The Magic of Lyle
By Timothy Falendysz
aka Mr. F

 As a 10 yr boy, I remember working hard around the yard doing odd jobs in order to earn a few bucks of my own. I had a goal to spend the money. In today’s world some may see video games, computer games or maybe a TV for their bed room. But for me, none of those were in my mind, my goal was to earn the $26 fee to go to Summer Camp with my friends in Boy Scouts. I wanted to go, the details are faded now but I must have earned my money cause I went and remember bits and pieces of the trip, but it is odd how the memory seems to forget the things that may not be really important, but then for some odd reasons some items are snap shots that seem to have no purpose now, but for some reason I remember them. I remember pulling weeds to earn money, I remember sitting on the School bus in the most uncomfortable seats to ride to camp, I remember carving my name into a log that was cut down by a beaver. I remember earning my first merit badge, Environmental Science. On the way home for the first time, I remember boarding the bus and I was either homesick or just so beat I could no longer control my emotions and I was crying. My dad was there and he comforted me but it didn’t seem to be enough, but it must not have bothered me to much, I suspect I was sleeping shortly after that and we would be home sooner than I thought.  Camp was cool, but little did I know at that time as a now 11 yr old, what impact that trip would have on my life. If I had had a bad time that year, I may have never gone back.

 In the years that followed, the memories kept adding themselves to the now ever growing pile. I remember canoeing the river UP stream, taking the 20 mile hike to that OTHER camp and the many tube trips, over night canoe trips and the many memories with my grade school friends. Those too, are snap shots of memories in my mind. I remember chasing daddy long leg spiders out of our tent cause Jimmy Heck was terrified of them, I remember one over night canoe trip, when they thought someone trashed our tent in a act vandalism only to find out that is how we left it before the trip. I remember one trip home on the bus where Jimmy and I had staged a false “HOT BABE” alert that woke up most on the bus looking out a window to see NOTHING outside, but inside Jimmy and I were laughing hysterically. I remember another Scout grabbing the stove pipe of the sheep herder stove and burning his hand quite well. Those thoughts are there to remember. But as I think back on my trips and there are so many things that I don’t remember. The reason I don’t remember is because I am not sure I realize it was happening.

 Now that camping at Robert S. Lyle is not a distant memory but a tradition in my life for over 30 consecutive years, I have totally different responsibilities as a Scoutmaster. Matter fact, I am not sure I could classify what I did when I was 11 yrs old as “having responsibilities”. I see the magic that Robert S. Lyle creates. Lyle is more than a summer camp, Lyle is a learning theater for so many things, some at the program areas, but even more at the patrol site, many are hard to explain, and even harder to recognize as a Scout.

 Many people go to camps both in and out of Scouting. For some, it is a great week of swimming, canoeing, fishing and working on your advancement of the Boy Scouts of America. Best of all it is a chance to spend time with a group of friends. Lyle is NOT just another one of those camps, Lyle offers so much more.

 I look back at my experiences I think of what did I really learn at Camp Lyle. The list of lessons is too long to even begin to list.

 When Camp Lyle opened in the early 1960’s it was designed to be a wilderness camp. The leaders of the Council had the wisdom and knowledge of what a camp like Lyle could offer the Scouts of the area. They already had a dinning hall camp called Chippicotton, but they felt a wilderness camp could offer so much more. Lyle is not just a camp where Scouts could be put in the wilderness to learn about nature. More importantly it is a chance to learn things about themselves. Today, after 40 years of existence, the camp still offers a similar program, but do we even realize all that it offers? Have some of us been there so long we don't realize the benefits, we never think about what other camps don’t offer? Sometimes the grass is always greener on the other side, but unless you take stock in what you own, you really don’t know.

 As I look back through my life I think about what I learned in those early years of camping at Lyle that did not make it to my pile of snap shots of memories. What camp had to offer me as a Scout really has affected my life as an adult. Yea, cooking in the sites is one of the programs that I never realized was part of the learning. As I think back, those were crucial moments in developing the little nerd I was at the time. While at camp, as a Patrol we worked as a team to accomplish a common goal, to fill our always empty teenage stomachs. It was not a matter of entertainment but a matter of survival for us. Sometimes the cooking was good and the results were entrée of delicious meals, other times it was a disaster. Can you say scrambled pancakes?

 One disaster that comes to mind is one of my fellow scouts who read the instructions to cook spaghetti as to put on water, then cook the sauce, which this Scout mis-read as to pour the entire bottle of sauce right in the  noodle water. Needless to say, this now red tinted water did not fit the desires of the Scouts who were really looking forward to a nice meal of spaghetti. During the events that followed, I am sure we all showed our displeasure for this mistake, but in fairness to all there, it may not have been as justified, anyone of us could have made the same mistake and I am fairly sure that we all probably did. Sometimes being criticized, sometimes being the criticizer. Whether it was with food, building the fire or what ever it was, not every thing turns out perfect. There is ALWAYS a damp morning when the fire doest start well, but then we make up for it another day when the flames are shooting out of the smoke stack of the sheepherder stoves. As you read this, I am sure you are thinking why didn’t the adults protect us from making these mistakes and the damage it caused our always over inflated ego. Looking back, I fully understand why they didn’t, but at the time, my empty stomach would have really appreciated it if they did. But hindsight today, I am sticking with, I am glad they didn’t. We as youth then needed to know how to fail, cope with it, and move on. Failure is part of everyone’s life, and not knowing how to deal with it can scar us more than dealing with it at such a young age.

