As and extrovert, Kathy Krohn (1965-68) always made friends easily and despite knowing some of the girls from school, she loved meeting new ones. The assistant director at the time, “Beanie”, used to call her “Itty Bitty Wee One” after the story about Montague the Rabbit she always told the campers and because Kathy was such a tiny girl.
Upon returning from camp one summer, Kathy told that story to her father. It was a story that Beanie would tell all the campers, but Kathy was too young to understand the moral of the story—“Hare today, gone tomorrow”. Her father would laugh and laugh and it would become their private little bonding connection.
“He would say to me, here comes itty bitty baby rabbit,” said Kathy, “and it was not until I was about fifty years old that I finally understood what the moral of the story was. He passed away, but until the end he always brough up Montague the Rabbit.”
Valerie Monto had an experience in 1968 that remains clear in her camping memory– the magic of one special night. “One evening, after lights out, our counselor had us get up and get dressed. We walked quietly to the lodge where the other older campers and counselors were gathered. We were divided into small groups and were given a nursery book rhyme or storybook assignment.”
“Two other campers and myself were given “Three Blind Mice”. We put together costumes from what was available and rehearsed. Our groups were then placed around the camp along the trails. The younger campers were awakened and led through the camp. As they would come to one our groups, the counselor would shine flashlights at us and we would perform our act. Once they had been taken through the camp, the younger campers were sent back to bed and we returned to the lodge to clean up before returning to our cabins.”
“The next morning at breakfast the younger campers were very excited and would approach us older girls saying, “I saw you last night. You were one of the Three Blind Mice, or you were Little Bo Peep,” or whatever . We older girls acted like we didn’t know what they were talking about and told them they had been dreaming. To this day, I wonder if those little girls are still unsure about their own experience.”
Do you remember any of the night-time performances?
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