Camp Nebagamon

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The Arrowhead

Camp Nebagamon's Monthly Newsletter

Volume XCIII

Number 6

June 2021

Return to Our New Style

Please Remember to Complete Your Camper Forms!

With camp just around the corner, our office has been busy checking in forms and getting ready for the first round of campers to arrive on June 21st. Regardless of which session your child is attending at camp, please submit his required paperwork if you have not already done so.

Please make sure the following items are completed as soon as possible:

  • Cabin Preference Form: We need this information within the next few days in order to work on cabin placement before the season begins.
  • Health History Form: Parents, make sure to complete all sections of this form (including medications and vaccination records) so that we are able to accurately understand your camper’s health history and prepare for his arrival. If your child needs prescription medications, please place your order with CampMeds, Inc. at www.campmeds.com. The ordering deadline is 30 days prior to your son’s arrival at camp.
  • Physician’s Examination Form: We need paperwork showing that your son has received a physical exam within the past 12 months. You may download our physician’s examination form for your child’s doctor to complete or submit a copy of similar documentation from the doctor’s office. Please note that any immunization records provided by your doctor should also be entered in your son’s online health history form by you.
  • Medical Treatment Authorization Form: This form must be signed by a parent/guardian prior to camper arrivals. A copy of his health insurance card should also be attached.
  • Objectives & Personality Form: This information helps our counselors prepare to guide your son towards completing a happy and productive summer. You may also email a more detailed letter to his counselors at [email protected].

Last, but not least, when you have logged in to the camper forms system, make sure YOUR contact information is up-to-date and that you have listed two emergency contacts besides a parent/guardian. You may do so by clicking on “Update Addresses/Phone Numbers” under the Your Family section.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION REGARDING CAMPER LUGGAGE AND TRAVEL

LUGGAGE TAGS:

These should be firmly attached to every bag a camper brings with him, whether it is being checked in, carried on an airplane, or taken on the Chicago bus. This applies to everyone, regardless of airline or travel arrangements to camp. It is important that we, and airline personnel, are able to identify all baggage by the yellow Camp Nebagamon tags.

DUFFEL BAGS/LUGGAGE:

ALL Airlines: Please pre-pay baggage fees for your son’s return flight. This has changed from recent years and now includes Delta Airlines. (Please note that if for some reason the airline does not allow you to pre-pay, we will pay the fees on the return trip and charge your son’s spending money account.)

If you need to ship bags to camp, please notify Briggs ahead of time and send them at least one week prior to your son’s arrival at camp. Camp’s physical address (needed for any UPS/FedEx deliveries) is 11454 Camp Nebagamon Dr, Lake Nebagamon, WI 54849. Please note that if you also want the luggage shipped home at the end of the camp season, it is simplest for our office (and our local UPS & FedEx drivers) if you can mail to Briggs’s attention at camp ([email protected]) completed FedEx/UPS tags or forms. (Please note that due to limited storage space at camp, and our arrangement with the MSP airport, we do urge you to check bags on the trip home if possible, especially on Delta Airlines.)

CAMPERS TRAVELING VIA AIRPLANE:

If you are booking your tickets through our travel agent, Travel One, any questions about airline tickets should be directed to Travel One at 800-245-1111. Please ask for Sonni Banks. Travel One issues electronic tickets for each camper, so do not worry about receiving a paper ticket for your child. If you are arranging travel independently, please submit the information via the online transportation form.

Returning To Camp

By Adam Kaplan

Josie (my daughter) and I finished our drive from Boise to Nebagamon yesterday afternoon. After two very long days it felt great to finally get here. This was a bit of an unusual year in terms of my arrival at camp for the summer. I had arrived here on May 11th for the first time, and spent two weeks with just the other full time staff…but I had to head back home last week for my son, Ben’s, high school graduation. Consequently, when Josie and I arrived yesterday, camp had already seen the arrival of the entire pre-camp crew, and its population had swollen to over 30. I was a bit nervous about it as I am usually the one to greet folks upon arrival, and I like the rhythm of gradually adding a few people to the group every day for a few days. This time, I would be the one walking in to an already established group. Very unusual for me.

