TRAGEDY AT CAMP JULIA CROWELL

At about 4:45 on the morning of August 4, 1959, while the girls slept at Camp Julia Crowell (CJC), a bolt of lightening from a summer thunderstorm struck a tree and forked out to strike two tents in a primitive camping section of the camp.  Two thirteen year old girls, Sallie Parker and June Gamble, were killed instantly.  Merrilyn Featherstun and Lynn Weisenberger in the other tent were injured. Camp station wagons took the injured girls to a hospital in Medina. Merrilyn was treated and released. She considered returning to camp but decided to go home. “I’ll be back next year”, she told camp officials when she left.  Lynn was hospitalized for a few days and did not return to camp; however her sister Peggy stayed at camp. ”Why bring her home?”, asked her father. “It is a well run camp. You can’t guard against lightening.” A few parents withdrew their children from camp, but most of the 200 campers stayed.

  (from The First 75 Years- A Council History 1912-1987, Lake Erie Girl Scout Council, by Georginanna Bonds, page 54.)

excerpt from The Millwheel September/October 1959

High Lea Shelter was built as a memorial to Sallie