Camp Cachalot Alumni Association Announces 2010 Camp Cachalot Wall of Fame Inductees

Four Honored in Inaugural Class

(NEW BEDFORD, MA / FALL RIVER, MA / WAREHAM, MA)—June 1, 2010— The membership Camp Cachalot Alumni Association is pleased to announce the inaugural class of honorees being inducted onto the Camp Cachalot Wall of Fame.

Albert “Al” Hall, a veteran of four Scout units in the New Bedford area, and a highly-decorated Scouter (recipient of the Silver Beaver, the Pelican Award, Scouters Key, St. George Award, Wood Badge, and a Vigil Honor member of the Order of the Arrow), has been a fixture at Cachalot from the late 1960s to the present time. In addition to serving on the staff of many district and council events at Cachalot and as both a unit leader and a commissioner during summer camp, Al was a tireless volunteer at camp. Along with serving as a member of the Restoration Committee in the 1970s, Al was always on hand at “Beaver Weekends” tackling service projects, and spent a good deal of his own time to help with plumbing projects out at camp, whether it was replacing toilets or completely redoing the hot water system at the shower house. He even came out to help the ranger shut down the seasonal water system at the close of summer camp for much of the 1980s.

Mr. Hall also provided instruction and leadership to a large number of young men during his Scouting career. Many of Cachalot’s summer camp staffers counted Mr. Hall among their unit leaders, thanks to his involvement with several units, and many Scouts built their first hobo stoves or got their first taste of dutch oven cookery under his tutelage.

Sumner H. Morse served two separate stints of his career as a professional Scouter at Camp Cachalot, with very different impact each time.

His first service to Cachalot came as a professional in the Cachalot Council, in the early 1960s. Sumner was employed by the Council at the time of the 1964 fire that destroyed much of the forest canopy over Camp Cachalot. As the fire occurred mere months before the opening of summer camp, something had to be done to ensure that a summer program took place for the Scouts in the Cachalot Council. This took the form of a joint operation of the Cachalot and Squanto councils at neighboring Camp Squanto, and Sumner was very involved in operating this joint program, as its assistant director in 1964 and as its director in 1965.

He returned to the newly-formed Moby Dick Council as Scout Executive in the late 1970s, right at the height of the “Save Our Camps” campaign, with protestors on the lawn of the council’s offices on his first day on the job! He helped to defuse that situation and helped prevent the sale of Cachalot, and in his decade-long tenure, his efforts helped to transform the Moby Dick Council and Camp Cachalot from nearly-broke entities to financially-sound ones. He retired, leaving a legacy of a substantial permanent endowment to help finance Cachalot into its future.

L. Fred Prefontaine, member and sometime Scoutmaster of Troop 1 New Bedford, began his long service to Cachalot in 1958, and made many, many contributions to camp, right up until his death in 2001. He was a recipient of many of Scouting’s highest awards, including the Scouters Key, Scouter Training Award, the District Award of Merit, the Silver Beaver, Woodbadge, the Bronze Pelican, and the Vigil Honor of the Order of the Arrow. His service to Cachalot and its people was varied: helping to evacuate units and fight the fire of 1964, running the small resident program at Cachalot in 1964 and 1965 whose sole purpose was to clear debris from camp after the fire, to serving many years on both the Restoration Committee and the Cachalot and Moby Dick Camping and Properties Committee. He was a member of the Catholic Committee on Scouting, the Woodbadge Training Committee, an active adviser to Agawam and Neemat Lodge, and served as Cachalot’s summer camp director from 1971 until 1975. He was a frequent participant at Beaver Weekends, and once led the Council’s contingent to Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico, helping provide local Scouts with a backcountry adventure.

His skills as a carpenter and cabinetmaker also served Cachalot well. He coordinated the construction of the Trading Post across from Tom Cullen Field that was used from the mid-1960s until its destruction by fire in 1987, designed the current kitchen area for the camp’s Dining Hall, and, leveraging his role as an instructor with New Bedford Regional Vocational Technical High School, helped keep the camp supplied with tent platforms, picnic tables, and other carpentry projects with the help of his students.

The George W. Magee Memorial Trust Fund was established upon the death in 1939 of George W. P. Magee, the former manager of the Boston Opera House, who left a substantial portion of his estate to establish this permanent trust fund in his name, to “distribute the balance of the net income of the said Trust Fund to such of the councils of the BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA as are located in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and as, in the opinion of said Trustees, are performing the most efficient service, the said net income to be used, so far as possible, for the purchase and maintenance of summer camps or training camps in New England for the use of Boy Scouts.” Through the fund’s contributions, Mr. Magee’s name appears on buildings at Cachalot (and at other camps in Massachusetts) and on “Magee Night” competitions held during at summer camp.

Since its establishment, the Magee Fund has contributed more money towards the ongoing maintenance, program, and expansion of Camp Cachalot than any other single entity, well in excess of $500,000, and they continue to make contributions today. This money has enabled the construction and repair of many of the buildings at camp (almost every building at camp has benefited from monies from the Magee Fund), has purchased program equipment, bought and repaired vehicles, and has recently helped enable the replacement of the camp’s main power line in from Wareham.

About the Camp Cachalot Wall of Fame

Modeled after other “Hall of Fame”-type institutions, the Camp Cachalot Wall of Fame is intended to be a lasting memorial to the people and organizations that have been instrumental in the success of Cachalot and the experiences of those who have attended Cachalot over the years. Honorees may be nominated by anyone, but are strictly vetted by our Wall of Fame committee and are voted on by our membership for induction.

Nominees will have had a long history of service, program, financial, or professional contributions to the success of Camp Cachalot. More information can be found on the Alumni Association’s web site at:

http://www.cachalotalumni.org/walloffame/

About the Camp Cachalot Alumni Association

The Camp Cachalot Alumni Association was founded in 2004 by several current and former attendees of Camp Cachalot, with the express purpose of providing support for Camp Cachalot, helping to preserve the traditions and history of Camp Cachalot, and bringing generations of campers together to share their experiences. It is a not-for-profit organization operating under the auspices of the Narragansett Council. Camp Cachalot, whose name is taken from the French and Portuguese term for “sperm whale,” opened in the summer of 1946 and has since served the youth of Southeastern Massachusetts, including New Bedford, Fall River, Wareham, Taunton, and points between.

Membership is open to any and all persons who have been affiliated with Camp Cachalot, the former Moby Dick Council, or any predecessor camps or councils. More information about the Association can be found at its Web site: www.cachalotalumni.org.

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