But here is the thing; it didn’t feel unusual at all. I was absolutely amazed at how normal it felt here. When we arrived, people were out and about working and engaged in all of the normal tasks that have been undertaken for 92 pre-camps since 1929.

It was perhaps the most comforting moment I have had in the past 16 months. Normalcy…

I don’t even have words to describe how incredible it felt…and feels.

Camp is upon us. It will be perhaps the most important summer here ever as our entire camp community needs camp so badly. We all need a return to normal.

So…I have nothing particularly profound to share with you today…I am just grateful.

I am grateful for our full-time staff. For Louis Levin, Adam Fornear, Joe Briggs, Andy Mack, and Joe Crain. They have undertaken herculean efforts to bring us to this day. They have planned, re-planned, re-re-planned, built, re-built, re-re-built. All with the goal of getting us all back together up here. They have been amazing.

I am grateful for all the staff that have signed on to work at camp this summer. They signed on knowing that there would be some new and challenging aspects to this summer. But they signed on knowing that whatever differences may exist, just being up here would be the panacea for all of the turbulence they have endured. They signed on to work in hope of normalcy, and with the desire to gift normalcy to our campers.

I am grateful to our parents. In a time as tempestuous, and, frankly, frightening as what we have all been through, to still have it in them to trust us with their favorite things in the world is among the most humbling things that I have ever experienced. But, if I am being honest, I am always incredibly humbled by parents’ trust…every year. It’s a normal feeling…

Finally, I am grateful to those kids. Those amazing kids that are headed up here in just under three weeks to spend four or eight weeks running, laughing, playing, singing, struggling, achieving, triumphing, failing and having just plain unabashed fun. All of the facets of a normal childhood…

Now, of course, I know that some things here will not be the same as they have always been (i.e. added COVID safety protocols). There will certainly be some differences. But after my arrival here yesterday, and the feeling of normalcy that instantly calmed and sated me despite some new protocols, I have all the confidence in the world that the summer of 2021 is going to be an incredible one because, this summer, normal feels incredible!

Run the Dragin’ Tail 5 Mile This Summer!

Fornear finishing up a job with the LNVFD in his superhero suit ?

Great News!!! The Lake Nebagamon Volunteer Fire Department’s Dragin’ Tail Run/Walk returns this summer! Every season for many years running (ha!) our staff and campers take to the starting line of the fun run in downtown Lake Nebagamon. It’s a hoot to run in, and even cooler to participate in a big event in our community. Fornear knows first hand that the monies raised from this great race get used for equipment at the fire department, as he’s been on the volunteer fire department for the past 15 years. It’s a wonderful cause that we love supporting

This year, the LNVFD is adding a virtual option for the Dragin’ Tail Run/Walk. We will be running the race on the camp property this summer and we would encourage any and all parents and alumni to join us on July 3rd! To top it all off, if you register for the run, the fire department will send you a race bib and a 2021 race shirt (the sweet one with the dragon on it!). Over the years, the Dragin’ Tail shirt has become in a way the unofficial Camp Nebagamon t-shirt.

Campers who want to participate will signup at camp, and all camp parents or alumni who want to join in the race can sign up at the link here.

We hope you join us in running the Dragin’ Tail this year, and support an awesome organization! Thanks for signing up!

Support a great cause and get a sweet shirt, like this one from 1998!

News of the Camp Family — June 2021

Compiled by Adam Fornear

Last month I floated the Brule River with a buddy from Duluth, and brought along the fishing gear. The mission was to catch at least one steelhead trout…that’s all…just one. I met my buddy Scott at the landing on a late Saturday afternoon, we both agreed that we would probably be getting off the water in the dark and we were both cool with that. After loading up the 17’ Old Town Penobscot (a classic wilderness river canoe) with three fly rods, tackle bags, and an extra lifejacket, we began searching for the best runs to hunt down some steelhead. For the next two hours we would jump mergansers, bufflehead, mallards and wood ducks. So sweet.

