Markie- Got your letter yesterday!
You save everything!!
Thanks...
So What are your Markie Memories?
Mine- maintaining the most miles run with him-
be it daily Aikens, or the Long Schvitz!
also regretting not getting to be in Bunk I with him as my counselor! As crazy as everyone told me you where and to stay away-obviously I didn't Listen-to them <IMG SRC="http://www.campalton.com/smilies/smile.gif" BORDER=0 ALT=":)">- Thanks for Making MY CAMP ALTON Years some of the best in my Life!
Hope to see you soon as I will be NYC bound in a few weekends maybe.
So what are your MARK BRECKER MEMORIES!
altaholic@hotmail.com
Uncle Markie Memories!
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Gary Scharoff
- Site Admin
- Posts: 212
- Joined: Mon Jan 08, 2001 7:00 pm
- Location: Scarsdale,NY
- Contact:
Re: Uncle Markie Memories! 
Quote
My favorite and I am not sure how it happened but Uncle Markie and poison ivy where it should not have been...I remember him walking around in a toga for days!
Must have been out camping and used the wrong leaves!!!! Did not read JC and Connie Martin's manual of foliage to avoid!
Just one of many...now you have me thinking!
There are MANY!
[url=http://www.campalton.com/2004altondinner_invitation.htm]Annual Alton Dinner[/url]
gms@pipeline.com
Must have been out camping and used the wrong leaves!!!! Did not read JC and Connie Martin's manual of foliage to avoid!
Just one of many...now you have me thinking!
There are MANY!
[url=http://www.campalton.com/2004altondinner_invitation.htm]Annual Alton Dinner[/url]
gms@pipeline.com
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Bernie Sweet
Re: Uncle Markie Memories!
Uncle Markie Memories? Chief did smile from time to time. Bobby Fisher's parents swung by the pavilion one weekend and took us counselors water skiing. One evening, it took me fifteen minutes to reel in a six pound bass. Resident fish maven Alan Wulf dressed and fileted the 'beastie' into enough pieces so that my whole bunk had breaded filets for breakfast the next morning. Harry Hart did the honors. Hot showers were available only under the kitchen. Figures. That said, we dove into the chilly deep water at the pavilion, climbed out, soaped up everywhere then dove back in for the rinse. That was living! Once, I saw Mary Tobe bathe in the shallow crib at the waterfront. I remember a trip to Laconia where film star James Mason and his wife, Pamela Caleno (sp?) were starring on stage at the Laconia Playhouse. We went back stage and met them. I've been star struck ever since. There was a young and beautiful Wolfeboro teen we knew who bore the nick name, "The Town Pump!" To this day I can't remember why. More as time permits, Markie.
bernarda@bellsouth.net
bernarda@bellsouth.net
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Michael Kupersmith
NOW IT CAN BE TOLD
Mark Brecker has been a living legend at Camp Alton for six decades (including the 12 years since Alton?s demise.) I thought that scores of memories of ?Uncle Markie? would have been recorded on this page by this time. I, for one, am bitterly disappointed.
Of course, I have not yet made my contribution, but I do so now in the hopes that more reminiscences will follow. I have been reluctant to tell this tale for reasons that will become apparent as you read on, I have decided that since the applicable statutes of limitations, both civil and criminal, have long ago expired, that NOW IT CAN BE TOLD.
It was either 1959 or 1960 ? Mark, I am certain, will provide not only the correct year but the precise day. Mutiny was afoot among the junior staff. Counselors? snack ? I must assume that most of you are familiar with counselors? snack ? or was snack eliminated after my time? ? had devolved to stingy servings of stale Jello. Some of us decided that we needed to take things into our own hands ? literally.
Late one evening, after snack had ended and the last stragglers had straggled back to their bunks and elsewhere, a small group of brave commandos invaded the kitchen cooler in search of victuals. Among the stalwart crew were Mark and yours truly. (There were one or two others, but time has deprived my memory of their identities ? perhaps Mark could fill in these names as well.) One of the conspirators entered the cooler, expropriated a large watermelon and beat a hasty retreat across the circle, in the general direction of the A-field.
It was at this juncture that the point man made a fatal miscalculation. The prize (melon, not camper), was handed off to Mark, who enthusiastically seized it and took off uphill at top speed. At the top of the circle, on the very spot where Mrs. M?s memorial garden was later (ironically) located, disaster struck. To this day, I cannot say with confidence exactly what happened. I heard a loud shriek and turned in the direction of M. Brecker in time to see his arms and legs splayed in all directions, and the prize melon flying upwardly and then downwardly with a very hard splat. We quickly scattered for cover.