 As an adult today, I see why the adults didn’t step in as well. Lets take the ill-fated spaghetti night and think about what was learned. Yeah, I doubt that we (and I mean any of us) will ever do that mistake again, we really WANTED to eat, but it just didn’t happen the way we planned. What we learned is the compassion for our fellow Scout, after we finished the whining, we all realize he was as hungry as we were or maybe even more so. We learned that as a team, we would succeed or in this case, failed as a team. No matter which course we took, it would be dependent on what WE did as a TEAM. We were all guilty of letting (or probably MAKING) this scout cook dinner alone. If we were truly working as a team, would this dinner be a disaster? I am pretty sure SOMEONE in the group had done spaghetti at home and would have corrected the problem sooner. The spaghetti was only ONE element of the meal. What if the fire person failed to do their job, what if the person responsible to go up to the commissary didn’t pick up the food (we did that back then), and maybe the worst situation, what if the dish person didn’t clean the dishes well enough from the meal before. As you can see, each and every element of the meal in camp is a lesson in team work, of unity and of great life skills. When we think of camp memories, the meals always seem to be part of it. I am sure there were people in the patrol that didn’t do their job and each  team member helped them understand their role. I am sure we could have done it in nicer ways, but as 12 yr olds, we didn’t understand, but we also didn’t let it weigh to heavy on us as recipients either, I don’t think any of us are having terror flash backs after spaghetti mishap.

 As I think back to those days as a camper I wonder as an older person now if those 6 or 7 days in camp each year made me what I am today. When I see people in different settings besides Scouting I think about how people react differently to situations. As an adult I know that person or corporation I either work or play with that work well as a team players, but more importantly I also know those who don’t. Those are the ones that stand out. As a Scout leader at camp now mentoring the young scouts, I see Scouts in all walks of life. Some pitch in and do a job, others avoid it. The most important thing, is to see the scout who comes to camp and at the beginning of the week who is not a team player, but by the time they leave, they have a good understanding of how important it is to BE a team player or have honed their skills to be a better one.

 One of the most common comments I hear from parents after a week of camp is WOW my son really grew up at camp. Do you think that is cause he weaved a basket? Swam a 100 yards, or played with frogs till they themselves turned green and started hanging out in the mud puddles? No, what caused them to grow up was how they became a team player as part of the patrol’s survival. That team player attitude became part of their camp life, but also a part of their home life too. For some, they did learn how to cook a meal they never did before, or they learned how to be helpful, or they realized how things went better if you worked with others. Parents have said, WOW, my son came home and he wanted to start cooking, (unfortunately most do not come home and say they want to wash dishes though). So how do the scouts feel about the experience? Well to quote one of my Scouts who attended a church camp, “Mom, Church camp is a sissy camp.”  When she questioned him why it was a sissy camp, he told her “cause they do EVERYTHING for us”. He continued to say, how much he liked Lyle because it gave him the chance to learn more than just the scheduled program, he learned so many OTHER things as well and it was a lot of fun. Not that there was anything wrong with Church camp or if it is even fair to call it a “sissy camp” just it had a different program.

 As a fellow leader put it to me, Lyle is a program, other places are camps. When you analyze that, it really is an interesting thought. Lyle is a program, not one that stops to feed people but one that lasts from sunrise, to sun set.  The staff may be working the allotted shifts but the real program runs every waking hour of a scout. I always love it when people say, we go to a dinning hall camp because the Scouts can get more done at camp that way. How does that work, cause when you think about it, aren’t their brains turned off while they are sitting in that dinning hall, where the scouts back at the sites are still working to make a meal happen and continue working and having fun with it. Yeah, they might come back with more patches but what about the scouts who have to cook a meal for less than First Class, how are they advancing? But more importantly, Scouts is not all about patches and recognition, it is about preparing a youth for a better life. It is molding them into a team player. It is about giving them the tools for self discovery. Scouting often reminds me of the statement, give me food, I will be fed for a day, show me how to grow my food, I will be fed for a life time. Aren’t we as Scout leaders suppose to show them how to grow their food? We don’t have to force a program down their throat, matter fact we don’t have to even tell them we are teaching them teamwork and life skills. Matter fact, it might be better if they discovered that on their own, even if is 5, 10 or even 20 years down the road. Maybe as their own son’ (and daughters) are learning it in their life.

As I said in the beginning of this, I can not mention all that I learned at camp, partly cause it would be long, but also, some are just very hard to identify, but as I work and live each day, I know that the experience in the 6 days of camp each year played a strong role in the person I am today. It is even more important to me, to help other scouts to learn these great things as well. That is why it has become a yearly tradition for so many years. I know that I have instilled many of these values to the youth that have attended Lyle but I could have never done it without Lyle as a tool. Some Scouts have come back to say “Thanks” to me and the camp. Some talk about the great things that happened at camp. Some, never a say word, but as you seen them in life after Scouting, you know that Scouting and more importantly, the camp program at Lyle had a large impact on them as professionals in the business world they belong to now. Teamwork, unity and understanding how to deal with both success and failure are all big elements to their future successes.

 God Bless Lyle and it staffs, for the many skills and lessons which it brings to so many Scouts AND leaders each year, Robert S. Lyle is really a magic place to those who allow the magic to happen and the wisdom to recognize how valuable it is to both the youth and adults who participate in program.

Tim Falendysz
Scoutmaster Troop 161
Southeast Wisconsin Council #634
Camper of Robert S. Lyle since 1974