The routine was simple. Find a deep run with a definable seam of current butted up against some flat stagnant water. Get out of the boat, drift some flies through the run and push down stream. It was a beautiful evening to be on the water (let’s be honest though, it’s always great to be on the water). Three hours later we finally came across some juicy looking steelhead water. We parked the canoe, drifted some flies and soon thereafter Scott hooked up with a nice steelhead! The battle was on. The steely ran up stream, downstream and across the river. The rod was doubled over and the drag was screaming at times. I’m pretty sure that if you were outside that day, at that moment you probably heard the two of us hootin’ and hollerin’…It was awesome! Finally, Scott was able to land the fish, grabbed one photo and quickly released him back into the river.

Fornear’s got flow like the Brule after a heavy rain! Nice Fish!

The sun was getting real low in the sky and we’re still hootin’ and hollerin’, so we thought we should keep on pushing downstream. There we were, paddling pretty fast through some good current, laughing and happy as can be that we landed a steely when all of a sudden, the canoe comes to an abrupt stop and actually pushes back up stream! We both fell to the floor of the canoe, Scott yells “I dropped my paddle!” and I respond with, “I did too!” There we were in some moving water and our only two paddles were drifting downstream faster than the boat. We immediately start paddling with our hands, still laughing hysterically, trying to catch those paddles. Finally, we caught one paddle and then the next, and then we started to tell each other what happened in between catching our breath from laughing so hard. So, somehow, we slammed directly into a rock in the middle of the river putting a huge dent in the canoe. The funny thing was, I had three extra paddles in my truck. We both always paddle with extra paddles. That’s what you do. Not to brag but we are both accomplished paddlers, Scott is one of those guys who goes over waterfalls in kayaks and I’m a trip director for a pretty sweet camp. We always bring extra paddles…. And this night we didn’t. But next time and every time after, we will always have an extra.

While a tad bit embarrassing, I wouldn’t change a thing about paddling the Brule that night. It was a beautiful fish; the perfect rock and belly laughs that could be heard around the world. Like I said earlier, it’s always great to get out on the water.

Even though The Arrowhead is going into hibernation for the next three months, please keep on sending any news of the camp family. Thank you for your contributions, and I look forward to sharing updates with you after the summer. Summer’s coming…See you soon!

IT MAY INTEREST YOU TO KNOW Manny Ruiz (New York) is playing baseball for two different teams this spring. Pitching for one and shortstop for the other.

CONGRATULATIONS ON THE RECENT ENGAGEMENTS go to Nicky Laskin (L.A.’99-’03,’05-‘09) and Lindsay Theirl (L.A.).

WEDDING CONGRATULATIONS go to Max Sapiro (Denver/Park City ’02-’07,’09-‘12) and Heather Cook (Park City).

Mailgabber — A Pre-Camp Perspective

The Mailgabber features writing by members of the Camp Family. This month, we present a look in on the past week of Pre-Camp by trip staff member Jonah Domsky. Interested in submitting for Mailgabber? Send submissions to Louis.

Pre-camp is undoubtedly one of the most special parts of any summer camp. It may be filled with hard and exhausting work, but also amazing moments of connection and reconnection with the people and place around you. This is particularly true this year as the pandemic derailed the summer routine of coming to camp that so many of us cherish. But after spending just six days at camp I am happy to say that while there are of course some things that are different this year, all of the important stuff is the same.

Ordinarily, during pre-camp, we have our meals gathered closely around the Big House table, while this summer we have had our meals spread out in small, socially distanced groups. Despite the physical separation, our pre-camp crew is getting as close as ever taking turns warming up by the fireplace in the mornings after several sub-freezing nights, recounting stories of past summers, and of course, sharing a lot of laughs.