When we finally determined that the coast was clear, we returned to the scene of the calamity. Panic set in as we realized that the dawn would soon reveal evidence of our misadventure. We picked up and carried off all identifiable pieces of melon to the incinerator. (I understand that environmental consciousness eventually led to the elimination of the incinerator, but let me tell you, as one who spent many a long trip day burning Alton?s week-long accumulation of garbage (burnable or not) of every imaginable description, it was a camp institution to be avoided.) I remember clearly grinding what we could see of melon-remains into the sandy soil and pine needles to further disguise our misdeeds, and I remember rendezvousing by agreement immediately after reveille to insure the elimination of the last scraps of evidence. (As it happened, this melon was particularly fecund, and we never did hide or remove all of the seeds, but apparently no one ever noticed.)
I don?t recall that the melon was ever missed by the kitchen crew. In any event, I?m quite sure that we did not receive any dire warnings at the Lower Camp counselors? meeting about pilfering from the kitchen or other related felonious conduct.
Of course, I feel very bad about it now. I?ve said 100 baruchas in penitence. I?ve also made an extra contribution to the Marson Scholarship Fund at BLS.
What about you, Mark?
kuper@mail.crt.state.vt.us
Of course, I have not yet made my contribution, but I do so now in the hopes that more reminiscences will follow. I have been reluctant to tell this tale for reasons that will become apparent as you read on, I have decided that since the applicable statutes of limitations, both civil and criminal, have long ago expired, that NOW IT CAN BE TOLD.
It was either 1959 or 1960 ? Mark, I am certain, will provide not only the correct year but the precise day. Mutiny was afoot among the junior staff. Counselors? snack ? I must assume that most of you are familiar with counselors? snack ? or was snack eliminated after my time? ? had devolved to stingy servings of stale Jello. Some of us decided that we needed to take things into our own hands ? literally.
Late one evening, after snack had ended and the last stragglers had straggled back to their bunks and elsewhere, a small group of brave commandos invaded the kitchen cooler in search of victuals. Among the stalwart crew were Mark and yours truly. (There were one or two others, but time has deprived my memory of their identities ? perhaps Mark could fill in these names as well.) One of the conspirators entered the cooler, expropriated a large watermelon and beat a hasty retreat across the circle, in the general direction of the A-field.
It was at this juncture that the point man made a fatal miscalculation. The prize (melon, not camper), was handed off to Mark, who enthusiastically seized it and took off uphill at top speed. At the top of the circle, on the very spot where Mrs. M?s memorial garden was later (ironically) located, disaster struck. To this day, I cannot say with confidence exactly what happened. I heard a loud shriek and turned in the direction of M. Brecker in time to see his arms and legs splayed in all directions, and the prize melon flying upwardly and then downwardly with a very hard splat. We quickly scattered for cover.
When we finally determined that the coast was clear, we returned to the scene of the calamity. Panic set in as we realized that the dawn would soon reveal evidence of our misadventure. We picked up and carried off all identifiable pieces of melon to the incinerator. (I understand that environmental consciousness eventually led to the elimination of the incinerator, but let me tell you, as one who spent many a long trip day burning Alton?s week-long accumulation of garbage (burnable or not) of every imaginable description, it was a camp institution to be avoided.) I remember clearly grinding what we could see of melon-remains into the sandy soil and pine needles to further disguise our misdeeds, and I remember rendezvousing by agreement immediately after reveille to insure the elimination of the last scraps of evidence. (As it happened, this melon was particularly fecund, and we never did hide or remove all of the seeds, but apparently no one ever noticed.)
I don?t recall that the melon was ever missed by the kitchen crew. In any event, I?m quite sure that we did not receive any dire warnings at the Lower Camp counselors? meeting about pilfering from the kitchen or other related felonious conduct.
Of course, I feel very bad about it now. I?ve said 100 baruchas in penitence. I?ve also made an extra contribution to the Marson Scholarship Fund at BLS.
What about you, Mark?
kuper@mail.crt.state.vt.us
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Uncler Marky
Re: 1960 [and then back to the "future" {1959}]
Yes, Your Honor,
Vague as it is, especially many of the details, I now recall the watermelon affair and know it had been 1960 [when we were junior counselors], unlike 1959 when it would have been an "inside job".
As a matter of fact, there was that "inside job" to which I had alluded, in 1959 when your cousin [Mike Reiss] and I were [so ugly we could be?] kitchen boys. Food and snack were quite good that year, but we just didn't get our just desserts, literally. Pies especially were less than a delight to eat and a danger to serve, their fruit components being so liquidy that most of their contents would indiscriminantly "spill-over" into bunk mothers' sheitls and OD's tsitsit [or was it the other way around?], onto walls, floors and the porches, wherever, so by the time the poor campees got a serving, other than the crust there was only the aroma to salivate.
