Book Description

"We are all a little wild here with numerous projects of social reform," Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote in 1840 about the spirit of his time. "Not a reading man but has a draft of a new community in his waistcoat pocket." Almost a century later, five idealists, similarly committed to social reform, founded a new community, Camp Woodland, in upstate New York inspired by the spirit of their time. Some founders were educators. Others contributed administrative talents to the camp's operations. All were committed to racial and social justice and cultural diversity. Well before the currency of the Civil Rights Movement, Camp Woodland introduced a racially and ethnically diverse group of campers and staff into a traditional, rural community and succeeded in having its progressive vision accepted and embraced by its neighbors. How was a camp like Woodland able to become part of the rural community in which it was located? How did it earn the trust and acceptance of its mountain neighbors? And how was it able to harmonize potentially incompatible cultures? The Improbable Community tells the story of this achievement and recounts the collection of folk music, folklore and history by Camp Woodland that was an outgrowth of the friendships it formed.