Bark Lake Memories from Richard Devenney
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Growing Up at Bark Lake
Richard Devenney shares a few stories from Bark Lake.
I am the youngest son of the Bark Lake Camp Director - Hart Devenney (1956-1968) and brother of Counsellor Don Devenney. Born in 1949, I first stepped on the soil of Bark Lake in 1956 when my family moved to Ontario from Manitoba (where I was born) and my father had been Provincial Director of Physical Education in the years 1946-1956.
I never attended as a camper at Bark Lake, nor was I ever a Counsellor; but, I was present for some or all of the summers of 1956 through 1968 with my Mother and Father where I served in the ceremonial roles as both "Camp Brat" and the "Catcher of Fish" for the Counsellor's Table at breakfast in those years. I did manage to get my Bronze Medaillion certification of the Royal Life Saving Society at Bark around 1965 (you would have to look it up). I also watched alot. For example, when the instructive swimming classes for the leaders'-in-training were being held, I often sat on the very large rock formation to the left of Bark Lodge, and took in (as best I could) what they were being taught.
I spent alot of time with the maintenance men who were very kind and generous to me in allowing me to tag along on various chores. They taught me how to carve wood, and to stay away from the places where snapping turtles might be (I am sure my little toes would have been delectable). In particular, Mr. Dallin ('Dal') Pickens, of nearby Gooderham, who was the head man on the maintenace team for all those early years, and Mr. Lloyd King were formative examples to me of the special decency of real country gentlemen.
I also spent alot of time in the Craft Shop where, as the campers were learning how to teach crafts, they could have a guinea-pig young fellow on which to try the techniques they were learning. Fishing, even all alone, was also a constant diversion - Flag Point, the Canoe docks (when not in use), various shore locations, and after dinner with my Dad on the Swimming Dock, or out and about in one of the small motor boats in several favourite locations around the lake.
Later as I grew older, I went to summer camps of my own such as 'Pinecrest' near Bala Ontario , and to 'On Dah Da Wah' on Golden Lake near Pembroke. When I was 14, I took up long distance running. So when I was at Bark, in the years 1964-67 especially, I regularly ran out and back on the Camp road (before paving) to check on mosquito levels and for lynx tracks, all while scaring numerous frogs and squirrels, and the various drivers of incoming or outgoing vehicles. It was about a 8 km jaunt.
Once, I decided to try the 'great circle' out Bark road to the Highway (503), west on it to the old highway 503 into Irondale, thorough the village of Irondale and around to where the old highway met the new and back west to the entance of the Camp road, and home. Close to 20 km, I figured then. That was a long run with no water. Wisely, I never tried that again.
There are many other remembrances which I will record in due course. The 'magic' campfires, the story-telling, the sing-songs, the chapel services, the bouncing bog, the 'mock' disaster exercises, the snapping turtles, the fish stories, building kayaks, visits by John Robarts and Bill Davis (when each were Minister of Education), trying out 'winter-camping'...it goes on and on...and it is all before 1970.
Hart Devenney
My Dad - Hartland Morrison Devenney, Sr. - known to everyone as "Hart" - shuffled off this mortal coil in 1976 - and even if he had not, he would be 103 now - so he will only be able to attend in spirit. I am sure he will be around, if he ever listens to my prayers...
This year will mark the 51st anniversary of his (and my) setting foot on the Bark Lake property - yes, 1956 - he was 53, and I had just turned 7 - I have a huge volume of very special memories as I played a special role - I was the "Camp Brat" - ask any of the counsellors, or maintenance guys from back then (if they are around).
Dad was a "Y" man all his life. He graduated in 1927 from the YMCA College in Springfield, Massachussets (where Canadian Dr. James Naismith invented the game of basketball in 1891), taking a four year degee in three years, receiving a B.Sc. in Physical Education. He was one of the first student Canadians to have so graduated. His brother Allan followed two years later. The next year he spent a year at Yale Divinity School, but it was not for him.
He came back to Canada to marry my mother Catherine Elizabeth Bickerton (always known as "Rena") in late 1929 and take up a post at the Montreal YMCA - running the teenage progarmme there for the next ten years. During that period, he also earned an M.Sc. in Phys. Ed at McGill in 1934. Accepted in the PhD. cousre, he never did it due to the econmic constraints of the Depression and having a young family.
