Morristown Rotary offers helping hand to Girl Scouts January 1, 2003 MORRISTOWN – History will be repeating itself thanks to the Morristown Rotary Club which recently renewed its commitment to providing a fun, safe and educational camping experience for Morris Area Girl Scouts. Rotary Club members have begun discussing ways to refurbish the old log cabin the group built at Jockey Hollow Girl Scout Camp and presented to Morris Area Girl Scout Council almost 70 years ago. As early as 1929, Morris Area Girl Scout Council was desperately seeking a property to provide a camping experience for all Girl Scouts in Morris County. According to Girl Scout archives, the Jockey Hollow Club loaned a “beautiful tract of land situated on Jockey Hollow Road’’ that “consists of woodland and open fields with several delightful brooks and a pond well suited to swimming.” To provide the camping experience to more girls, the Morristown Rotary Club began raising money to build a log cabin for Girl Scouts in Morris County. According to J.T. Maxwell, the cabin was constructed from logs that were used as scaffolding when the old National Armory on South Street in Morristown was torn down. The Morristown Rotary Club presented the cabin, now known as Old Cabin, to the Girl Scouts on Wednesday, June 20, 1934. Maxwell is the son of Dr. Harry T. Maxwell, who was the Rotary Club president at the time the cabin was dedicated to the Girl Scouts and son of Thyra Maxwell, chair of the Girl Scouts’ Camp Committee. For almost 70 years, Old Cabin has been the heart of camp, serving as a meeting place, a program center, a summer day camp office and a trading post. With plans to enhance the existing facilities and programs offered at Jockey Hollow Girl Scout Camp, the Morristown Rotary Club has offered to refurbish Old Cabin as a historic center. “With Jockey Hollow Girl Scout Camp’s location in a historic area, we feel it is important to teach our girls about the wonderful history of the area and the importance of the stewardship of the land,” said Helen Wronski, chief executive officer of Morris Area Girl Scout Council. “ We also want to teach our girls the important role the Morristown Rotary Club and Morris Area Girl Scout Council has played in local history.” Morris Area Girl Scout Council plans to use the interior of the two-room cabin to display Girl Scout memorabilia, including old camping equipment and photo archives of seven decades of the Jockey Hollow camp. Programs on local history will be offered to Girl Scouts and future trips to nearby Morristown National Historical Park at Jockey Hollow will be included in the Girl Scout program as part of the council’s Heritage Patch. To earn the Heritage Patch, girls must participate in several activities to learn about the history of Jockey Hollow, Tempe Wick, the Girl Scout camp, the Lenni-Lenape Indians and Native American folklore. “We have always been committed to the youth of our community, especially the Girl Scouts,” Rotary Club President Paul Nelson. “Our organization has a long history of supporting Girl Scouts and it would be fitting to take on this restoration project.” Through old photographs, the cabin will be renovated to its original appearance.“We have many volunteers who are eager to offer their expertise to this project,” Nelson said. “We are especially excited to take on a community project that has such meaning to our club. Members of our Rotary Club felt a great passion to provide facilities and learning experiences for our youth back in 1934. We are happy to follow through with their efforts 70 years later.” In addition to refurbishing Old Cabin, Morris Area Girl Scout Council plans to make the camp handicapped accessible, replace two existing pools with a more environmentally efficient pool, add troop cabins and replace the latrines with flush and composting toilets. ###