After Bob Egbert contacted me wanting to know why I was interested in the history of the campground this is what I told him...............Bob, My parents took us there camping many times during the mid to late 60’s. I have many fond memories of spending time there. We had a pop up camper and sometimes we used to stay there for a couple weeks at a time and my father commuted to work at Bobst Champlain in Roseland from there. Some of my fond memories. The house….can’t remember why but we often had to go up to the house and there was an older lady there that seemed to run the place on the business end. I can’t recall if we bought worms there or if there was a store in there on not but the lady was always very nice. I never recalled ever seeing anyone else there. The pavilion. There was a small room in the basement and there was a pinball machine in there. I used to play pinball every chance I got if I could get a little money. There also was on occasion a radio in there playing and I never forget some of the great music of that era. “In the summertime especially”, by Munjo Jerry. The RR tracks. We kids used to take long hikes on the RR tracks. I also loved it when the trains came through. Always a big fan of trains. I made a friend there once and it seemed that there were often repeat campers. This particular friend was my first experience with a “spoiled brat”. Generally the kid was nice but spoiled. He was never there with his parents but only his grandfather. I don’t remember the specifics other than the kids grandfather gave him everything he wanted and he was kind of a brat to the grandfather. I inquired to my mother about this behavior and she explained what spoiling a child was about. Good learning experience. I never wanted to do that to my children. There was another family that had older children closer to my brothers and sisters ages. They were a lot of fun and I liked following the big kids around even though they always told me to get lost. One year this family came back in a school bus that they had bought and converted into a camper. We thought that was so cool. Catching bull frogs. I was a bit young for this but the older kids used to go out at night with a flashlight and a fishing pole. They would go around the shore and shine the light in the frogs eyes and put the hook under the frogs chin and pull up. There was a man at the campground that gave them money for the frogs. They would usually catch quite a few this way. The fishing. I always remembered the fishing was very good and I spent a lot of time fishing. On occasion my mom gave me a little money and I could rent one of the row boats. I was out with our dog penny once and she was looking over the side of the boat and fell in. I had to pull her back into the boat and at 7 that was a bit of a chore. The between fishing in the boats or walking around the lake I was always fascinated by the cottages and wished we could own one. I always thought those cottages were privately owned but from reading on the internet it appeared that the cottages were actually part of the resort. I assume your family rented them. That would be a dream retirement for me. To own a place like that and manage it. I went in the Army in 1980 and went back to NJ in 1981 or so and ended up in that area so I drove through the property. I was very surprised to see it closed. Could not understand why. I still don’t. My mother and father were Ernest and Lorette Hawks, 11 Florham Ave. East Hanover NJ. They divorced in 1970 so my best guess is the last summer I was there was 1969. My father has since deceased in 1990 and my mother is still alive and resides in Colorado Springs Colorado. I have a half brother and sister that camped with us. Their names them were Bill and Debbie Estes. They would have been in their teens during the times we camped. On a side note did you know that a music group filed a music video on the property? Let me know if you don’t know about it and I can find it and email it to you. It is pretty neat. youtube/watch?v=JuoQgkPKplQ Sincerely, Ed Hawks
Posted on: Fri, 26 Sep 2014 16:13:54 +0000
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