Located between Tupper Lake and Long Lake, the remote camp is latest Boy Scout camp to close
By Tim Rowland
The Boy Scouts’ Sabattis Scout Reservation that has hosted young adventurers on the shores of Lows Lake in remote St. Lawrence County for decades will close this summer, as the legacy of Adirondack scouting continues to wane.
Declining interest in scouting among youngsters paired with a reluctance to “rough it” among adults have eroded the organization’s ability to break even on the camp, said Edwin Theetge, CEO and Scout Executive of the Mattydale-based Longhouse Council.
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Theetge lamented the closure, but said revenue was no longer meeting expenses. “It’s one of the most pristine (Scout) camps up there,” he said. “It’s almost literally smack dab in the middle of the Adirondacks and it’s gorgeous with lakes and loons in the morning — but the future of scouting is not going to be camping” in rustic sites.
Reacting to the news on social media, former campers lamented the closure but looked back at the camp with fondness. “Sabattis was the place to be when I was in Boy Scouts!! Damn, the good ole times!” posted Glen White of Clay, N.Y.
Remote location, dwindling numbers of Scouts
Located between Tupper Lake and Long Lake, the camp’s remote location was both its blessing and its curse. Comprising 1,250 acres of land and a 250-acre lake assessed on tax maps at $1 million, it is pristine, but offers few amenities. Patrols cooked over campfires and had no access to electronic communication.
While kids remained enthusiastic, there weren’t enough of them. This year 225 scouts camped at the site, 75 fewer than the council needed to cover the $250,000 it cost to operate the summer camp over three months. Overall, membership in the council has fallen from 3,400 to 1,775 over the past four years, a self-feeding decline as fewer and fewer dads were themselves involved in scouting. The father-son tradition was a chief recruiting tool, Theetge said.
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RELATED READING: Summer camp sell-off: The end of an era?
That’s consistent with nationwide numbers, which have also plunged over the past few years. There were nearly 5 million Boy Scouts in 1972 to fewer than 1 million today, according to the organization, which pointed to the pandemic, competing recreational activities and sexual abuse settlements as among the reasons for the nationwide decline.
Sabattis Scout Reservation was purchased in 1957 for $120,000 and thrived during its “high adventure” era of the 1970s. Scouts learned outdoor skills as well as the sports of canoeing, fishing and archery.
Theetge said the council has no immediate plans for the property but will only sell it if scouts retain access rights. “We still want it to be available to Scouts and hopefully to other people too,” he said.
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Staying closer to home
And while kids remained enthusiastic, volunteer leaders were less enthralled with the primitive site. “It’s the adult leaders who are driving the decision, not the youth,” Theetge said. “I’m not shaming them, I one hundred percent understand; they’re being asked to take a week of their vacation time and go somewhere where there is no cell or internet connection with family or work.”
That means retrenching in camps closer to home and limiting the roughing-it aspect to a weekend instead of a week. “Sixty percent would prefer to be somewhere else, and even if we were able to break even that still wouldn’t pay for any improvements,” Theetge said.
The Boy Scouts of America sought bankruptcy protection in 2020, and has since made efforts to become more inclusive and rebranded as Scouting America. Leaders have stressed community involvement and more modern skill sets, with merit badges in areas including robots and digital technology.
But the Boy Scout camps of the Adirondacks have been indelibly altered, with many being sold or closed. In the Long Lake vicinity alone, the like-named Sabattis Adventure Camp on Bear Pond was sold three years ago by a New Jersey council as part of a sexual-abuse lawsuit settlement, and the Cedarlands Scout Reservation in Long Lake recently sold for $3.35 million to a Manhattan LLC.
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It’s really sad that adult leaders can’t handle “roughing it” without cell phones and Internet at a nice established camp like Sabattis. Meanwhile, there are a lot of outdoor lovers (including me) who would love to have drive-in access to a premier location like this. It is definitely not “primitive” camping when you can drive in and have a lodge, dining facility, camp store, etc.
If Internet access and cell phone connectivity is a limiting factor in attracting adult leaders, just get Starlink. Problem solved.
Fortunately, Camp Massawepie is still open.
As someone who has been to both multiple times as an adult they are not the same thing and our experienced scouts preferred Sabatis as the place to truly get away and really experience camping. As a kid I grew up going to Massawepie back then it was bigger and more spread out but they closed 3/4 of it and sold off or returned several of the old camp portions and what is left has camp sights stacked up on each other and offered fewer merry badge classes in a overall day limiting offerings and combinations.
When I was a Boy Scout in the Otetiana Council in Rochester in the early 1960s, I spent two weeks during each of two summers at Camp Massawepie in the northwest Adirondacks. I learned a lot about birding, canoeing and other topics on my way to earning merit badges there. The camaraderie was great, from slurping “bug juice” and singing songs in the dining hall, to slogging up Moosehead Mountain to experience physical endurance and primitive camping. And I earned “Order of the Arrow” while hiking blindfolded single-file with other “Order” candidates on a “secret” trail to leech-filled Pine Pond. Anyway, it was a lot of fun. I hope boys (and girls) today can enjoy similar outdoor experiences, whether or not they involve Scouting. Sorry to hear about the Camp Sabattis closure, but it appears there are good reasons for doing so. In any case, keep it wild, everybody.
I am the Advisor for Birchbark Expeditions run by Great Falls Council BSA based in western and central New York. We are having great success with canoe outfitting expeditions and treks for 2025. The key is aggressive promotion all over the country – and that is where our crews come from. They WANT to experience the Adirondacks and Algonquin Canada where we operate. Another key is our volunteer staff, wanting to bring these experiences to youth
I was sorry to hear of the loss of still another Boy Scout camp. It was a marvelous experience of my own youth in Massena, N. Y. where, 1944-56, I was a member of Troop 32, Homer Bower -Scoutmaster. We went to Camp Vigor, as a troop, in Morristown, NY, on the St Lawrence River .
Joseph Betsch was the camp director. Camp Vigor no longer exists as a scout camp, but the good
experiences remain with me. I hope that some form of scouting will remain.
This is a sad but not unexpected situation. Having grown up in the ADK and being a very active Scout I had the opportunity to go to most of the camps in the region through Order of the Arrow retreats and conclaves. Knowledge and skills I learned in numerous areas have served me well for over 50 years. I hope the property can still be available for Scouts and the public and not turned into a Manhattan based resort.
Dale A. Currier
I’m stunned, but I suppose I shouldn’t be. I spent four amazing summers at Sabattis (85-88), the last on staff, and loved every minute of it. My troop would do a week working on merit badges and then a good long canoe trip. The memories of rifle shooting, archery, mile swim, polar bear club, Dutch oven peach cobbler, under-cooked spaghetti, cans of government peanuts, canoeing, hiking. The list is endless, as are the memories. Going to dig out my pictures tonight….
I was a staff member at Camp-Vigor-of-the-Woods on Clear Pond near Parishville during the summers of ’66 and ’67. This camp was mentioned in an earlier comment here. It was formerly located on the St Lawerence River, before moving to Clear Pond. We did all the activities mentioned. We went to church on Sundays in Parishville.
Clear Pond, along with many other lakes in the area, was beautiful. Many Boy Scouts learned to swim at the camp….but the only fish living were stunted perch, along with lots of leeches and some crawdads. I suspect acid rain from midwest power plants and industrial facilities killed off the game fish.