Camp Stories "Stetztown"

Here are some of the boys of Stetztown, back row: Barry Stickler, David Anspach, Keven Tobias; front row: Richard Fortuna and John Tobias.

The next two pictures are from inside the camp.

The following information was relayed to me mostly by John Tobias.

In 1939, my dad, Edgar S. Tobias, stayed first at Junction Hotel at 414, then at Cedar Run Inn when he came up hunting. Then he decided to build a place of his own. At that time you could pick out a piece of property to lease from the State and build a camp on it. Edgar picked out two places and the State wouldn’t let him build there. Then he came up this Painter Leetonia Road and staked out this place with a 99 year lease.

When the camp started there were seven members. They contacted a log building company in Maine, called Shaw and order a $2400 log cabin kit. The logs came down by rail from Jersey Shore, loaded on two big trucks. When they reached the first steel bridge it wouldn’t hold the weight in one of the trucks and it had to be unloaded and reloaded on the other side. The trucks dumped everything at the road. A contractor from Wellsboro laid block foundation for the camp; and a man and two sons from Maine came down to erect it.

Edgar S. Tobias, John’s father, had clothing store come up after supper on Friday, an 8 hour drive, from Williamsport. At that time the roads were dirt all the way up from Williamsport. The streets in Williamsport were brick or wood block at that time.

Lowe lived down the road in Leetonia and had four boys helped with cabin. The Lowes used to guide hunters through the mountains. It took a lot of help to get the purlins up on the camp. It took them a year and a half to get the roof on. They had enough lumber left to put the front porch on and build the log outhouse, which was demolished 14 years ago. During the early year they had a Heatrola in the middle of the camp to heat the camp. They had electric from the beginning by using a generator and 24 12-volt car batteries. They affectionately called this the Delco System. In the fifties electric came to the Leetonia area by pole.

Stetztown started with seven members then went to nine members until Edgar died in 1960. John Tobias just turned 18 and got his father’s share in the camp. Then members went up to 20, which is the number they have today.

Some of their favorite memories are:

For John at six…riding his tricycle down the stairs and into the coal bin where he bit is tongue in two. They drove him unconscious from the pain to Wellboro were a doctor clamped it together and saved his tongue.

The deer drive in the Fahneystock area: A six-point deer was spotted a long distance away near a birch tree. Thirty-five shots were fired and on the thirty-sixth shot the deer dropped. The guides weren’t happy since they were sent to climb up and down the steep cliffs to retrieve the deer

David Anspach’s favorite memory is hunting with his Grandfather the year before his grandfather died of cancer. His grandfather shot a buck that was flanking down the hill in 3 shots as it crossed the road. David remarks, “Man that was a hell of a shot, but he didn’t want a fuss made over him.”

The last memory involves a drive at my cabin. Where part of the hunting party waited on the porch for the rain to stopped while the others drove the deer. It never stopped raining and the ones under the porch were always envied for their dry position. And to this day they know which hunter’s got the porch and which ones got wet. As far as I know no deer were injured in the porch drive.

John Tobias said the most deer we ever shot were fifteen and seven of them were on the hill behind my house. I can like them remember seeing fifty to a hundred deer on my hill in the evenings. Now we are lucky to see two or three.

I asked why they think the deer population is down so much? The Stetztown boys blame the Game Commission for giving out doe licenses up here and too many licenses for the area. They said the first year this happened we believe around 1968 there was a deer slaughter and the deer have never come back from that day.

Mountain Girl, Paula, logging out.