions I would experience during my four-year stint with Shiloh, but I also had some of my favorite interactions with a camper named Ernesto.
      I’m not sure how many times Ernesto had been to camp, but I know this wasn’t his first year. He was aware of the camp’s expectations for its campers, and he continually made decisions to push the limits with my co-counselor Bradley and I. We had an unusually large cabin that session (10 campers), and there was really no way to keep an eye on every camper throughout the day. By the end of the session, our cabin was at odds with each other, and Ernesto was one of many campers that seemed to always end up at the center of the conflict. I probably broke up more fights within my cabin during that session than I ever had to break up in any other session, and somehow, I always seemed to end up one on one with Ernesto, talking through whatever conflict had taken place that day.
     The conversation that I remember most clearly took place a couple of days before the end of the session. The conflict in our cabin had peaked, and several of our campers had been involved in a situation that almost escalated to punches being thrown. We had to separate the majority of our campers, and I ended up one on one with Ernesto again. We spent the first 15-30 minutes in silence, kicking a soccer ball against a backstop, and just trying to cool down. The frustration from the continual conflict throughout the session had worn on both Ernesto and me, so I really feel like kicking that soccer ball as hard as we could was therapeutic for both of us. But after a time of releasing frustration, and shedding some tears, Ernesto and I shared one of the most meaningful conversations that I experienced in my time at Shiloh. He told me about a sickness that his grandmother (his primary guardian at the time) was experiencing, along with some of the other difficult things that were happening within his family. He told me that he didn’t like being frustrated all the time, and hated reacting out of anger, but that he didn’t know how to react differently. He communicated that he respected me, and that he was sorry for causing conflict in the cabin. And after we had both said, “I love you”, the last comment that I can remember hearing Ernesto say is that he wished he could be more like me.
     Unfortunately, some of the campers, including Ernesto, were sent home from camp early because of the situation that took place that night. I always hated seeing kids leave Shiloh early, but I felt that the conversations that we were able to have had been important. His story came to represent something about Shiloh that has always meant a lot to me. Shiloh is a place of growth. I’ve witnessed it in the campers, and I’ve witnessed it in the staff. You come as you are to Shiloh, and without a second thought, you are loved. I’ve had the opportunity to be on both ends of the spectrum during my time at Shiloh, trying to pour love into those, who like Ernesto, come to Shiloh needing it, and I’ve also received love from the staff and the campers when I probably didn’t deserve it. It’s something that’s hard to understand fully unless you’ve experienced it. But in short, God is love, and if you want to really know God in a deeper way, you should go to Shiloh.  

Tanner Albright 
Shiloh Alumni 2006-2009

Tanner worked at Camp Shiloh from 2006-2009.  He was a Cabin Counselor for his first three summers and served as the Youth Counseling Director his last summer.  He is currently working as the Resident Youth Minister at Central Church of Christ in Amarillo, Texas and volunteers with the Boys and Girls Club of Amarillo.

The Old Blue Bus Goes South

I came to Shiloh in the summer of 1973.  Although coming to work in the year-round program, I came in the middle of the summer, so I worked as a teacher for the two remaining camp sessions.  I fell in love with four boys in one of my classes, and I asked for that age group when I got the East New York area that September. Working in the year-round program and then the summer camp for three years, I had those same boys as fourth, fifth, and sixth graders.

One for my fondest memories is the time we took the kids in our bible class home with us for their Spring Break.  Kimble Forrester took his kids to Nashville, and Kenny Beck, Mary Nell Garner, and I took ours to various cities in Arkansas.  The logistics of the trip were enormous, but we were young and in our first year as year-round workers, and thought nothing of making that trip.  Now, after thirty years of teaching and permission slips, when I think of that trip, I am more than amazed at the trust those parents had in Shiloh.

Kenny Beck and I got our bus drivers licenses to help drive the bus.  That’s another memory of weekends at the Bernardsville camp learning to drive the bus on the back roads, taking the bus to town for dinner, driving to Morristown to take the driving test.