One day the baker had an epiphany: shortcake made from strawberry so good that even Darryl would have been proud. The entire staff, especially the elders [and in those days anyone over 40 met that criteria], looked forward to a novel [for 1959] nocturnal delight.
Unfortunately for them, fortunately for a self-selected few, and most unfortunate for the devious, fifth columnist perpetrator, the latter kitchen boy trying, it would seem, to curry favor with his colleagues in preparation for the next year's equal class standing as a co-junior counselor, figuratively over-turned the "apple cart".
Fifteen minutes before snack CIT's and JC's gathered behind the kitchen, I entered the walk in, a more less human "chain" was formed, and that prized and longed for evening snack highlight was despoiled at a rate greater than that which occured in/to Egypt as Moses led the Children out and to freedom.
But if you think the Children of Israel found the sight of the approaching chariots of Pharoah frightful, it ain't notin compared to hearing the footsteps of The Fox [our beloved Phil Bortnick, may G-d rest his and Rose's souls] approaching. Swifter than the parting of the Red Sea, all perpetrators scrambled, pies in tow, to parts unknown. All except one, that insidious, invidious "insider".
"Hi, Phil", I tried to, as calmly as possible, greet him. "What's going on?" he asked me while a plurality of my body was still in the walk in, my heart and soul having already departed. OK, I was a thief, or worse, why compound the felony by lying, especially when it wouldn't work. Without naming names [I still had hoped for comeraderie should I be nonetheless "invited back"] I confessed.
By then, one by one, staff started filing into the dining hall and, long before reaching "the trough" each bellowed: "Where is the short-cake?" I don't recall how Phil conveyed that there were barely any left [six, I believe] and who was at fault, but each speedily became aware of both realities. There was no place for me to hide and running away would have substantiated the cowardly the wimp that I was [am?]. So I sat there, at the same table with Rose and Phil, and as best as I can recall, with Eddie and Fritzi [may G-d bless the soul of this woman who had been one of my Mom's closest friends for scores of years] Goldman, and, after an all too short hiatus, Chief and Mrs. M [whose souls are surely united with the others, our beloved Mary Tobe, and everyone else, including grays!]
Classically, NOBODY [that I can recall] chastised me for this, to put it euphemistically, "indiscretion" [not even Eddie Goldman or Phin Tobe!] And classically and typically, our leader, The Chief, forwent being one of the six recipients, making sure, of course, that Mrs. M., a lady of ladies, was not similarly deprived.
Those were the days, but Mike, so were those that preceded 1959 and 1960 as well as 1953 when we first encountered Camp Alton in G-1. [Five counselors, in retrospect barely old than we, had to endure me, three of whom we had simultaneously, and of these three none survived to see this day.] Do you recall Bobby Reissman in our bunk? I ask because another [deserved] Alton legend - "Uncle" Neil Brier - provided me with a recent obituary of a "Providian" octogenerian by the same name [leaving a son "Jr."] who silently had owned a portion of Camp Alton Inc. stock, and possibly someone reading this megillah [gorillah?] can provide some info. Similarly, the ensuing decades were indeed great ones and I am sure it will surprise nobody that a night does not pass when the [souless] body of this immature sixty+ year old is not back at the shores of Winnie P at locations never far from Clay Point whose topography is emanating alternate yet simultaneous vibrations of tenuous surreality and resurrection.
May G-d bless and conserve.
mark@lgpltd.com
Vague as it is, especially many of the details, I now recall the watermelon affair and know it had been 1960 [when we were junior counselors], unlike 1959 when it would have been an "inside job".
As a matter of fact, there was that "inside job" to which I had alluded, in 1959 when your cousin [Mike Reiss] and I were [so ugly we could be?] kitchen boys. Food and snack were quite good that year, but we just didn't get our just desserts, literally. Pies especially were less than a delight to eat and a danger to serve, their fruit components being so liquidy that most of their contents would indiscriminantly "spill-over" into bunk mothers' sheitls and OD's tsitsit [or was it the other way around?], onto walls, floors and the porches, wherever, so by the time the poor campees got a serving, other than the crust there was only the aroma to salivate.
One day the baker had an epiphany: shortcake made from strawberry so good that even Darryl would have been proud. The entire staff, especially the elders [and in those days anyone over 40 met that criteria], looked forward to a novel [for 1959] nocturnal delight.