Usually, the first days of pre-camp are spent transforming the waterfront from mounds of docks and boats scattered across the beach into the completed H-dock and rigged sailboats ready for a summer of project periods and G-swims. All of that (except for a new canoeing dock) had to be delayed due to the aforementioned sub-freezing temperatures. Instead of setting up the waterfront, the pre-camp crew got to work sanding and sealing countless new picnic tables ready for outdoor meals. We have also filled our days cleaning cabins and push shacks, hanging whirly-gigs on the hill, and preparing the Council Fire Ring.

Also, while pre-camp is often filled with people who have spent countless summers at camp (this is my thirteenth!) many of our crew this year are here for their first summer at Nebagamon. That includes several new staff from Mexico who, as you can probably imagine, have been less than thrilled about the weather but have happily partaken in watching the sunset on Lorber point and enjoying their first s’mores around the fire. Those of us who are returning to camp have enjoyed showing the new staff around and teaching them many of our camp traditions.

And of course, that includes walking into town for Dairy Queen on opening night. The many blizzards and minimal shivering were a clear success and a satisfying reward after a long day of hard work.

The million little tasks in every corner of camp that fill this short time of pre-camp often distract from how truly special it is to be here. After several years of traveling back and forth between college in Los Angeles and home in Chicago, plus a year of pandemic-induced uncertainty, it is hard to beat being back at camp for the summer. In just a few short weeks campers will arrive, trips will head out, and camp will be in full swing. I think I speak for all of us here at pre-camp when I say that I can’t wait.

Briggs’s Nature Cam — June 2021

By Joe Briggs

We’ve been at camp for a few weeks now, and I’ve had the game camera set up across camp this spring! You can see some lovely shots of deer, foxes, and most impressively, a beaver that have made their way through camp. This year, I’ll keep the game camera running, and I’ll try not to catch too many campers out in the woods. Keep your eye open for an update at the end of the summer!

Caretaker Joe’s Extended Winter Revue

By Joe Crain

As we put camp to bed for the 2019-2020 off-season, I couldn’t have imagined in my wildest fantasies that it wouldn’t be until June 2021 that there would be campers back at camp. We spent the fall of 2019 filled with memories of how great the summer season went and started thinking about what we would be doing during the upcoming off season to address the things that needed attention before the summer of 2020. As I always do each fall, I had started making plans and lists in my head and on paper of the things I saw while putting camp to bed that needed attention or repair over the winter months. Additionally, I started going over the ever-running list I keep in my head of the Wan-a-Dos that I think would add some fun and whimsy to the camp grounds if I could just find the time to do them. On that mental list, I keep things like new trails I want to add or whirly gigs I have had visions of in my head, as well as bigger projects we have talked about but never quite seem to find the time to get to.

As the 2019-2020 off season got under way and we began work on the Have-to-Do list, a couple of my Wan-a-Dos started to nag at me and force themselves to the top of my list. One of these projects was a whirly gig that I had envisioned for years of a large fish chasing a school of smaller fish. Another of these fantasy projects that really started to nag at me was of a trail that I had planned in my head that would snake through the woods from the Range to Lorber point. The goal was to have the trail wind its way through the original Weyerhaeuser mill foundations that are still sitting out in that part of the camp’s grounds. That fantasy project was a big one and would take some major time, and so I had only gotten as far as naming it and making the entry signs. The name I had come up with for the trail was “Mill Ruins” and a few years back when I was routing other signs for the trails I had completed, I made and painted these signs as well. I put them on a shop windowsill, waiting for the off season that I would be able to scratch out enough time to get the trail flagged and cut through the woods.

