ANGELES CREST IS OPEN!!

Angeles Crest Christian Camp is now open!  Angeles Crest highway is open after being closed due to the Station Fire and the public now has access to the entire mountain.  It has been a long road to recovery from the fire but Angeles Crest Christian Camp is now moving forward to a promising year in 2010!!  Winter Camp sign-ups are in full swing and our staff is planning a fantastic program for children and students.  See below to sign up!!

By the mid 1940’s, the Christian Churches/Churches of Christ were growing at a rapid pace and Christian Camping was an important part of their ministry.  However, each year it became increasingly difficult to find facilities to rent for our churches.

 A number of locations were used in those days.  It seemed as if the churches were at the mercies of the camps when it came time for scheduling and available facilities.  Socachriseco (Southern California Christian Service Conference) was the name given to the week of High School Camp.  It was this week of camp in particular that needed room to grow.

It became apparent that our Churches needed a Camp of their own.  Reuben Anderson (First Christian Church, Long Beach), John Chase (First Christian Church, Downey), G. Russell Barber (Park Avenue Christian Church, Montebello), and Lowell Megorden (First Christian Church, Compton) were the leaders who had taken a strong interest in Camp.  These men began to look for suitable land on which to build a church camp.

At about the same time, Harold “Hal” DeBar, a man in one of our Los Angeles churches, had obtained a lease on U.S. Forestry land deep in the heart of the San Gabriel Mountains.  It was Hal’s dream to start a boy’s camp there.  However, when Hal heard that these men were looking for a camp site for our churches, he invited these ministers to meet with he and his wife, Esther, in their kitchen.  Hal was so excited about the dream of a Christian church camp that he offered his lease to these men and Angeles Crest Christian Camp came into existence.

There was much work to do before having the first week of Camp at Angeles Crest.  The land was very primitive and unspoiled by man.  There was not any electricity, water, gas, telephone or buildings on the property.  Sunday School classes, and scores of individuals, began to make regular trips up the mountain to get the grounds ready for the first week of camp in the summer of 1948.  There were pit toilets to be dug, tents to be set up, a concrete slab was poured for a dining room, a small kitchen to be constructed, land to be cleared, etc.  “Old Timers” will tell you that they literally were nailing the doors on the outhouses when the first campers came up the hill.