Glen Lake Children’s Camp steeped in history

Betsy Adams, Eden Prairie News

Copyright © Eden Prairie News, 2003

By the turn of the century, tuberculosis, or consumption as it was commonly called, had become a huge problem in Minnesota. In fact, the State Board of Health reported that between 1887 and 1899 more than 20,000 Minnesotans had died of the disease. It became clear that state and local governments had to assume a role in the prevention and treatment of TB. As a first step, the state Legislature authorized the construction of the State Sanatorium for Consumptives on Leech Lake. It opened in 1907 but wasn’t able to handle the escalating number of TB patients. So in 1913, the Legislature passed the County Sanatorium Law facilitating the construction and maintenance of county sanatoriums. In 1914, Hennepin County began construction of the Glen Lake Sanatorium on land spanning the Eden Prairie/Minnetonka border. The first TB patient was admitted to Glen Lake on January 4, 1916, arriving on a sleigh during a raging snowstorm.

Heroes

The fight against TB had many heroes. In Hennepin County the leaders were Mr. and Mrs. George Christian, pioneers and activists for the prevention, control and treatment of TB. Ironically, in 1905, the Christians lost their son, Henry Hall Christian, to TB … only intensifying their determination. George H. Christian came to Minneapolis from Alabama in 1867, the same year he married Leonora Hall. He was a flour buyer, and forming a partnership with Gov. Cadwallader Washburn, successfully rode the wave of Minnesota’s milling boom. Mr. Christian became a very wealthy man. Mrs. Christian, having set up housekeeping at 404 South 8th St. in Minneapolis, dedicated herself to the fight against tuberculosis. She lobbied the Legislature, surveyed doctors, paid nurses’ salaries and in 1906, established the state’s first treatment facility for tubercular children.

It was a summer camp, located at Lake Street and North River Road in Minneapolis. That first year, 22 children spent the summer, living in tents, eating well-balanced meals and playing in the restorative open air. In 1909 the camp program was adopted by the Visiting Nurses Association and relocated to Glenwood Park (now Theodore Wirth). But by 1925, the VNA determined they could no longer operate the camp; it was feared the program would be discontinued.

Saving the day

Two factors saved the day. First, during the 1920s, major remodeling and expansion took place transforming Glen Lake Sanatorium into an immense, modern medical facility, the largest in the state. (More than 700 patients underwent treatment there during its peak in 1927.) And secondly, the Children’s Aid Society, a foundation created by philanthropist George Christian in 1916, offered to construct a permanent children’s camp. Glen Lake Sanatorium was willing to manage and maintain the camp and provide a site – just to the south of the main sanatorium complex, on the crest of a hill overlooking Birch Island Lake in Eden Prairie.

Focal point and social center of Glen Lake Children’s Camp, the dining hall/recreation building was built in 1925. Photo courtesy of the Minnesota Historical Society

Named Glen Lake Children’s Camp and built at a cost of more than $12,000, it opened on June 12, 1925. Over the course of that first summer, 85 children were enrolled in the camp. During this period, children with tuberculosis were treated in a variety of facilities, ranging from summer camps to sanatoriums, based on the severity of their disease. The children eligible to attend the camps were infected with what was known as “childhood” or “juvenile” tuberculosis, meaning that they had been exposed to, and infected by, the disease but were not symptomatic or contagious. Glen Lake Children’s Camp’s purpose was “to provide a summer in the country for infected children to help them prevent their infection from developing into active disease.”

A summer in the country

The big, wooded camp was a haven for children, age 4 to 14 years.
Under a doctor’s watchful eye, the children’s daily routine was all about healthy bodies, social skills, fresh air and sunshine. A 1939 camp report gave details: “The boys had a very interesting summer. Their activities consisted mainly of model aeroplane building and flying, swimming, softball, hiking, sandbox playing, archery … and, above all, the acquiring of patience.” The girls’ program included a variety of sewing and crafts projects, hiking, swimming and team sports. At the end of the summer, awards were given for the greatest weight gain and best tan.

