Camp Kinderland

Camp Kinderland is a summer camp located in Tolland, Massachusetts for people aged eight through sixteen. The camp's motto is summer camp with a conscience since 1923. The main topics of the curriculum are: equality, peace, community, social justice, activism, civil rights, Yiddishkeit, and friendship. Campers may stay for four weeks in July, three weeks in August, or all seven of the offered weeks. There is also a two-week session available for first-time campers in the youngest group.

Founding and history

Kinderland was founded by members of The Workmen's Circle/Arbeter Ring, a leftist Jewish fraternal organization, in 1923 in Hopewell Junction, New York. Camp Kinderland, along with the rest of the left wing of the Workmen's Circle, split off in 1930 and created the International Workers Order and became the official summer camp of the Jewish section of the International Workers Order. In 1954, the IWO was shut down and its assets liquidated by the government, which had determined that it was a Communist organization. At that time, Camp Kinderland became an independent corporation. Camp Kinderland is now a multicultural summer camp and community. While campers come from around the US, many are from the New York area, especially Brooklyn, where there is a kindershule, or secular school.

Social values

Camp Kinderland promotes progressive social values through its cultural program. It is anti-death penalty, pro-labor union, and generally socialist. Every year it holds the Peace Olympics, where camp is evenly divided into four teams, each representing a movement or nation that the camp's directors feel is advancing the progressive cause.^{[citation needed]}

Politics

The camp's left-wing politics led it to be the place many red diaper babies were sent growing up,^[1] which caused it to be investigated during the McCarthy era.

Notable Kinderland alumni

Spencer Ackerman, progressive blogger
Chesa Boudin, lawyer and activist; San Francisco District Attorney.
Lawrence Bush, editor, Jewish Currents
Jules Dassin, film director
Delia Graff Fara, philosopher of language
Ted Gold, a member of Weatherman Underground
Max Kellerman, sports commentator
Michael Klonsky, education policy expert
Harvey Kurtzman, cartoonist and founder of Mad Magazine
Ivy Meeropol, documentary filmmaker, granddaughter of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
Marky Ramone, drummer, The Ramones, Misfits
Suze Rotolo, artist and teacher^[2]
Ben Shuldiner, 2006 Democratic candidate for New York's 19th Congressional District
Paul Stanley, singer and guitarist, KISS
Sol Stern, senior fellow, Manhattan Institute
Marisa Tomei, actress
Merritt Wever, actress

Footnotes

^ Butnick, Stephanie; Leibovitz, Liel; Oppenheimer, Mark (October 2019). The Newish Jewish Encyclopedia: From Abraham to Zabar's and Everything in Between. Artisan Books. p. 55. ISBN 978-1-57965-953-0.
^ "Camp Kinderland class of 1958".

External links

Official camp website
Camp Kinderland Alumni Association
Camp Kinderland Records, online finding aid, Tamiment Library, New York University.

[1] Butnick, Stephanie; Leibovitz, Liel; Oppenheimer, Mark (October 2019). The Newish Jewish Encyclopedia: From Abraham to Zabar's and Everything in Between. Artisan Books. p. 55. ISBN 978-1-57965-953-0.

[2] "Camp Kinderland class of 1958".

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