Camp memories

Rabbi Lipszyc's Story of the Week
Dedicated in honor of  the Yahrzeit of the Rebbe's father Rabbi Levi Yitzchak Schneerson

To say that the camp in 1964 was a tremendous success would be an understatement.

When Rabbi Korf went into yechidus after the summer to give the Rebbe a report, as was the custom in those years, the Rebbe told Rabbi Korf that two camps gave him the most nachas that year – “Gan Yisroel of Montréal, because that year was when Montréal came up with the idea of a masmidim bunk, and your camp,” the Rebbe continued, “because it was 100% fremde campers and 100% success. Every camper went home with a mitzvah that he will continue for the rest of his life.”

That we saw this in fact, was four years later. The camp, unfortunately, was not able to open again. The Rebbe had asked me to keep in touch with the campers and I did so for many years after. In 1968 I asked the Rebbe if perhaps I should go to Florida and see if I could look up these campers to see what is doing with them. They Rebbe gave me manybrachos to do it and so together with Kasriel Brusowankin we made the trip. We took along an extra driver with us, Shmuel Ptalis, and I make mention of it because he was an exceptional help during the trip. When we looked up the children, each one individually, we found that each of them were still keeping at least one mitzvah and almost all of them with a mesiras nefesh.

Just a couple of examples, one of the children was telling us how he says modeh ani every morning with his pillow on his head because his mother will not let him wear a yarmulke. Another one told us that every day he would say the Shema in the bathroom so that his parents would not catch him doing so.

But the most amazing experience we had during that trip was when we saw the tremendous foresight and vision of the Rebbe. You see, it was at the behest of the Rebbe that Rabbi Korf hired Coach Irving Montgomery to be sports director of camp that summer. Coach Montgomery was considered the best sports director and coach throughout the entire South East region of the United States. Now understand that every camp was vying to get him. He was being offered on the average $20,000 for the two months. Remember this is talking about 1964, when thousands was real money. When Rabbi Korf offered to hire coach Montgomery he asked how much he was offering? Rabbi Korf explained to him that in general all of the staff in Gan Yisroel were volunteers, but in his case he would make an exception and offer $2000. Coach Montgomery burst out laughing knowing that this didn’t even come close to consideration. Nevertheless, he was intrigued what kind of camp is this man running? Thinking it over, coach felt that money he didn’t need (he was independently wealthy) and out of curiosity decided that he would accept this offer.

Coach was the one who scouted out the campers and in fact was the attraction that drew the campers. I had a very special relationship with him and there were numerous incidents that we shared which drew us very close together. Those stories perhaps I’ll tell at another time.

The summer in 1968, when we had gone to Florida to look up the campers from 1964, I contacted him and he asked me to come speak to the children of a conservative synagogue day camp of which he was the director. It was there that we saw how far the Rebbe’s vision extended.  When our camp did not open in the summer of 1965, he was offered numerous alternatives. The one he accepted was a conservative synagogue day camp.

The camp started off with about 40 children but four years later when we went there the camp had already 400 children.  The first year, he was watching how the camp was working and he kept saying to himself something is missing here where is that chayus that he had seen in Gan Yisroel? When he replayed in his mind the scenes from Gan Yisroel he realized that one of the things missing was the children singing grace after the meals. So he went to the Rabbi of the synagogue and asked him, “how come the children are not saying Grace after meals?” The Rabbi explained that the camp that coach attended the year before was an Orthodox camp while this is a conservative camp and we don’t say grace after meals. Coach told him in no uncertain terms that if he wants to keep him as director then they’re going to have to start saying grace after meals. The Rabbi shrugged his shoulders and said “do what you want.”

Coach knew that he was not able to lead the Grace after meals and so he hired a Torah observant Jew as his assistant and advisor in Jewish content. He kept reverting back to his experiences in Gan Yisroel to keep adding Jewish content to this camp that he was now running. Each time he wanted to introduce more Yiddishkeit, he had to literally fight it out with the rabbi. Can you picture this scene, the Rabbi is saying no more Yiddishkeit while coach is insisting on more Yiddishkeit! Each time coach got his way. Finally, this summer that we came coach had wanted to introduce to the bar mitzvah boys and bas mitzvah girls the idea of praying in the morning. To this the Rabbi put his foot down and said no. Coach stormed out of the Rabbi’s office when the Rabbi called him back and said coach I want to ask you a personal question. Coach asked him “what?” The Rabbi asked, “if you are so hepped up about Judaism why don’t you convert?” To this coach retorted, “because if I were to convert I wouldn’t have anything to do the likes of you!”

Thus from coach’s experiences in Gan Yisroel he took a conservative day camp of 400 children and taught them Jewish concepts and Jewish pride. When I told Rabbi Korf about this amazing after effect of Gan Yisroel, he added that at the beginning of this summer coach Montgomery was interviewed on national TV. One of the questions he was asked was in all his years of experience which camp did he consider the best? Coach responded, “none of the camps came anywhere close to Camp Gan Yisroel, the counselors were dedicated like he never saw anywhere else and the kids had an enjoyable time like nowhere else.”

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