Finally the day came for us to leave and we loaded the Shiloh bus with kids, luggage, and a whole lot of faith and took off.  We drove to Tennessee with stops for gas and food, dropped off the Nashville group, and then headed for Arkansas.  A few days later, we did the trip in reverse.

Somewhere along I-40 there is a sign for Shiloh, a town I suppose.  I have a photo of one of Kimble’s boys in the front of the bus, finding and reading scripture containing the word Shiloh.  We sang, slept, talked, but mostly we laughed all the way there and back.

My boys and I visited all the hot spots in Little Rock, and visited the farm of the parents of my best childhood friend.  Mainly we played: at the big park in town, on my front porch and in my yard.  They were amazed at how big my yard was (actually not all that large), but were also amazed at the fact that the neighbors were never out: sitting on their stoops visiting with each other.  Thirty years later it’s hard to remember all the details of the trip, but I do remember the laughter and fun.

The trip was not without problems.  Twice I had boys to get upset about something and refuse to come with me when it was time to leave.  At the time, I really was in a quandary about how to handle the situation.  However, things worked out both times, and now it’s a story to tell:  “Remember when . . .  wouldn’t get on the bus.”

When the day came to leave Little Rock, my boys put on their new Arkansas shirts, said good-bye to my parents, and got on the bus for the return trip.  Since I kept the bus at my house, we had the longest trip.

When my mom died years later, I found among her possessions a letter written by one my boys thanking her for the great time he had.  I still have the letter and am still in email contact with the boy (man now) who wrote it.

Karyn Blucker

East New York  1973-1976

Karyn Blucker lived in Brooklyn and taught for another year after Shiloh at Risen Christ Lutheran School in East New York.  She later moved to Denton Texas where she taught elementary school until her early retirement two years ago.  

The Very First Summer - 1951

An excited group of sixty college students and a few sponsors came via a Greyhound bus and car caravans to Bernardsville, New Jersey in the early summer of 1951 to the open Camp Shiloh. They stared in awe at the 52 room mansion with a tapestry walled music room and 17 baths—some as large as bedrooms.

As they toured the premises, they were spellbound with its beauty, but heard the cry for cleansing and repair. Exuberant Eddie Grindley shouted with his hearty laugh, urging everyone on with his “we can do it” attitude while handing out buckets of soapy water, hammers and paint brushes.

Noises of hammering, laughter and intermittent wails of pain from smashed fingers echoed across the grounds. Some worked on flooring for tents, others built a kitchen and a dining room in the basement. Still others graciously accepted any chore that called their name. Eddie’s dream awakened into reality.

He’d spent the previous year traveling across the country to raise the money and recruit staff to reach out to the disadvantaged young people of New York City and get them off the streets.
Eddie went to the city in his dilapidated old bus and honked the horn and handed out brochures, offering the street kids an opportunity to get away to the beautiful country-side—away from crime and the hopelessness of street life. They would be transported to a free two week vacation in God’s great outdoors, with an opportunity to play, and learn of a Savior who was willing to die for them.

This gregarious Irishman charmed his followers, arriving with the first bus-load of noisy confusion. They were checked for switch-blades and lice as they got off the bus and assigned to cabins.

I don’t recall any fights the entire summer from these whose life-style had been centered on fighting. Shouts of glee replaced shouts of anger in an atmosphere of peace instead of turmoil.
My husband, Carey Looney, was assigned to go to the farmer’s market several times a week to persuade farmers to either give or sell at greatly reduced prices their left-over produce at the end of the day. Innovative cooks created meals from any and all possible resources.

Bible stories and preaching disclosed how God often chooses the unlikely to accomplish his purposes. Had He not chosen Eddie who was once a drinking, gambling and cheating refugee from Ireland to transform into an example of a beautiful and productive life? Eddie was bent on convincing these youngsters that God also had a plan and purpose for their lives. His legacy lives on.

There were six couples from this group that married as a result of the summer spent together as they shared the common goal of reaching out to unlikely young people. (Carey and I were among those couples.)

Louise Looney
Shiloh Alumni 1951