Dance New England Site History from the 1989-1997

as reported by Bill McCarthy

Camp 1989-1996

At the end of camp in 1989 I reached an oral agreement with the owners of the then "Samantha Smith World Peace Camp" for the next summer. In January (or so) we were informed that they had a better offer and did not honor the oral commitment or sign a written one. That winter the managing partner had changed from Jay Steiger to Michael Wilkes. We had agreed orally with Jay and Michael had gone for a richer deal. Not being a stupid businessman, Jay offered space at another camp (Maine Teen Camp) that would have the space and time we required. Since it was late in the rental season I jumped at the opportunity. I met with Kris Kayman (spell?) the director and I believe a part owner. After spending 3 hours looking at the site in the rain and measuring all the buildings and taking numerous notes and then talking to David about who we were and what we would be doing it looked like a doable, not perfect, fit. He knew about the nudity and noise and dismissed both, saying that the lake was pretty private and that it shouldn't be a problem. On my recommendation (it was now March I believe) the reps O.K.'d the site.

After the summer of 1995 it was clear that we ere outgrowing the now Omni campsite. We secured a contact commitment for the next summer, but at that time we were told that the Omni program was expanding and we would only have a little more than a week available. After that we had started to look for a new rental option.

The task was divvied up by states I provided a script (similar to the one you already have) and a copy of the appropriate ACA guide (or pages from the national guide). Anne had New York (with Paul Marienthal) and western Mass. Kevin Benjamin had eastern Mass., Naomi Lindenfeld had VT., Jim Cowles had Conn. and RI and I had NH and ME.

One month into the search Omni reported they were not changing their schedule and we could return. I found only two to visit from all my calls 1) Camp Cody in Ossipee NH was interested. I visited, they were adequate in size and had nice facilities, but were close to a road and had frontage on a very large lake, although they did not care about the nudity and like at Maine Teen, they owned enough frontage to discourage prosecution under nudity in public charges. Encountered difficulty in our controlling the kitchen. At that time it looked like a possibility until we checked the math and figured they were expecting 10 times what he could pay.

The second Camp was Camp Wicosuta(I think). This was a good phone call/bad site. The camp was on a main road, had no privacy, looked ugly and you had to walk through a fairly conservative Jewish camp across the road to get to the waterfront. After calling this info into the Nov. rep meeting it was decide to return to Omni and the search was generally suspended.

Although the search was not as extensive as the one before summer 1997, the same patterns were emerging: sites that were big enough either did not need us, had a public waterfront, or both.

Camp Search 1996-97

After summer 96 it was made clear to us that we were no longer going to be able to return to Omni. A much more substantial search was initiated, most of which you already know. The piece that you don't know is what I did in NH and ME.

I basically called all camps in the ACA book that had beds for over 25O and went through the questions with them (I did edit some of the more conservative camps out). The biggest camps were not interested because they 1)were loaded and didn't rent out, 2) they didn't want a group of our nature on their site. This mostly dealt with the fact that we had a nude waterfront, and on a couple of cases they wanted to keep control of the kitchen and 3)_ they didn't have the time available. The middle size spaces had much the same response , excluding the first concern.

I remember having lengthier discussions with the following camps: (Any outside of NH and ME were because I was sent there way by the original callers from the CSC).

Camp Hi-Roc (western MA): We didn't fit and the director could not move a pre scheduled event to fit us in. (see more)

Camp Wing/Stockade (Duxbury MA): Was ready to go look, but only one week, no nudity and iffy sleeping space. Primarily a day camp. (see more)

Camp Becket and Chimney Corners: Talked about renting all of one and some of the other. Ran into $$$$ issue and having to share a lot. Also available only one week. (see more)

Camp Walt Whitman (NH): Nudity and too crowded for them (their opinion)

Meadowlark (ME) : Put forward and then withdrawn by Jay Steiger, too small and would have to use another site in combo across the lake. Basically not available and not private enough.

The rest were one discussion or one phone call wonders.

Mataponi was found after the community Meeting at Boston & on_line discussions said that they could live without nudity for a year. I had never called Mataponi in the first round since I knew they were on Sebago. Margaret found them through a Camp head hunter.

Once Mataponi was found, the search really stopped. Two somewhat major flaws of Mataponi were missed in our visit in November (Steve Robins, Laurie Tennant-Gadd, Mel and Emily Gadd) 1). The owner had said it wouldn't bother him if we had a nude waterfront. We went down to what we erroneously thought was the cove that the beach was in. It turned out that the channel markers were removed for the winter (they would have been a big giveaway!!) and we did not follow the shoreline to the road and beyond to realize the nature of this area. 2) The boat docks (the marina) across the way had been removed for the winter and we did not get a clear enough answer (for our issues) about how many boats would be parked there. We were told there were only a half-dozen cottages on the lake, but no one thought to tell us, nor did we ask, how many had docking rights (whoops!). In the end even if we had known all this I still believe that we would have ended up at Mataponi. We really didn't have any other good choices at this time.

Also talked at length with owner of Camp Waziyatah (ME) on recommend of Ed Trenner. Camp looked beautiful. Would have been excellent set up, lots of dance spaces, open spaces, living, etc. but three main concerns 1) no private waterfront 2) owners wanted big bucks 3) sounded like they had heavy investment in facility and rep and would have had major control issues with us being there.

Last modified: May 1, 1998