Shoe Column: The Camp

By Tim “Shoe” Sullivan

The year was probably about 1956.

My family lived at 440 Water St. in Stevens Point. The address was changed to 1555 Water St. many years ago.

Our next-door neighbors to the south were the Rossiers. Their big family—Ben, Rosemary, Charlie, Edmund, Mary, Suzie, and Carol—lived in a huge house several feet away.

Across the street from our house was Cigel’s Grocery. The water tower was a few buildings over.

Our house and the Rossier house were next to a big vacant lot on the corner of Water and Brawley. You could throw a football from Cigel’s and easily reach that vacant lot. On the other hand, several large trees might block the toss.

And if one really took a good look at that area, one would notice what was called “the camp.”

In a word, that camp was an odd duck. How to explain it?

The camp was right on the border of the Rossier and Sullivan properties.

The crazy part was that nobody knew who it actually belonged to. It was right between our houses.

I’m guessing the camp was about 12 yards long. Maybe 10. It was perhaps about 10 yards wide.

The camp was about the size of half of a garage. You could probably fit four or five cars in it.

The camp consisted of a few big elm trees on one end and a couple of trees along the sides. Inside the camp were some bushes, broken glass, stones, big rocks—you name it.

A kid couldn’t even hide in that camp.

If you were on the front sidewalk, you could see the camp and walk to it in five seconds.

Nobody ever “cleaned up” the camp, mainly because nobody was ever actually inside it. I never saw anyone in it.

As far as camps go, our camp was the Rodney Dangerfield of all camps. It totally didn’t get any respect.

It was just there.

Some people might hear “camp” and think about a place you put up a tent and sleep over. You know, when you sit around a campfire and roast marshmallows or chestnuts on an open fire.

Dream on.

Not in our camp.

Over the years, a million people have walked down our Water Street sidewalk.

Not once did anyone ever walk into the camp.

There wasn’t any reason to do it.

Nobody ever played a game in it. Nobody ever climbed a tree. Nobody ever went in and sat on a rock.

Our camp was the most useless thing on earth.

And it was there for many years—until everything came down. The Rossier house and their beautiful yard. The vacant lot. And yes, also the camp.

So the apartment building and parking lot could go up.

I personally have one memory of the camp.

One summer day when I was maybe 8, I was bored and decided to go on a hunting trip. I grabbed my toy plastic bow and arrows with the suction-cup tips and went looking for something to shoot at.

I ended up in the camp, which was about five seconds from our back door.

And there they were.

My targets.

Two bees were resting on one of the big rocks.

I snuck up to them, bent down some, took careful aim, and let my arrow fly.

Splat!

A direct hit!

That bee was a goner.

But one tiny problem.

Where the heck was the other bee?

I quickly found out. It stung me on the hand. And it hurt like hell.

I ran inside the house and vowed never to shoot an arrow at a bee again.

I wrote a paper about that incident while taking a journalism class with Dan Houlihan at UWSP.

The title: “Two Bees or Not Two Bees… That Was the Question.”

And I never walked into that camp again.