On Thursday, September 2, we drove to Salemville, Pennsylvania for lunch with Marion and Erma Van Horn. It was great having them meet Madeline, my wife. That afternoon we were on to Punxsutawney, PA, and spent the night in a neat little cabin on the back lawn of a tourist home. Friday we traveled to Alfred Station, New York, where we were guests of Mrs. Ivanna Lewis and daughter, Jean over the Sabbath. I could not have been more proud, introducing my wife to my friends in the Second Alfred Seventh Day Baptist Church. Madeline had her first look at the Gothic in Alfred–soon to be our first home.

Driving to Camp Gorton on Sunday afternoon, we met the Dunn family on their way home to Hornell. All of them seemed especially excited meeting Madeline and we were to learn the reason when we reached Camp Gorton. Going into the Chief’s cottage, where we were to live the next two weeks, we discovered that the Dunns and the staff members left in camp had made special preparations for our coming. Amusing signs and notes were placed in appropriate places in the cottage: On the living room stove, “Old Home Week”. On the bathroom mirror, “Shave twice a day the first week”. Etc., Etc. A large cardboard box on the kitchen table contained forty-two pieces of Corning top-of-the-stove cookware with clamp-on aluminum handles–gift to us from the Boy Scout Council. We had fun discovering the mischievous welcoming ideas my Scouting friends had worked out for us.

Two Sea Scout staff members–one of them Addison Scholes–were still in camp and invited us to dinner with them in the mess hall. Tired of being dressed up for several days, Madeline and I changed into comfortable shorts and culottes. I-Then the dinner bell rang, we went to the mess hall to find our hosts in full Sea Scout uniform dress. Incidentally, the menu they served was scrambled eggs and fried potatoes. After the meal we loaned the men our car to go to a dance on Keuka Lake. It was a good way to start our Camp Gorton honeymoon.

In addition to the use of the pleasant Chief’s cottage, there was a canoe and a sailboat at our disposal. Sailing was a “first” for Madeline. She learned quickly but often preferred to experiment with cooking and baking in the new Corning glassware, I remember that one night we paddled the canoe across the lake, following a shaft of moonlight.

Farmer Wood, a friend of Camp Gorton whose farm was at the end of Lake Waneta, offered us any vegetables we would like from his garden. The sweet corn, tomatoes and other vegetables we gathered made super meals.

One day we found an injured chipmunk on the lake shore. All of our efforts to save him failed. We named him “Rocky” because we found him on the rocks.

It was a good experience to visit my first cousin, Dr. Lowell Fitz Randolph and his wife in Ithaca, New York. Lowell was Uncle Alvah’s only son. He was a world renowned plant geneticist at Cornell University. I believe that visit was the last time we saw him. (Dr. Lowell’s son, Robert and I are in frequent contact now by phone and correspondence.)