George Meylan

Item Information

Title:
George Meylan
Description:
A portrait photograph of George Meylan. Meylan was born in Le Brassus, Switzerland, and moved to New York at the age of fourteen. At the age of eighteen, he started working at the YMCA in Bangor, Maine. Here he met the Reverend George W. Hinckley, director of the nearby Good Will Camps. Hinckley’s philosophy and personality strengthened Meylan's belief in the value of camping. Meylan spent the next four years working at the Boston YMCA. In 1897, he took a group of young men from the Boston YMCA on a two-week camping trip near Lake Sebago in Maine. The trip proved so successful that the board established an outing department and purchased an island in Lake Winnepesaukee (New Hampshire). In 1904, he accepted the post of medical director at Columbia University, which he held until his retirement in 1929. He received an M.D. from New York University in 1906. While living in New York City, Meylan bought land a summer cottage at Lake Sebago, Maine, and in 1907 founded White Mountain for Boys. The Gulicks purchased land from him for a summer home, later locating the Gulick camps there. The two families quickly became fast friends. Meylan joined the Camp Directors Association of America (CDAA) soon after its founding in 1910, and he served as the organization's president four year later. When World War I broke out, he took a leave of absence to serve as the French Army's Director of Recreation. Soon after his return to the United States, Meylan purchased Camp Arcadia for Girls, where his daughter worked as a lead counselor. In 1924-1925, he again served as president of the newly merged Camp Directors Association. Meylan also served as president of the American Physical Education Association. In 1929, he retired from Columbia to devote more time to camping. Soon after his retirement, Meylan developed the two-hundred acre Arcadia farm near Casco as an experimental agricultural center. His herd of purebred jerseys won regional and national awards, and he was able to supply eighty percent of the food needed for his two camps.
Date:
[1910?–1920?]
Format:
Photographs
Location:
Springfield College Archives and Special Collections
Collection (local):
College Archives Digital Collections
Subjects:
Springfield College
International Young Men's Christian Association Training School (Springfield, Mass.)
Springfield College--Alumni and alumnae
Young Men's Christian Association of North America
Meylan, George L. (1903)
YMCA
Physical Education
Camps
Camping
Places:
Massachusetts > Hampden (county) > Springfield
Link to Item:
http://cdm16122.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p15370coll2/id/27656
Terms of Use:
Text and images are owned, held, or licensed by Springfield College and are available for personal, non-commercial, and educational use, provided that ownership is properly cited. A credit line is required and should read: Courtesy of Springfield College, Archives and Special Collections. Any commercial use without written permission from Springfield College is strictly prohibited. Other individuals or entities other than, and in addition to, Springfield College may also own copyrights and other propriety rights. The publishing, exhibiting, or broadcasting party assumes all responsibility for clearing reproduction rights and for any infringement of United States copyright law.
Contact host institution for more information.
Publisher:
Springfield College
Language:
English
Identifier:
ms539-01-04-063