In the late 1930s after my mother and father were married, they bought some land on a local pond. The idea was to build a boathouse on the water and a camp up on a ledge overlooking the water and mountains. The boathouse was built with logs from trees on the property. All done by my mother and father.
Soon they decided that lugging all those supplies up the hill to the ledge was not going to be much fun. So they moved it back from the edge of the pond and turned the boathouse into their camp.
Here is my mother, some time around 1942. Because of the tall white pine trees she named the camp "Sequoia Lodge." Of course she knew that they weren't true Sequoia trees, but they towered over the little camp in true Sequoia spirit.
The original camp seemed small so they built a kitchen wing on the left and a bedroom wing on the right. Now there was a large kitchen, large livingroom (original boathouse) and two nice bedrooms. I was probably around 10 years old when the kitchen was added. I remember my father falling the trees, my mother peeling the logs. They gave me a putty knife and a roll of oakum to chink the spaces between the logs.
Here is the livingroom as it looked during the 1980s. Pure camp. No electricity, just a wood stove for heat, Coleman lanterns for light and gas stove and refrigerator in the kitchen. I loved it!
And the view to the mountains from the small dock.
Same view, taken with a modern digital camera.
I used to live there summers. Commuting to work from the camp. Now it is used during the summers by my children and grandchildren,...
And even my son's girlfriend's grandchildren. How about that! That would be five generations in all!
Thanks Mom and Dad, -- I miss you!
May everyone have a safe holiday weekend as we remember why we have the picnics and parades!
