Des Moines Y Camp

            Yesterday, we as Launch visited the Des Moines Y Camp along the Des Moines River near Fraser, Iowa.  It was first of all quite unlike any camp we have visited yet.  It is along the river, so it has a canoe ramp.  The Dragoon Trail, a series of Iowa roads which follows the Des Moines River, goes right through the camp, dividing it in two.  Along the road leading up to the camp are signs that indicate the driver must slow down, all the way to 10 mph.  When I first drove through there on my way to Boone a few weeks ago, I had no idea what I was running into, but was delighted to see such a beautiful and well-organized camp.  The other unique thing is that it is divided again by the Boone & Scenic Valley Railroad, an old coal line which is now used for tourism, and takes folks on old-fashioned train rides through the beautiful Des Moines River Valley.  The railroad’s Des Moines River bridge is right by the camp.

            I ended up with many questions, but I will mostly share the ones I wrote down.

1.  When was the camp established?

2.  Was it the vision of one man or of a group?

3.  What is the history of the YMCA in Iowa?

4.  Why was this spot chosen for the camp?

            I list all these questions together because they were answered for me in one monologue.  The Boone YMCA was one of the first in the state, but did not join the Des Moines YMCA until recently, and was not involved in the camp.  The camp was founded in 1919.  The YMCA of Greater Des Moines had been looking for a camp for a while, but had hitherto only had access to Camp Foster, near Okoboji, which was a long journey by train in 1912.  They went there several summers, but were looking for a place of their own.  Howard Crawford and George Weber, two leaders of the Des Moines YMCA, went on the Des Moines-Fort Dodge train to see a property along the Des Moines River which was for sale near Fraser, which at the time was a booming mine town of 12,000 people.  They decided not to buy it, but as they were waiting at the station, another man from the area told them that an old dance hall was for sale, which had been quite popular before it was closed by the constable a few years before due to some recent stabbings.  So the two men walked out to the dance hall, and decided to buy it.

5.  What is the biggest change that has come about since you’ve been director?

            My original question was, in the last ten years, but the director, who gave us our tour, had been there twelve, so I extended it.  He said the biggest change was the retention rate.  Their rate at his arrival was 11%, meaning that about one out of ten campers from one summer came back the next summer.  Now it is at 78%, an impressive figure, but softened by the fact that they do some medical specialty camps which are not found elsewhere, such as diabetes camp, kids with cancer camp, siblings of cancer patients camp, and the like.

6.  What do you want your campers to leave with?

            I never actually asked this question, because I considered it sufficiently answered when the director explained, “We’re a seed-planting camp.” I assumed, therefore, that their goal is that the kids leave with the Gospel, so I didn’t ask the question.

            One thing that was very different at the Y Camp versus Hidden Acres is the way the staff are handled.  They have established tracks, set responsibilities, and they are not allowed to help another department unless they are asked to by that department.  This avoids burning them out completely.  They will have up and down times of the year, but that’s understandable.  They aren’t giving their all every week of the year.  Here at Hidden Acres, we experience a lot more “Department-hopping” as I would call it, jumping from one thing to another from week to week, or even hour to hour.  Of course, that is the job of Launch, anyway, so that makes sense.  We have our reasons for the way we do it, but they way they do it, they have much lower staff turnaround. 

            Another idea I found quite exciting was their concept of “Boys will be boys” camp.  This allows boys to act like boys with very few restrictions.  This is not really a concept that Hidden Acres as a whole could implement, but I have been churning through my head ways to implement it, in a controlled way, in my own cabins this summer.  Boys really aren’t allowed to be rowdy in school anymore, they are expected to act like girls.  It’s lame.  So my Rule #3 last year was, “Be rowdy, but not nasty.”  That seemed to work pretty well, but I want to have some more exciting adventures with them this year.

            The thing that I appreciated perhaps the most about them was their sense of history.  They are currently in the process of interviewing old veterans about what the camp used to be like, etc., and have hired an author from Boone to write a camp history book for them, with stories and lore.  I would love to see something like this done at Hidden Acres, and it would be even better to do now for us, because most of the founding fathers of camp are still alive.  I love history, so the sense of their continuation of the path set before them by their forefathers was particularly exciting for me.