As we started to hear about the first waves of COVID hitting Seattle and New York in January of 2020 we still had no clue of what was coming. All our planning and time management was aiming at the summer of 2020 season and I had decided that if this fish whirly gig was going to ever actually be seen by more than just me in my head, I had better go for it before the season of 2020 Have-to-Dos swallow up all of our time. After having a quick reality check with head caretaker Andy Mack, and concluding that yes indeed there was time to get this “school of pursued fish” chase scene out of my head and into the real world, I went to work on it. I kept the project just between him and me thinking it would be a great surprise at the start of the season of 2020. I finished it up and, if I do say so myself it turned out great, I couldn’t wait for the big reveal at the start of the summer of 2020. Well things started to get serious with COVID for us here in March, the essential workers only orders came to us in Wisconsin and the Midwest. As Caretakers, we perform maintenance and maintenance was deemed essential, so we were able to keep working. The office crew was all working remotely from their respective homes already so they kept chugging toward the 2020 season as well. In order to follow distancing guidelines, we agreed that it was a good time for me to work on a long-term project I had started some years before, and got to work putting new screens in camper cabins. Caretaker Andy stayed working in the shop on the projects we had collected for winter work that off season. At this point we started having weekly group phone meetings about what was going to happen for the upcoming season and if there was going to be a season! I started to replace every screen in Lumberjack-1, and with the growing uncertainty about what was going to be possible with the season moved on to Lumberjack-2. Well, you know how the rest of this story goes, and at about Lumberjack 4 (Weyerhaeuser), it was clear I’d have enough time to re-screen the rest of the LJ village — 7 cabins in total.

As for my sweet fish whirly gig, I had a small reveal for the skeleton crew that was at camp for the season of 2020. Well as you can imagine the work list quickly went from have-to-dos to Wan-a-Dos, most of which I wrote about in the summer 2020 Arrowheads At Camp. These “silver lining” projects, as I came to call them, included the new mountain biking skills track down by the bike shack, tons of rail road tie replacement throughout camp, as well as a few deferred maintenance projects throughout the grounds. Well, with so much time spent on so many projects through the “summer season that wasn’t,” I decided there was time to flag and cut the “Mill Ruins” trail. Though I had to work through a few much-too-early snows last fall, I was able to rough in the trail. The snow kept me from doing the stumping that’s needed to smooth the track, it is a sweet windy trail through the old mill sites foundations and remaining wall chunks. It is a great addition to the Camp Nebagamon Bike Trail (CNBT), and brings us to a nice, round number: a total of four miles of trails all through camp.

Well mass vaccination has COVID on the ropes, the pre-camp crew is working hard to get things ready for the summer, and we here on the grounds are so excited for the 2021 season to get started!!

Excited to hear the reviews of the new waterfront “school of pursued fish” whirligig, it’s Caretaker Joe At Camp.

The largest foundation on the Mill Ruins trail

Meet the 2021 Nebagamon Staff

What a year of hiring staff for the 2021 summer. Saying that we are proud of our 2021 staff lineup would be an understatement! Many of them have a wealth of experience working with kids and everyone is excited to continue the tradition of counseling amongst the tall pines! Their experiences vary from playing competitive futbol to creating amazing ceramic artwork. Whether they are from California, Memphis, River Falls, WI, or Puebla, Mexico, they all have one common goal: to create an amazing experience for the 320 campers coming to camp this summer!

(* denotes a new staff member)

ADMINISTRATIVE STAFF AND PROGRAM SPECIALISTS: Adam Kaplan (Director), Stephanie Hanson (Director), Joe Briggs (Associate Director/Office Manager), Adam Fornear (Associate Director/Wilderness Trip Director), David Sachs & Jason Yale (Swamper Village Directors), Alex Gordon (Logger Village Director), Larry Rivkin & Andy Cohen (Axeman Village Directors), Noah Stein (Lumberjack Village Director), Louis Levin (Associate Director/Program Director), Henry Pulitzer (Waterfront Director), Jake Beren (Waterfront Director), Josh Levitas (Sailing Specialist), Grant Rosskamm (CNOC Director), Sam Worth (Nature Director), Heather Kennedy (Artshop Director), *Ruthie Caro (Art Specialist), Shayna Rosenbloom (MOCA Director), Jonson Dillard (Target Shooting Director), Cassie Owens (Climbing Wall Specialist), Nick Copeland (Climbing Wall Specialist), Gabe Colman (Waterskiing Specialist), *Salma Schwartzman (Promotional Photographer), Zach Muzik (Specialist At Large)

