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Recollections of Camping at Cook Forest State Park in the Early-Mid 1950s

Of course, one of the reasons that we frequently went swimming was that this was our only method of bathing. My father would bring along a bar of soap and make us wash up while we swam. When we didn’t bathe in the swimming hole, we were subject to the dreaded sponge baths that Mom and Dad would give us, standing us naked on the picnic table in a shallow plastic tub and washing us down in full view of the entire campground, rinsing us off by pouring a bucket of frigid water over us.

Other than just fooling around at the campground, hiking was the primary activity that we engaged in. Across on the far side of the campground from where we usually had our campsite was an entrance to a trail. This trail led through one of those stands of old growth pine that Cook Forest was so famous for (I may be conflating this with another trail, however – perhaps it was a different trail that visited the old growth area). I wish that my children and grandchildren could some day experience what it was like to walk in this kind of forest, because there was nothing like it. The huge trees towered high into the sky, creating a canopy that allowed little or no direct sunlight to filter through. As a result, there was very little undergrowth, other than a plethora of gorgeous ferns. The enormity of the trees was overwhelming, and I can only liken the environment to that of being in a cathedral – that’s a bit of a cliché, but it is nevertheless absolutely apropos. It was quiet, dim, and magnificent. When we arrived for the final year that we camped at Cook Forest, in 1956, a huge storm had roared through just weeks earlier, knocking down many of these stupendous old trees, leaving gashes in the canopy that allowed the sunlight to stream through to the ground far below. We were deeply saddened by the loss of the formerly pristine forest, with the trunks of trees that had been there for centuries now lying across the path.

Romping around the campground filled much of our time. We loved to play on the stage that stood in the circular field in the center of the campground – I think that there is now an amphitheater where the stage once stood. The stage was just a raised wooden platform, perhaps three to five feet high, depending on which side you were on. My childhood perception of it was that it was about twenty feet square, although it may have been larger or smaller than that. I have no recollection of ever attending any sort of event at this location, like a pageant, speech, concert or anything else. My memory is that it just stood there, unused, except when we kids were gallivanting around on it. Mostly we’d just climb up the steps and run and jump off the edge, rolling on the ground like we’d been shot – cowboys and Indians stuff. On other occasions we might spend some time pretending that we were actors on the stage, although this didn’t last long because we had no script and weren’t adept at improvising. Scrabbling around underneath the platform was also fun. We’d catch grasshoppers, frogs, toads, lizards – any living creature that we could lay our hands on.

I am certain that we saw many deer, and possibly bears on occasion, but I have no specific recollection of these events. I seem to remember that perhaps there was a totem pole in the campground, but that may not be correct – we camped in many different parks across the eastern part of the U.S. over the years, and it’s easy to get them all mixed up.

Evenings were usually spent sitting around the campfire – we often roasted marshmallows, and on special occasions we might make s’mores, those exquisite little sandwiches of graham crackers, a piece of a Hershey’s milk chocolate bar and a roasted marshmallow. Unfortunately, the fire and the lantern (which made a very loud, annoying hissing sound) would draw swarms of bugs, which dampened my spirits quite a bit. I was a big reader, but trying to read by lantern-light while being dive-bombed by half the insect population of the county was less than enjoyable.

Another thing that we often did during the long summer days was to play around in the drainage pipes that dotted the campground. These were corrugated metal pipes that ranged from quite small ones going under the circular road of the campground up to ones that were large enough for me to walk into without even stooping. The largest one was over near the entrance to the trail, and we loved to play in and around this one. We believed – rightly or wrongly – that this large pipe was infested with snakes, so we were constantly daring each other to venture further and further into the pipe, the diameter of which got smaller the further you went into it.

Once when we were playing around this particular pipe, my older brother David got up on top of it and jumped off, but he didn’t jump far enough, and the sharp edge at the top of the metal pipe caught him in the back, opening a large gash. But cuts and bruises were an accepted part of the camping experience, so we all just chalked it up to experience. When I was quite small, I would crawl through some of the pipes that went under the campground road, my narrow shoulders just barely allowing me to make it through. But the next year I was bigger, and also had acquired a bit of claustrophobia, so I was afraid to repeat the act – this was probably wise, as getting stuck in one of these pipes could have proven to be disastrous.

The most disastrous thing that actually did happen to me (although it all came out OK in the end) occurred when I was probably five years old. A family in a neighboring campsite had a son who was about three years old, and this little boy and I played some. Now, I was quite independent for my age, and thought nothing of going off on my own. So one day as we were playing, I decided that this little boy and I should go on an adventure. We headed off on the trail leading out of the campground, and walked all the way down to the Clarion River. The further that we went, the more aggravated I became with this little boy – I was clueless about just how young this kid actually was, and I unrealistically expected him to behave more rationally than he did. He was crying and saying that he wanted his mama, and I was saying, “Well, come on and we’ll get back to the campground, then!” I knew exactly where we were, so when we reached the river we turned to the right and walked along the riverbank until we came to the bridge that carried Route 36 over the river – I knew that we just needed to get up on the road and climb the hill back to the campground. But the tiny three-year-old had by this time become completely exhausted, and he just sat on the riverbank by the bridge, crying and refusing to go any further. I was standing there trying to coax him up to the road when suddenly several men appeared, shouting, “Here they are!” One of them rushed down and grabbed the boy, and I calmly climbed up to the road, wondering what all the fuss was about. It appears that the boy’s parents had panicked when they discovered him missing, and the entire population of the campground – and who knows who else – was out in search parties trying to find us. I thought that it was much ado about nothing, but that was because I was just a little kid myself and didn’t have an appreciation of what a dangerous situation it actually was. I got in trouble, but not too much, since everyone realized that I was really too young to know any better.

My mother told me many years later that our month-long vacations camping at Cook Forest State Park would typically cost a total of about $100.00. That sounds impossible, but you do have to remember that we pinched pennies unmercifully. We never – never – ate at a restaurant, my poor mother cooking all of the meals for five or six people on the little cook stove that used white gas. We never went to events or activities that had an admission fee or otherwise cost anything. The rental of the campsite was free. Most people today wouldn’t even consider that what we did constituted a “vacation,” and honestly, I can’t see that it was much of a one for my mother, at least. But Cook Forest was a very special place for us, and I have nothing but fond memories of the summer months that I spent there. Nevertheless, I have not returned to visit Cook Forest State Park since 1956.

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