An interview with Yonahlossee's first Campers!

Held in June, 2010



To the 2010 Reunion:

Greetings from California!

Suzy sent a very diplomatic query to update information for my mother, Kathryn ('Kitty') Kiker Harris, who had the distinction of being Yonahlossee's youngest camper in its opening year.

Mother was the eldest of three Kiker sisters from Reidsville, N.C., who each attended Yonahlossee in the 1920s. Marion Kiker Lane , the middle sister, would have had keen observations, but she died in 2006.

Mercifully, my mother is still as sharp as a tack, so I offered to quiz her on Suzy's behalf, working from Suzy's questions, below. For good measure, I also telephoned my aunt Lucy Kiker Jones , who attended camp for six years (1929-1934) and now resides in Virginia Beach. I hope you'll enjoy their stories.

Katie Harris 1959-61, 63, 67

Suzy: Oh, please send the story of how she got to be the youngest one that opening year. I would love to share these things with a most appreciative audience!

Kitty : "There was a young woman in Reidsville, Constance Gwaltney, who got my mother interested in my going. Constance, a camp counselor, was 'a beautiful dancer' and friend of Susie Sharp, the future chief justice of North Carolina's highest court." Kitty thinks that Constance must have learned of Yonahlossee while attending the North Carolina College for Women in Greensboro (now UNC at Greensboro), where Dr. Kephart taught.

Initially, the Kepharts wanted campers who were at least 10 years of age, but they made an exception for 7-year-old Kitty, because they hoped that she'd be a companion for their daughter, Margaret, who was a few months older. Seven years later, the Kepharts waived the age restriction for Lucy.

Lucy: I was only 8 years old! This time, the Kepharts needed a companion for an 8-year-old camper who had just lost her mother. The Kikers agreed to let Lucy go to Yonahlossee for a few weeks, rather than the customary two months. But when they arrived to pick her up, Lucy begged to stay. "Mother cried all the way down the mountain," as Lucy's father, Bill Kiker, later told the story. She was heartbroken that her 'baby' didn't want to return home.

Please ask her what traditions she saw established in those early years, if the Kepharts were strict then . . .

Kitty: "Oh, yes! We had taps every night and reveille every morning. You had to go down and jump in the lake, and of course, it was cold." Kitty, in a cabin with 'all older girls' her first year, remembers that they were supposed to lie on their bunks quietly during rest hour. So what did she do? "I taught them to play bridge."

Lucy: "I can close my eyes right now and see Dr. Kephart and Mrs. Kephart. Dr. Kephart was really ahead of his time. He really taught us to respect and love the environment. Before trail rides, Dr. Kephart reminded the counselors and campers to show respect for local farmers by sticking to the trail. 'You don't pick their fruit or walk on their crops. Don't leave any trash.'" Lucy recalls one tradition at night: "We had milk and graham crackers, and then Taps."

Please ask . . .what tribe was she in . .

Kitty:" I can't remember my tribe! She's not sure the tribes were established in the camp's earliest years." By 1929, however, Lucy vividly recalls that Yonahlossee girls were divided into two tribes: Algonquians and Cherokees. Lucy was an Algonquian.

. . .and what she loved best.

Kitty:" I loved the hiking. She also loved earning enough points to qualify for a special overnight trip. We'd camp out in Linville and take Tweetsie, the little train, over to Johnson City."

Did they have awesome fried chicken, biscuits and cinnamon coffee cake back then?

Kitty doesn't recall the particulars, but she liked the food! She remembers her reaction when her parents came to Blowing Rock during her first summer, to celebrate her 8th birthday. As a treat, her father offered her anything she wanted on the menu at the swank Mayview Manor. Puzzled, Kitty replied: "We have such good food at Yonahlossee, I don't need anything special!"

Did the girls go berry picking and have ice cream made with the fruits of their labors?

Kitty: "Dr. Kephart was so smart. They'd give a prize to the campers who brought back the most [berries], to keep us from eating them all as we picked them."

Lucy: "I remember wonderful blackberry cobblers." In her final year at camp, she lived "up on the hill, back of the kitchen, with a clear view of the porch where the ice cream was churned." She and her friends soon learned to dash down to help, because they were rewarded with extra helpings.

What was Jete like as a college girl?

Kitty:"She had a boyish haircut and was very athletic."

Lucy:"There was nobody like Jete. She was my counselor my last year." The year was 1934, and by then, Jete had been promoted to head counselor. "She knew we weren't always doing what we were supposed to be doing." Jete won the girls' cooperation by saying that she was supposed to set a good example as head counselor. "Don't embarrass me."

Other memories:

At some point in the 1920s, Yonahlossee's dam collapsed. The girls had no place to swim or canoe. There was a handsome lake, however, on the nearby estate of Moses H. Cone, the late textile tycoon. Kitty was asked to join a delegation of campers to visit his widow, Bertha Cone, who kindly let the Yonahlossee girls use her property for the remainder of the summer.




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