SENIOR COUNSELORS: Josh Hanson Kaplan, Eric Portillo, Joey Rivkin, Sam Branstad Phillips, Simon Topf, Tommy Bellaire, Ari Krupnick, Jesse Herzog, Tommy Branstad Phillips, Sebastin Klein, Charlie Fromm, Andrew Guest, Oliver Swack, Nate Susser, Dylan Fox, Charlie Steinbaum, Max Steinbaum, Nathaniel Margerum, Mason Priest, Alejandro Loza, Will McCreary, Jonah Docter-Loeb, Brett Schoppert

JUNIOR COUNSELORS: Ben Hanson Kaplan, Nate Woldenberg, Parker Johnson, Orion Kornfeld, John Bellaire, Isaac Schiff Lewin, Matthew Garchik, John Osburn, Oliver Held, Matthew Hooper, Sam Shapira, Finn Sher, *Owen Wignall, Jason Schacter, Adam Lewis, Gabi Huberman-Shales, Billy Galpern, Brady Rivkin, Charlie Cohen, *Michael Bass, Jack Gordon, Jesse Chan, Jesse Gell, Jonah Karafoil, Max Rontal, Ben Schacter, Michael Bayer, Peter Kallos, Trevor Harriman, Tyler Gray, Jordan Carlin, Justin Blumberg, Misha Patent

TRIP STAFF: Adam Fornear (Trip Director), Jason Yale (Assistant Trip Director), Amy Mack (Driver), Bill Hensel (Driver), Allen Bennett (Quartermaster), Jonah Domsky, Hannah Kane, Andrew Meyer, Jeremy Berkowitz, *Ricky Keuhn, *Harrison Tankersly, *Maya Horn, *Phoebe Stern, *Mack Hildebrand

FOOD STAFF: Anne Rowe (Food Service Manager), Cody Keys (Cook), *Morgan Campbell (Cook), Alex Fuller, Asher Burvall, *Noe Alvarez, *Cynthia Dominguez, *Maria Alonso, *Johan Martinez, *Ruben Perez, *Alejandra Rodriguez, *Manuel Sejas, *Marco Torres, *Seth Wallack, *Elijah Shore

MEDICAL STAFF: Amber Burvall (Nurse), Zack Stern (Nurse’s Aide), *Isaac Dubois (Nurse Assistant), Trent Rosenbloom (M.D.)

OFFICE STAFF:  Joe Briggs (Associate Director/Office Manager), Linnea Moss (Town Driver), Jaye Hensel, *Julie Gordon, *Claire Guest, Josie Hanson Kaplan

CARETAKING STAFF: Andy Mack (Head Caretaker), Joe Crain, *Mike Fritsch-Rudser, *Sofie Viveros, *Angel Torres

Congratulations to our June Birthdays!

Han Skal Leve to our June Birthdays! This month’s birthdays include…

June 1st – Phoebe Stern

2nd – Adam Fornear, Cooper Milan

3rd – Matthew Gordon

4th – Andrew Condrell, Judah Thacker

6th – Ben Bernstein

7th – Jonson Dillard

8th – Jake Paderewski

10th – Ruthie Caro, Jack Gordon, Jesse Herzog, Chase Kornblet, Finn Sher

11th – Ryan Glickman

12th – Allen Bennett

12th – Reece O’Connor

14th – Sam Brandstad Phillips

15th – Noe Alvarez, Matthew Hooper

16th – Rollie Cohen

17th – Ryan Crean

18th – Drew Malk

19th – Ben Polonsky

21st – Micah Stone

22nd – Hadley Goldsmith, Sam Worth

23rd – Nick Copeland, Logan Segal

24th – Nathaniel Kehrberg

25th – Chase Herbert

26th – Fernando Cuevas

28th – Judah Gladstein, Nathan Starhill, Tanner Toback

29th – Holden May

30th – Ruben Perez Angel