Historic Hood River
“Leaving Camp”
1-30-2023
Notes
Color images, more recent history! I’ve started scanning a set of 35mm slides from the 1950s and 1960s which includes some great images of Camp Yallani. Camp Yallani was a Campfire Girls facility on the shores of Kingsley Reservoir, where girls would go for a week at a time in the summer to learn to swim, build a fire, arts and crafts, and the like.
This image is titled “Leaving Camp.” The bus full of girls kicking up a cloud of dust as it crosses the dam headed in to town. The swimming area is to the right.
I’ll bet a lot of Camp Yallani alums are following this site. I hope you’ll weigh in with some of your memories.
Roger Sheldrake
Are you sure this was a Campfire girls facility? Must have been shared by the Boy Scouts too as I remember going there as a Cub Scout. I think I would have noticed if there were girls!!
L.E.
Good one Roger. That started my morning off with a laugh.
Bhuk
I attended Yallani from the age of 8-13. Then worked as a Junior counselor for 2 years. 1965- 1973. I think its last summer was 1975 or 76. My Mom also attended the camp and worked as a counselor in her young years.
My Mom and Dad helped get the camp cleaned up and running every year. With the help of a small group of other volunteers.Hauling mattresses up on the back of my Dads old pickup and us riding on top! Up Binns hill! Cleaning mice and rat nests out of the old cook stove in the lodge, hiking up to White Horse Springs to get the water running, it was basically run by the Campfire Girls but was rented out to other groups too; as Yallani usually only ran for 2-2 1/2 weeks each summer. One of the most important things that happened there was building life long friendships and learning lots of crazy songs – that I still like to sing! And hiking to the top of Mt Defiance and taking a dip in Warren Lake on the way down.I remember there was a boys camp- Camp Davenport? down the road and they would come swim- on the other side of the reservoir. We would hear their voices and probably the counselors used binoculars to check them out! There was also a Hood River county Art Camp that would happen there.
I could go on"¦
Norma
I attended as a camper and then later as a junior counselor. Girl’s camps lasted one week each for three weeks with one week off between the one week for the boys. One year our family stayed at the camp for the one week between camps. I always remembered the year they had a hard time finding a nurse for the camp and Mrs. Sumoge spent her honeymoon as the camp nurse.
Susie Irwin
I spent a lot of my childhood at Camp Yallani, first as a youngster too young to be a camper. My mother would volunteer as camp nurse one week each summer so I would stay in the nurse’s cabin with her until I was old enough to participate as a campfire girl. Then in high school I was a counselor and worked with Gayle Bronson Gray on the waterfront. It breaks my heart that something like this would be impossible for children nowadays due to the proliferation of sue-happy people. Such wonderful memories for all those years. John Chipley spent his college summers as administrator of the boys’ camping experience up there.
Bhuk
I forgot to mention that there would of been a lot of tearful girls on the bus ride home- saying goodbye to new friends and your favorite counselors"¦we didn’t want it to end"¦
Carolyn
Camp Yallani was truly a memorable time for me in the 50s and 60s as a camper, a program assistant, and even the cook’s assistant! There were themes for the camp sessions, and the one I always seemed to like was my birthday week. I remember being a little homesick, longing for letters from home, then crying when I had to go home.
Jan S
Responding to Norma’s comment: Nurse Sumoge sounds like .. my mother, who was a nurse at Hood River Hospital, & died at a very young age"” way before she could tell me about being a Yallani nurse.
I’d love to hear more about that.
I was a camper- and then a Jr Counselor/Dishwasher- many years later, with Miss Marian as our leader & Miss Flipper and Miss Flopper as our swim instructors.. amongst many other beloved staffers : )
Arlen
The smarts of the photographer is impressive to me…. I would never have thought about taking a picture of a departing school bus. yes, LOTS of memories.