The Strong River Way
The ethos of central Mississippi’s Strong River Camp & Farm left Jennifer Kornegay with a deep appreciation of sheer childhood joy, and it remains with her to this very day.
Summer is a season but also an attitude. Even as an adult, the rising temps flip a switch in me, leaving me feeling looser and more carefree, despite everything else in my life remaining unchanged. But nothing I sense compares to the “let out of jail” freedom I felt as a kid each summer. And, as I watch kids now, I wonder how many of them get to experience this. I see over-involved parents hovering over their over-committed, over-scheduled children. I’m not a parent myself, so I'll concede I’ve probably got no place commenting on the above. But I can tell you this, when it’s done right, summer sleep-away camp is a sure way, perhaps the purest way, to capture the enchanting ease of a Southern summer — the attitude.
The South boasts some of the best camps in the country. They’re perched high amid mountain scenery, nestled behind dunes on the coast and cozied up to the banks of sparkling, sprawling lakes. But amid the pines and beside a rushing river in rural central Mississippi, Strong River Camp & Farm has elevated the simple magic of summer (the season and the attitude) to an art, and has been delivering it to kids since it first opened its orange gates almost 50 years ago.
It looks pretty ordinary. It’s not. Ask any past camper or counselor about their time there, and you’ll get a smile and a story about the spot that founder Tay Gillespie built into what she deemed “a paradise for children,” its foundation rooted in a philosophy she shared with me during my counselor interview in 1994.
“I want campers to know what it means to be honestly hungry, and then be fed and fed well; to get really dirty, and then get good and clean; to play and explore until they are truly worn-out tired, and then go to sleep. And to feel the freedom of choosing what they want to do and then doing it for the sheer fun of it,” she said.
We were sitting in rockers on her porch, drinking iced tea, a mint sprig freshly snipped from her garden and tucked into the glass, tickling my nose with each sip. I thought back to my summer as a Strong River camper eight years prior with an “a-ha!” realization. What she’d just described was at the core of my love for the place, an affection forged by a single sweltering week I spent there at age 12 and one that had become a beacon calling me back to be a counselor after my freshman year of college.
Tay’s mantra also underpins my Strong River memories. Of sticky juice trailing down my chin as I eat watermelon, chilled to icy perfection not in a refrigerator but in a cold, bubbling river. Of getting up before dawn, happily (if not easily) on my own, to pluck blueberries off the bush for a cobbler to be enjoyed later that day. Of not cursing dark clouds but praying for rain since it meant playing a game of soccer where the object was not scoring points but discovering just how much mud it takes to cover my body completely. Of sitting on the floor in a barn, drinking chocolate milk in my PJs while singing “If I Had a Hammer” and “Midnight Special” to the guitar strumming of a counselor in cut-offs. Of reuniting with old friends. Of making a new friend as we find a shared rhythm padding a canoe. Of mustering the courage to challenge my first crush in tetherball (and having the confidence to beat him soundly).
Since there are no schedules at Strong River, there was time for it all. This emphasis on unstructured bliss is still in place. Watches are banned, and the clanging of a cast-iron bell marks important events like meals and lights out.
“I want campers to know what it means to be honestly hungry, and then be fed and fed well; to get really dirty, and then get good and clean; to play and explore until they are truly worn-out tired, and then go to sleep. And to feel the freedom of choosing what they want to do and then doing it for the sheer fun of it."
Unlike some camps that shuffle campers through a prescribed list of “fun” in 45-minute intervals, at Strong River campers do the activities — or activity — they enjoy most at their pace. Want to swim for hours? Play in the pool until your fingers resemble raisins. Ropes course your thing? Swing away. Nobody ever has to make macaroni art. Unless they want to make macaroni art.
There are a few rules. Cell phones, tablets and electronics (of all kinds) are not allowed. Tay wanted Strong River unsullied by distractions, allowing campers to connect with each other and nature and to find beauty and wonder in the smallest, most “mundane” moments. A key lesson learned was to be present.
The meals are a far cry from the lunchroom food found in many camp dining halls. Biscuits and pies are made from scratch. With most fruits and veggies harvested from the adjacent Strong River Farm, breakfast, lunch and dinner at the camp were farm-to-table long before that was a trend. As for accommodations, the cabins are comfortable enough, but there’s little luxury: no air-conditioning and, at least when I was there, one bare bulb with a string pull-on provided a bit of light at night.
Martyn Howells, a former counselor, turned the pleasures of a Strong River camp session into a poem. The most significant (to me) lines of “The Strong River Way” read:
To laugh often and love much
As Emerson taught us to say.
To find our joy in being a friend and living the Strong River Way
From miles around the campers come
And look forward to the day
When schedules end and freedom begins
For living the Strong River Way.
The Way has undeniable value but means different things to different people. On the Strong River website, Tay wrote, “What Strong River has to offer is good memories.” I respectfully disagree. The Strong River Way creates far more than fond recollections; it burns imprints of warm happiness into your brain, the kind that get you grinning any time you think on them.
Tay passed in 2018, but Strong River is still hosting kids and introducing them to the Way. Her daughter is running things now, with one of the guitar-playing, cut-off wearing counselors of my childhood by her side. I’ve not been to Strong River since I helped my last session campers load footlockers into their parents’ cars. Not much later, I said goodbye to my fellow counselors and Tay and returned to college. I’m not sure I’ll ever make it back to the camp physically, but no matter. Like any good Strong River camper or counselor, I’ve taken the Way to heart, so Strong River will always remain there.
About the author
Jennifer Stewart Kornegay's magazine articles appear in local, regional and national magazines and websites including Garden & Gun, Southern Living, American Profile,The Local Palate, Conde Nast Traveler, Alabama magazine, Birmingham magazine, Paste magazine, thekitchn.com, travelandleisure.com, The Atlanta Journal Constitution, Alabama Living, Alabama Journey, okra magazine, Good Grit, Edible Lower Alabama, Southern Ladymagazine, Georgia magazine, al.com, myscoop.com, rootsrated.com and more. She writes a monthly food column for Alabama Livingmagazine and is the managing editor of the Montgomery Business Journal.
- Jennifer Stewart Kornegayhttps://www.salvationsouth.com/author/jkornegay/
- Jennifer Stewart Kornegayhttps://www.salvationsouth.com/author/jkornegay/
