The New Promised Land: Maine's Summer Camps for Jewish Youth ...

involved in her children’s lives, constantly coddling them, and begging them to get
married. This stereotype could be applied to Jewish mothers regardless of their
socio-economic status. As the Young Women’s Hebrew Association of Philadelphia’s
camp said in 1923, “boys need a challenging experience away from the sheltering
(hence softening) influence of mom.” 91 Camp activists, both Jews and non-Jews,
believed that time at summer camp would teach children to be self-reliant,
independent, and an overall better person. In fact, in 1926, the president of the
American Camping Association said,
The purpose of summer camp was to aid families…by ‘returning the child to
his parents in better shape, physically and morally, than when he arrives, and
to iron out his habits of petulance, snobbishness, and bad temper and to
inculcate in their place habits of decency, honesty, self-reliance, cleanliness,
and sportsmanship.’ 92
This message resonated with Jews, who were determined to grow their children
into healthier and more secure adults.
As Jews rose to affluence, they too desired to spend their summers outside of
the cities. However, due to the rampant anti-Semitism at the time, they were not
welcome in the Episcopalian dominated areas like Northeast Harbor and Bar
Harbor. As Mykoff wrote of Jews’ attempt to vacation in these areas, “Money could
not buy their way in.” 93 Though Jews developed their own resorts and summer
communities in areas of the Adirondack and Catskill Mountains in New York, they
were still hungry for opportunities to summer in Maine. Joshua Weiss, a camper at
Camp Wigwam, said, “Maine was the new frontier for the wealthy to summer
91 Ibid.
92 Ibid, 74.
93 Ibid, 166.
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