Kids get bigger dock, thanks to Kiwanis

One excited camper holds down a prized catch to measure it before releasing it back into Slusher Lake.

(Top) Eager children gather during the dock’s dedication at Camp Rosenbaum. Kiwanians from Astoria/Warrenton were on hand to celebrate along with the campers.

About the camp Camp Rosenbaum is a camp for at-risk children, ages 9-11, who live in Oregon and Southwest Washington. Many volunteers at the camp, which has been held for 37 years at the Rilea Armed Forces Training Center, are police officers and military personnel; however, the children do not know this until the final day of camp, when the adults arrive in uniform to greet the children. “The reason it is important for these at-risk kids to have this camp and the way it is put on by all volunteer police officers, inner city housing authority people, and National Guard in civilian clothes, is that the kids learn they can make better choices,” Emil “Swede” Nyberg says. “On the last day, when the volunteers come in their uniforms, many a tear is shed.This camp does change lives.” Rachel Strobel, a Portland police officer who volunteers at the camp, agrees. In an article printed in “The Daily Astorian,” Strobel explains the importance of the bonds made during camp. “These kids come from some tough backgrounds,” she says, “and they don’t always have very positive interactions with authority. This way, they get to know us as people first, and I’m always amazed by their reactions when they learn I’m a police officer.” Families of deployed troops and Cub Scout troops also use the camp.

Young campers at Oregon’s Camp Rosenbaum stand in excitement, toes lined up to the edge of the wooden dock, and swing their arms toward the lake, casting lure-led lines into Slusher Lake, hoping to snag a big one.

These campers have all the room in the world on this brand new dock, at least compared to the previous structure on which only a few budding anglers could squeeze into one small area, counting the minutes until the next group could take a turn. When Tracy Crews, a biologist with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, decided to do something about the camp’s lackluster fishing accommodations, she knew exactly where to turn. Kiwanis, of course.

The Kiwanis Club of Astoria-Warrenton, Oregon, invited Crews to one of its meetings to speak about the camp and immediately agreed to raise funds to replace the dock, which was built by the United States National Guard.

“I was there on the first day of camp (after the new dock was finished),” says member Emil “Swede” Nyberg. “There was a line of kids waiting to fish, and while they were waiting, they were being taught how to cast. This 12-year-old girl I was working with, when her turn came, she made a perfect cast, and as the lure hit the water, an 18-inch rainbow trout hit it. She was so excited and happy, so we re-baited and she cast again and the same thing happened.

“(Though it was a new dock), with 170 kids in camp, they would only get to fish one time for 15 or 20 minutes. At that moment knew we had to do better.”

So, the Astoria-Warrenton club raised even more funds—$US$10,000—to build an addition. The club received three grants (one from the Pacific Northwest District Kiwanis Foundation) and several donations and gifts. According to an article in The Daily Astorian, Swede estimates that all donations, including time and labor, added up to nearly $40,000.

Trysten Hendricks, a 10-year-old camper from Portland, told a Daily Astorian newspaper reporter she’d fished before. But, she added, “not at a pretty place like this.”