At Camp Alleghany, Vespers is a cherished tradition held each Sunday evening—a quiet, meaningful time for the entire camp community to pause, reflect, and reconnect. During Vespers, campers and counselors gather together on the top of Vesper Hill to listen to thoughtful letters shared aloud by different groups in Camp. These personal reflections explore different aspects of what makes Camp special—from friendship and growth to challenge, joy, and tradition. It’s a still, peaceful time marked by community and introspection—one of the many highlights of our weeks.
Color plays an important role in identifying the many groups within our camp community, including a unique counselor group known as the Maroons. This summer, the first Vespers of the 2025 season was led by the Maroon counselors—staff members who were longtime Alleghany campers but took time away after their Leaders-In-Training (LIT) year before returning to camp as counselors down the line. Unlike our Junior Counselors, who transition directly into their roles at seventeen following their LIT summer, Maroons offer a distinct perspective: they vividly remember what it felt like to be campers themselves, yet return with fresh eyes and renewed appreciation. Their combination of camper roots and time away lends their reflections both depth and resonance, as well as valuable counseling insight.
Among our group of Maroon counselors this summer is Amelia Bailey—a devoted Maroon and two-year head of our Alleghany Singers department. Her letter offered a heartfelt reflection on growth, resilience, and the enduring lessons of camp, drawn from her time both at Alleghany and abroad. We’re honored to share her words with the wider Alleghany community as an example of the type of Vespers letter that positively impacts our community and offers deeper insight into the Alleghany counseling experience.
"At the beginning of this year, I flew abroad to live as an au pair, or a live-in nanny, for almost six months. I had never gone to Italy, I did not speak Italian, and I was going to be living with people who were essentially strangers to me. When I first got there, it was really hard. I wasn’t meshing with my host family the way I had hoped, constant January rain kept me inside all day, and when I did leave the house, I felt totally alienated by my surroundings. All I could think about how much I wanted to go home. And those feelings didn’t change overnight. It took time and effort on my part to find the good in my situation and to be able to enjoy it. But I would not have been able to do it, if not for the skills I had learned as a camper and counselor at Camp Alleghany. My first summer at Camp was in 2014. I was a very shy, very timid nine-year-old mini camper. It had taken a lot of coaxing for me to agree to go and live away from my home and my parents for a whole week. That week, I missed home a lot. I was making new friends and enjoying the different experiences Camp had to offer, but at the same time, I was struggling. Looking back on that summer, however, there is one moment that particularly stands out to me. There was one night during Mini Camp when I couldn’t sleep. It was almost midnight and I was still awake, so my counselor, Katherine Earls, took me on a walk down to the base of Vesper Hill. She told me to look up at the sky. “I know you want to go home right now,” she told me. “But right now, think of how when you go outside, you get to look at the stars.” Those words really stuck with me, and come next summer, I was back as a term camper. Not just because I was a city girl who wanted to see the stars again, but because I had realized that just because something is hard, doesn't mean it doesn’t hold value. In fact, sometimes experiences are valuable because they are difficult. My Mini Camp summer, I came back from Camp is more independent and more resilient than I had been before I left. That feeling of growth is what has kept me coming back ever since. Every year at Camp I face challenges, and I allow myself to feel frustrated, but then I turn around and focus on all the wonderful and unique opportunities that Alleghany has to offer. Opportunities for friendship, for leadership, and for witnessing natural wonder. During my winter in Italy, these Camp lessons helped me navigate my new situation. The resilience I had gained during eight years of camping is what allowed me to open myself up to new people, places, and situations. When I made new friends abroad, I thought of all the Camp friends who had once just been strangers or tentmates. Working with the children in my host family, I thought of the campers whom I had had the opportunity to meet in past summers. But most of all, I thought about the times at Camp when it had been hard, but I had kept going anyway. Because those are the moments of growth that have made me into the woman I am today. A proud, resilient, Ghany girl."
Thank You to Our Maroons!
As Amelia’s heartfelt letter so beautifully illustrates, the lessons learned at camp—resilience, growth, and the courage to face challenges—extend far beyond our time on Vesper Hill. The Maroons, with their unique perspective shaped by both camper experiences and time away, embody these values in powerful ways, enriching our community through their reflections and leadership. Vespers remains one of the most treasured traditions of our summer, a weekly moment of stillness and connection that brings us together to celebrate not only what makes Alleghany special, but also the ways it shapes who we are. We are grateful to Amelia and all of our Maroons for sharing their stories and reminding us that camp is not just a place, but a lifelong journey of discovery and belonging—a place we carry with us wherever we go.
