Memories and Meditations of a Workcamper

by David S. Richie

Overview

For many years I have been encouraged by the thought: "You can count the seeds in an apple, but you cannot count the apples in a seed."

Now that the time is coming, after thirty-three years of weekend workcamping, to entrust this instrument of God's purpose to other hands, I feel moved to share some of the prayers and insights and experiences that have prodded me on. I want to share these primarily with my extended family of workcampers--the seeds in my apple--that are now scattered around the world trying to carry out the implications of workcamp in their lives. If these thoughts carry any meaning and challenge to others as well, I can only be glad.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940150163348
Publisher:	Pendle Hill Publications
Publication date:	12/01/2014
Series:	Pendle Hill Pamphlets , #190
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	127 KB

About the Author

David Richie may be nearly the last American to be found at retirement living in the house where his life began. He was born in 1908 in Moorestown, New Jersey, the third of four brothers. After graduation from Haverford College, he taught for a few years in Moorestown Friends School; then his lifework with the international workcamp movement opened before him.
In 1934 the AFSC sponsored the first American workcamp. Intended predominantly as an educational instrument, the camp enabled young men and women of privileged groups to buy, with hard physical labor, their ticket into troubled communities where they could learn at first hand about the problems and the people concerned. David Richie and Mary Wright of Norristown, who was soon to become his wife, were both members of that first camp. In several succeeding summers they were themselves directors of camps. And soon after David became Secretary of the Social Order Committee of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, he invented the weekend workcamp.
The distinguishing feature of weekend workcamps is that although the leadership and the relationship to the communities worked in is ongoing, the personnel constantly changes. Special emphasis is put upon joint work with the members of the households in which the group have scraped, cleaned, and painted. On many a Sunday morning campers have been in magistrate’s court before attending local churches or Friends Meetings. They have met hostility as well as acceptance, and have learned to understand this, as well as to appreciate the close contacts and friendships made. It has been David’s great gift to be able to center the whole experience in a very practical and dauntless love.
As the first of their retirement activities, David and Mary are setting out on a comprehensive visit to persons and places known during nearly forty years of devotion to workcamps.