On Mountain Day, a group of kayakers, canoers, and paddleboarders all went to Lake Chocorua in Tamworth, NH. As soon as we got in the water, we were greeted by the sound of a pair of loons and were gifted the sight of a bald eagle circling our kayaks and canoes. The setting could not have been prettier. The clear, shallow waters surrounded by mountains made me think about the namesake camp that is closely associated with our school.

Camp Chocorua was a summer camp established by Ernest Balch in 1881 on Church Island on Squam Lake in Holderness, NH. Today, you can see a modern birch cross where the old one used to be in the outdoor chapel (depicted below).

Ernest Balch and the boys in the outdoor chapel in
Camp Chocorua, Church Island (c. 1886).

 Holderness Connections: The Balch Family 

Did you know that Camp Chocorua was the first boys’ camp in New Hampshire and one of the earliest in the US? Did you also know that it was established by a Holderness School alumnus? Ernest Balch was the son of the prominent Reverend Lewis Penn Witherspoon Balch and Emily Wiggin.

The Balchs are one of the early settler families in the town of Holderness–their former land (bought from the Livermores) is where our school sits today. We know about the goals of the camp thanks to the founder’s sister, Elizabeth Balch, as she wrote about the boys’ experiences for St. Nicholas Magazine in June of 1886.

Were I a boy, the life at Camp Chocorua would be my idea of a thoroughly good time, combining as it does plenty of fun, and a free, open-air life, with the acquisition of much useful knowledge for one's self, and the habit of exercising a thoughtful helpfulness for others. (Balch 1886, 607)

 Camp Life: Uniforms, Chores, and Traditions 

Campers would arrive in June and leave by early September, spending the whole summer strengthening their outdoor skills as well as learning life lessons. The boys had no academic classes. Instead, the camp focused on getting them used to the real world outside their comfortable upbringings.

They would build canoes, wash their own dishes, sleep on army blankets or on mattresses on the floor, earn their allowance, and decide how to use it (they could give it to charity, for example).

They even had a specific costume at the camp: a grey flannel shirt with shorts and the choice of shoes with stockings or barefoot. However, and only on Sundays, they had to wear red stockings and caps! We do have in our archival collections a photograph of one of the boys in the Chocorua uniform, so please use your imagination as to the colour of his outfit.

Holderness School Archives, Photography Collection (PH.6.5)

The camp had its own paper called “The Golden Rod”–which unfortunately, we do not hold a single copy in our school archives, so if by some miracle you come across one in your home, or even see one in a local store, please do let me know!

If you are interested in learning more about Camp Chocorua, please do take two minutes to read Elizabeth Balch’s own words here.

Until next time, 

About the Author

Dr. Jennifer Martinez
Archivist and Special Projects Associate, History and Capstone Faculty

Dr. Jennifer Martinez received her PhD and MA from the University of Liverpool in the United Kingdom. With a focus on classics and ancient history, Jennifer’s expertise is in gender and sexuality, art and archaeology, and museum collections. Her doctoral research investigated the wartime experiences of ordinary women in Classical Greece. Her MA dissertation focused on whether it is possible to identify soldiers as individuals as represented through the archaeological record of Classical Athens. She graduated magna cum laude from the University of Puerto Rico earning her Bachelor’s in Anthropology.

Jennifer reveals that she has a passion for travel literature, especially by women travelers from the 18th to early 20th centuries. She admits that she may be biased, but loves Greece, its culture, language and history (both ancient and modern.)