Unfortunately for them, fortunately for a self-selected few, and most unfortunate for the devious, fifth columnist perpetrator, the latter kitchen boy trying, it would seem, to curry favor with his colleagues in preparation for the next year's equal class standing as a co-junior counselor, figuratively over-turned the "apple cart".
Fifteen minutes before snack CIT's and JC's gathered behind the kitchen, I entered the walk in, a more less human "chain" was formed, and that prized and longed for evening snack highlight was despoiled at a rate greater than that which occured in/to Egypt as Moses led the Children out and to freedom.
But if you think the Children of Israel found the sight of the approaching chariots of Pharoah frightful, it ain't notin compared to hearing the footsteps of The Fox [our beloved Phil Bortnick, may G-d rest his and Rose's souls] approaching. Swifter than the parting of the Red Sea, all perpetrators scrambled, pies in tow, to parts unknown. All except one, that insidious, invidious "insider".
"Hi, Phil", I tried to, as calmly as possible, greet him. "What's going on?" he asked me while a plurality of my body was still in the walk in, my heart and soul having already departed. OK, I was a thief, or worse, why compound the felony by lying, especially when it wouldn't work. Without naming names [I still had hoped for comeraderie should I be nonetheless "invited back"] I confessed.
By then, one by one, staff started filing into the dining hall and, long before reaching "the trough" each bellowed: "Where is the short-cake?" I don't recall how Phil conveyed that there were barely any left [six, I believe] and who was at fault, but each speedily became aware of both realities. There was no place for me to hide and running away would have substantiated the cowardly the wimp that I was [am?]. So I sat there, at the same table with Rose and Phil, and as best as I can recall, with Eddie and Fritzi [may G-d bless the soul of this woman who had been one of my Mom's closest friends for scores of years] Goldman, and, after an all too short hiatus, Chief and Mrs. M [whose souls are surely united with the others, our beloved Mary Tobe, and everyone else, including grays!]
Classically, NOBODY [that I can recall] chastised me for this, to put it euphemistically, "indiscretion" [not even Eddie Goldman or Phin Tobe!] And classically and typically, our leader, The Chief, forwent being one of the six recipients, making sure, of course, that Mrs. M., a lady of ladies, was not similarly deprived.
Those were the days, but Mike, so were those that preceded 1959 and 1960 as well as 1953 when we first encountered Camp Alton in G-1. [Five counselors, in retrospect barely old than we, had to endure me, three of whom we had simultaneously, and of these three none survived to see this day.] Do you recall Bobby Reissman in our bunk? I ask because another [deserved] Alton legend - "Uncle" Neil Brier - provided me with a recent obituary of a "Providian" octogenerian by the same name [leaving a son "Jr."] who silently had owned a portion of Camp Alton Inc. stock, and possibly someone reading this megillah [gorillah?] can provide some info. Similarly, the ensuing decades were indeed great ones and I am sure it will surprise nobody that a night does not pass when the [souless] body of this immature sixty+ year old is not back at the shores of Winnie P at locations never far from Clay Point whose topography is emanating alternate yet simultaneous vibrations of tenuous surreality and resurrection.
May G-d bless and conserve.
mark@lgpltd.com
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Michael Kupersmith
Just the facts please, Ma'm.
That's all great, Mark, except that our bunkmate was Bobby Riseman, NOT Reissman. You can check both the '53 and '54 Annuals. Let's stick to the facts.
kuper@mail.crt.state.vt.us
kuper@mail.crt.state.vt.us
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Uncle Moish
- Senior Member
- Posts: 83
- Joined: Thu Jan 05, 2006 8:11 pm
Re: Your Right,
I'm wrong [as usual].
Of course I may be wrong about the way I spelled the decedent's name - it was about two weeks ago, so what might one expect.
Still, it would be great to hear from others [shareholders or those close to them] about this recent lost Altonian and, given his seeming silence, whether behind the scenes he was more active and positively involved that appears at first blush.
Moish
mark@lgpltd.com
Of course I may be wrong about the way I spelled the decedent's name - it was about two weeks ago, so what might one expect.
Still, it would be great to hear from others [shareholders or those close to them] about this recent lost Altonian and, given his seeming silence, whether behind the scenes he was more active and positively involved that appears at first blush.
Moish
mark@lgpltd.com
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Bernie Sweet
Another remembrance
Among other memories were those evenings spent in the mess hall at night listening to classical recordings on a Columbia 360K surround-sound player. No such thing as stereo in them there days, the mid-fifties. What did we hear? Brahms and Cesar Franck. We were a small group of devotees includeing Ronnie Weintraub. More later.
basweet@aol.com
basweet@aol.com