An Ashland historian is collecting stories about the early history of Girl Scout Camp Low Echo, opened at the end of World War II on the shore of Southern Oregon’s Lake of the Woods.
The historian, George Kramer, told the Medford Mail Tribune he is searching for stories, souvenirs and photos to be placed in a camp museum.
It was 1946 when the Rogue Valley Girl Scouts Council negotiated a lease on the property with the U.S. Forest Service. A power company hydroelectric engineer with two daughters, John Boyle, designed the campground and main lodge, built of salvaged materials from dissembled buildings at Camp White, a World War II army training base.
Thousands of Girl Scouts have spent summers at the camp over the last 70 years.
The Forest Service transferred the Girl Scout lease to a non-profit organization in 2013. The next year, benefactors Sid and Karen DeBoer purchased the buildings and Forest Service permit, donated $3 million for restoration of the deteriorated camp, and gave the 32-acre camp to the Ashland Family YMCA.
The Y plans to reopen the camp as a recreational site for all ages.
Sources: Pollock, Buffy. "Memories of Camp Low Echo." Mail Tribune, 19 Oct. 2016 [Medford, Ore.] , p. 1+; Kramer, George. "Camp Low Echo's Next Chapter." the preserveoregon blog, edited by George Kramer, George Kramer, Kramer & Company, 14 Dec. 2013, thepreserveoregonblog.blogspot.com/2013/12/camp-low-echos-next-chapter.html. Accessed 23 Oct. 2016.