It was all about healthy bodies, friendships, fresh air and sunshine at the Glen Lake Children’s Camp in Eden Prairie. The children eligible to attend the camps were infected with what was known as “childhood” or “juvenile” tuberculosis, meaning that they had been exposed to, and infected by, the disease but were not symptomatic or contagious. Photo courtesy of the Minnesota Historical Society

The discovery of antibiotics in the 1940s was the beginning of the end of the history of TB in Minnesota. In 1950, after 25 years, Glen Lake Children’s Camp ceased operation. One by one the state’s sanatoriums began to close. The State Sanatorium at Leech Lake closed in 1962, its patients transferred to Glen Lake Sanatorium. At the same time, a long-term care facility for geriatric patients was opened at Glen Lake.

Over the next 14 years the facility operated jointly as the Glen Lake Sanatorium and Oak Terrace Nursing Home. In 1976 the last TB patient was discharged and by 1991 the state had transferred geriatric patients to other facilities. In 1993, the entire sanatorium complex, excluding Glen Lake Children’s Camp, was demolished. In its 75 years of service, Glen Lake Sanatorium provided care to more than 17,000 people.

In 1997 the county-owned Glen Lake Sanatorium site became the Glen Lake Golf & Practice Center operated by Three Rivers Park District. But miraculously, Glen Lake Children’s Camp has survived as a camp … very much intact and with a very similar vision.

A tale to tell

An Aug. 5, 1999, letter to Mayor Jean Harris from the Minnesota Historical Society reads, “I am pleased and honored to congratulate you upon the entry of the Glen Lake Children’s Camp onto the National Register of Historic Places. By recognizing the significance of this property and planning for its preservation you are participating in a national movement which aims to preserve, for the benefit of future generations, our cultural heritage.”

Glen Lake Children’s Camp was so honored because:

• it is Minnesota’s only known surviving summer camp for tubercular children, with only one similar site identified anywhere else in the United States [Web Site Editor’s note: some authorities argue that the site is the only one of its kind to survive];
• it is the only surviving component of Glen Lake Sanatorium;
• it is the only known property related to the philanthropic efforts of Mr. and Mrs. Christian; and
• the entire site retains a remarkable degree of historic integrity, having never been winterized or significantly modified.
  
  Today, approaching the camp, one passes a carved-rock memorial and can see, extending across the length of the hillside, a cluster of rustic buildings, the most prominent of which are the dining hall/recreation building and the dormitory. The camp is nestled amid a lush grove of oak, maple, and basswood trees, overlooking Birch Island Lake. The buildings are sheathed with wide, rough, clapboard, referred to as “bungalow siding.” The windows are awing type, swinging up from inside for more fresh air, and all the floors are hardwood. A massive and finely-detailed brick fireplace is the focal point of the dining hall/recreation building; its two original wrought-iron cranes for hanging kettles, still in place.

Outside, the memorial is inscribed:

Glen Lake Children’s Camp
Presented by the Children’s Aid Society and Gratefully Dedicated to the Memory of Mr. and Mrs. George H. Christian who Maintained the First Camp in Minneapolis and whose Hope was for the Health and Happiness of all Children

After being closed in 1950 the camp remained vacant until 1957 when it was leased to the Minnesota Association for Retarded Citizens (today’s ARC of Hennepin County) and reopened as Indian Chief Camp. Then, in 1983, the seven-acre woodland property was transferred from Hennepin County to the City of Eden Prairie. In 1995 the city leased the camp to the non-profit organization, Friendship Ventures. Today, with the addition of four new buildings, Glen Lake Children’s Camp operates as [part of] Eden Wood Center, providing programs and serving the developmentally disabled.

Eden Prairie’s nationally recognized Glen Lake Children’s Camp remains a rare reminder of a time when tuberculosis was one of the country’s most serious diseases. Perhaps most remarkable, it has survived intact into the 21st century. The camp tells the touching story of TB children and the effort that was made to promote their health and happiness.

Special thanks to Rolf Anderson who researched and wrote (and shared with me) the original designation application to the National Register for Historic Places.

Betsy Adams is an Eden Prairie resident. Her column about history in Eden Prairie appears monthly [in the Eden Prairie News].