In 1939, he was selected to be Director of Physical Education for the Province of Manitoba, but War broke out and he wanted to do his part. Too old to enlist, he joined YMCA Special Sevices, went overseas, and served until 1945 in North Africa, Palestine, Italy and England running 'furlough' phys.ed. programs for the troops in those places. When he returned to Canada, he went to Manitoba to take up the postion he had been offered 6 years earlier.
In the mid 1950s, he met Gord Wright who got him to come to Ontario to work in the the Department of Education of the provincial government and to have, as part of his duties, being the Camp Director at Bark Lake, which he did until his retirement in 1968.
The Great Bear Hunt of 1957
In the summer of 1957, the dump for the Camp was just 3/4 of a mile outside the then location of the Administration building. A family or two of bears really appreciated this fast food outlet (ie. the dump), and often enjoyed an evening meal there, where Moma bear and cubs could dine in relative luxury.
They eventually found out that even better dining was available to them. It was when they all discovered all they had to do was go further 'down the road' to the camp kitchen premises well afterhours, and breaking in to take whatever they could directly from the kitchen stores, still well before dawn. However, not only did this activity present a variety of concerning sanitary issues; but also, a real risk there might be an extremely bad direct encounter between bear and human which could lead to a real tragedy.
So it was not long before it was eventaully determined that something simply had to be done, and the nearest Forest Ranger/ Ministry of Natural Resources team were called in to assess the situation, and to offer suggestions and to formulate a plan for what should be done.
The solution, with all due consideration to all the various safety concerns, was to have a 'cull' of the nearby population of the bears. This cull happened, I think, in early August, and six or seven bears were eventually taken down over a period of a couple of days. Several of the carcasses, about 4 as I remember, were left very near the main dirt road, out near where the smaller dump road was, and it was a day or two before they were able to be removed.
A few campers, (it was "Boys" camp at the time, as separate camps were held - July was "Girls" Camp/ August was "Boys" each summer) who wished to take some souvenirs from these deceased animals, were able to do so - and teeth and claws were removed where possible. My own brother, Don Devenney did do that himself, obtaining the claws from one paw of a dead bear. He cleaned them up and polished them and put them in a box. Years later, I discovered these claws and I put them onto to a raw leather strap. I still have that strap, and for 15 years, it hung as a handsome adornment at a former country home of mine.
The problem of the bears settled down, and in the off season when the camp was not in operation over the next several years, the Forest Rangers continually monitored the situation, and to the extent steps ever needed to be taken thereafter, that was done when large numbers of people were not on site.
Kirk Wipper
My father, Hart D. Sr., and Kirk Wipper, the former U.of T. Phys. Ed. Professor, noted collector of canoes, and Director of Kanadlore Camp had a long, warm and very good personal relationship of some 25 years.
It is my understanding that Kirk had and my Dad met during my Dad's tenure as that Province's Director of Physical Education. The other possiblitity was some connection developed as the result of my eldest brother's (Hart D. Jr.) swimming career which was flourshing in the late 1940s. He swam in 1951-52 for the team at the University of Toronto where Kirk was a young Phys. Ed. faculty member. Eventually, my brother, known as Skip, later claimed the Canadian record in the 400yd. freestyle. Yet, this was, as they say, all before my time, as I was born in 1949.
It does not matter, since I always remember that Kirk Wipper's name was always fondly spoken in my family.
I also know Kirk has some history vis-a-vis Bark Lake, the details of which are for others to articulate since I do not know them. I think they date from in the 1950s. But, I do have the notion that they involved some degree of high jinks for which I was too young to be privy. Perhaps, involving the "borrowing" of an inscripted, carved log which was lying over the mantel in Bark Lodge. Dad and Kirk I am sure were not involved themselves, more likely only unnamed associates or surrogates left to be so...by the legend itself.
Nevertheless, after my Dad formally retired, Kirk kindly allowed my Dad to have some involvement in the summer operations of Camp Kandalore, allowing Dad and my mother also, to enjoy the magnificent Haliburton Highlands several more summers in the early 1970s.
