12:00pm – 4:00pm

Location:
Tamaques Park Field #5 (Field behind tennis courts and playground)

1101 Lamberts Mill Road
Westfield, NJ

Here’s the Facebook note from the Echo Lark crowd:

To all Echo Larkers:
We would like to get together to honor the memory of Ed Shumsky, a great man who was a mentor to so many of us. What better way to honor Ed than to have a softball game, with some belt-to-skin, sunshine, Kansas City drills, and perhaps even some orange sodas and KitKats?
Jared Forminard, Rand Sacks and I visited with Ed’s daughters and Sandy on Saturday afternoon and they showed us an entire box full of Echo Lark memorabilia that Ed had saved – some dating all the way back to the 1970s. There was a photo album, softball score sheets, annual bunk lists hand-written by Ed, EL yearbooks, etc. – even a stack of letters from campers he had saved for decades. We would like to coordinate with his family so they can bring the box to the softball game so you have the opportunity to see how much camp meant to Ed, and so they can continue to see how much Ed meant to so many of us. The game will be July 10th at about 12pm in Westfield, NJ which is less than 20 miles from NYC – your families are of course welcome to join you. Please reply if you can make it – we hope to see you there. Also please pass this on to anyone else from EL who may not be on Facebook
Mike

Ed Shumsky, the man with the clipboard and pencil, with an often scratchy but booming voice heard at Twin Lake, Ma-Ho-Ge and Echo Lark, died on May 27, 2010. He was adept at catching and throwing softballs as he was at catching campers on raids and throwing them a curve ball, when they thought they had him fooled. He taught us how to execute a pickle play, to “turn the hips” while rounding first so you gained momentum to get to second base, to go to the opposite field with power, and how to lay down a successful bunt. He could manage a hundred kids on the boys side, know so much about each of them, and still run his Peach and Grapefruit Leagues like clockwork. Oh..and he also turned his numerous softball teams into inter-camp champions time and time again.

He was busy — but never too busy to help a kid in need. He was strict but he was caring. He was a bundle of energy, an amazing athlete, and you knew where you stood if you did something wrong.

Twin Lakers, Mahogeans and Echo Larkers won so many games on the field under Ed’s superior coaching. But those of us who knew him, know that his many life lessons — about attitude, about teamwork, about sportsmanship (except for his mighty elbow he’d throw you on the basketball court), about integrity — made us winners off the field as well. These were lessons that remain with so many of us, who are now the same age as he was in our memories.

Ed’s devotion to camp and his friendships with campers/counselors/staff went beyond the summer. I’ve heard for example that there were steady pickup basketball games in Syosset, NY that were organized and hosted by Ed for years. Mike Kera, a counselor who followed Ed from Twin Lake to Ma-Ho-Ge, said Ed was the single most influential figure in his life after his own father. You’d be hard pressed to find a better compliment.

Ed: Rest in peace..in God’s Country..and know that you built a Field of Dreams that has your name on it.

Here’s the new video interview with Milt Sirota from August 15, 2009 in Forestburgh, NY (about 15 miles from camp) and also featuring Carol Sirota and former camper Stuart Salenger. Sirota, a longtime assistant principal at Forest Hills High School in Queens, NY, was head counselor at Camp Ma-Ho-Ge in Bethel, NY from 1956 through 1977, when the camp was sold.

ANAWANA INVITATIONAL TOURNEY, 1966

Stay tuned for more video from my interview with Milt and Carol Sirota and former camper Stuart Salenger.

Rich Klein (1969 through 1977)
silverlake@mahoge.com
www.mahoge.com
www.catskillcamps.com

Bethel address:

P.O. Box 184
19 West Mitchell Street
Smallwood, NY 12778

Join our Ma-Ho-Ge group and Catskills Intercamp Games group on Facebook
Join the Camp Ma-Ho-Ge networking group on LinkedIn

One goal for the Ma-Ho-Ge site –as well as the catskillcamps.com site — is to do videotaped interviews with former campers, counselors and staff and start posting memories on these sites. Technology has made it easy for all of us to turn on the webcam, make short recordings and upload/share/email them out. So if you’d like to do a video for these sites, please keep it under two minutes so we may get a wide variety of submissions in coming years. Thanks to all for your continued support and have a great summer.

