OSWEGO – What started out as a camp to remedy tuberculosis has now turned into an Oswego County staple for 75 years, as former camp director and local author Jim Farfaglia will release his next book, “Oswego’s Camp Hollis: Haven by the Lake,” on July 5.
The three year project will take a look at the entire 75 year history of Camp Hollis, which started out as Oswego County Health Camp but became Camp Hollis after Judge Eugene Sullivan turned it into a camp for children with “troubles” as Farfaglia described it.
Farfaglia is nothing short of an expert on the camp and its history, being a native Oswego County resident from Fulton and being involved in the camp in three key facets: as a camper, counselor and full-time director for over two decades.
Farfaglia decided to write the full history of the camp to honor its 75th anniversary, even though a photograph book was released in 2007, highlighting the early years of the camp.
“[My book] relies heavily on the oral history from people that were involved with the camp,” Farfaglia said. “The coolest thing is I’ve been able to take it through its entire history, some of the landmark things that have happened over the years, how it shifted from a free camp to a camp with sliding scale fees.”
These fees came about in 2003 when the county, who runs Camp Hollis, could not afford to sustain as a free camp. This gave rise to the Friends of Camp Hollis, a not-for-profit group that raises money to send campers to Camp Hollis in the event that they cannot pay some or all of the fees.
The book starts off describing the camp’s origins in the 1920s and 30s, as Oswego County Health Camp. Since there was no cure for tuberculosis at the time, the remedy was “fresh air, good food and healthy living,” Farfaglia said. The camp invited sick kids to help build their immune system, something that Farfaglia’s father was invited to. According to Farfaglia, his dad’s summers at the health camp led him to send each of his children to camp, something that changed his son’s life.
“It changed my life going to that camp,” Farfaglia said. “That happens a lot, not just at our camp, but all camps. I thought it was important to honor what camps can do for kids in this book.”
In 1945, a decision was made to bring back a camp to Oswego, naming it Camp Hollis to honor Dr. LeRoy Hollis who started the health camp and passed away one year later. Sullivan saw a need for at-risk children to enjoy a break from their difficult lives and organized a way to send them to Camp Hollis.
“He saw kids come through his court, and he felt they weren’t bad kids, they were just given a tough break in life or maybe took a wrong turn somewhere,” Farfaglia said. “He really felt the kids just needed a break, something fun, something positive in their life and that’s why he created Camp Hollis.”
While the camp was open to all children at that time, it was not until around the 1960s that kids from outside the court system or orphanages were made aware of Camp Hollis, according to Farfaglia.
The process of compiling information for the book took two or three years by Farfaglia but the memories had been recounted over the course of five decades.
“When I ran the camp through most of my adult life, whenever [people] had memories and came by, I’d write them down and stick them in a folder,” Farfaglia said. “I’ve been collecting for 50 years, not continuously obviously.”
Farfaglia’s book brings up the generations of memories and stories from staff and children who spent their summers at the camp, culminating in a history of the entire camp from the Oswego County Health Camp to the modern day Camp Hollis.
For generations, the camp has provided children with countless memories and helped shape them into the people they are today, offering them the chance to learn new “skills,” and “be whoever you want to be,” according to Farfaglia. These memories are what makes up the 75 years of the camp and Farfaglia’s new book “Oswego’s Camp Hollis: Haven by the Lake.”
“Around 2009, one day these two men came to camp, they were adult brothers and asked if they could see the camp,” Farfaglia said. “They were orphans at one of the Oswego orphanages in the 1950s, and they came back to Oswego just to visit and decided to come to Camp Hollis because one of their best childhood memories was coming to camp. That really touched my heart … They really talked about what it meant to be able to go to Camp Hollis for the summers they got to go.”
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