Note: Here’s a link to the blog that’s connected to www.catskillcamps.com.

Forty years later, all Mahogeans can celebrate our connection to Bethel and Woodstock.

That’s why we are having a a dinner and a movie in Manhattan set for a Saturday night in late August or early September so we can see “Taking Woodstock” which premieres August 14. The movie is about Elliot Tiber who wrote the book of the same title. Tiber’s parents owned the El Monaco Hotel in White Lake
and he was instrumental in bringing the Woodstock Festival to Bethel and changing history. ( I’ve invited Mr. Tiber to join us and, depending on the date, he said he’d try to make it.)

The movie’s official trailer via YouTube can be seen here.

Ma-Ho-Ge is expected to get some ink in an upcoming book on the 40th anniversary of Woodstock. The book is already listed on Amazon.com and should be in stores June 15.

The Camp Ma-Ho-Ge Group on Facebook now has 105 members and is proving to be a great way not only to find old camp friends but to keep up with each other’s lives. It costs nothing to join so those of you on the sidelines, please get in the game and join the party.

Here’s some news:

1–Gary Winick (1974 to 1977) is the director of the movie, Bride Wars, that opens on January 9, 2009.

2–We are re-designing the www.mahoge.com website and will be adding pages each week. 

3–The Camp Ma-Ho-Ge Group on Facebook has become a great “canteen”.  Nearly 60 Mahogeans are in the group so far and it’s become a great place to exchange emails, comments, post photos and share regular information.  There’s also a nice built-in chat program. Who are some of the most active Facebookers so far? Ellen Schwartz (Wolen), Lisa Checkla (Klein), Jon Abeles, Susan Kaplan and Richie Cutler. More recently, the Rubin brothers (Andy and Michael) joined as did Debi Gutenplan and Steve Leventhal. You can ask to join the group by emailing me via Facebook.

Catskills Intercamp Games Group on Facebook

I’ve started a related Facebook group, Catskills Intercamp Games, and have invited alum  from many of our competitors (Anawana, Brookwood, Roosevelt, Ta-Go-La, Olympus, Lakonda, Lakota, Diana-Dalmaqua, etc.) We quickly got to 75 members but Ma-Ho-Ge members are outnumbered by Anawana..come on, let’s even the score!

There will also be a launch of a website called www.catskillcamps.com in 2009 that I hope will function as a portal for all our camps at some point.

4 — We’ve started a Camp Ma-Ho-Ge Network group on www.linkedin.com to enable all of us to share business ideas,  testimonials, references and help with job searches. I’m still working out the glitches about invites but kindly email me at rklein@beckermanpr.com if you want to join.

5–Ma-Ho-Ge is stillllisted on Wikipedia so feel free to add your comments.

6–Their is a Camp Echo Lark reunion in Manhattan on Friday, January 16, 2009 from 6-9pm at Pop Burger- 14 East 58th Street, 3rd Floor, between Fifth & Madison across from FAO Schwartz. “The room will be ours for that time, but of course we can stay,” says Lisa Hirsch Quinn. And here’s a photo of Ma-Ho-Ge girls at Echo Lark.

7–Funny story. A woman named Amy Katz (Weiner) who went to Camp Ma-Ho-Ge found me on Facebook. Her profile said she was married to Craig Weiner. So, obviously I thought it was that average looking (not!) mediocre athlete (not!) we called “Dolly”. However, it turns out she married another Craig Weiner from New Jersey and she didn’t know that the Dr. Craig Wiener in NJ also went to Ma-Ho-Ge.

8– Former Mahogean Mitchell Zuckoff has written a book about the original Ponzi and is getting quoted widely about the Madoff scandal. He made the front page of The New York Times last week and was seen on the one-hour CNBC special on Madoff.