Each summer, hundreds of Boy Scouts and their leaders make the long drive into the hills of Pocahontas County to enjoy a week of camping, craft making, pioneering, water activities, and fellowship at Buckskin Reservation. Buckskin Reservation serves the Buckskin Council of the Boy Scouts of America, which includes all of southern West Virginia and portions of northern Virginia and eastern Kentucky. During four weeks each June and July, more than 600 Boy Scouts and their leaders from dozens of different troops set up home in the tent campsites and spend a week playing, learning, and enjoying nature. Other times it hosts Scouting-related events such as Webelos (4th and 5th grade Cub Scouts) Weekends, Order of the Arrow (OA, a camping and service fraternity within Scouting) activities, Brownsea (junior leadership training), Woodbadge (adult leader training), and many other Scouting activities year round. It's usually warm and dry during the weeks of summer resident camp, but it's not unusual for rain and even snow to make an appearance in the mountains when least expected, or wanted.

      "The wonderful part of the location is the ability to completely immerse yourself and your Scouts in the great outdoors and live the focus of the movement, while being able to isolate yourself from the world outside the camp," says Don Ellis, who, as a Scoutmaster, took his troop to the reservation when it opened in 1960 and many years thereafter. He continues today as a driving force for camp improvements. "I view the Reservation as the Ideal. You can totally immerse yourself and the Scouts in the program offered, or develop one that suits the unit's needs."

      The year 2000 is the 40th anniversary of Buckskin Reservation, as it is now called. Scouters (adult leaders) more familiarly refer to it as Dilley's Mill, because that's what it was called until an official name change a few years ago. As that name suggests, the property belonged to the Dilley family, who owned and operated a grain mill for the farmers who grew wheat, oats and corn in the area near the town of Marlinton. What remains of that mill can be seen today as four millstones, two intact and two broken, that decorate the entrance to the camp.

      An article in the Charleston Gazette dated January 11, 1959, stated that a new camp was needed because the number of Scouts in the council was growing, and the existing smaller camps in other parts of the council could no longer accommodate their needs. The search for a new location had been conducted during the previous two years, and this land in Pocahontas County was acquired "at a price much below that prevailing in Pocahontas County." Central to the land acquisition were property owner Palmer Stacy, who agreed to sell at a low price, and John G. Fox, who raised $250,000 in a capital campaign for land purchase and construction. Frank Deputy, the Reverend Byron John, and Gordon Dilley donated adjacent property, allowing the existing small lake to be enlarged.

      "There were some deep pockets involved, and the plaques that are mounted in the dining hall testify to those major contributors," says Ellis. "Most of the trails at the camp are named for the people who were instrumental in making the reservation a reality." Today, Buckskin is comprised of roughly 1,800 acres, of which only about 600 are developed for the camping area itself. The rest is essentially undeveloped but available to Scouts who want to explore undisturbed nature. Nothing other than farm, pasture, woods and the mill occupied the current site prior to the purchase and development of the facility for a Scout camp.

I woke one morning with the sun.
My week of fun had just begun.
The air was clear.
The lake was still.

      Ground was broken June 22, 1959, to build the earthen dam that allowed the creation of Lake Sam Hill, named after the chairman of the camp construction committee. By the time the camp was open to a full program in the summer of 1960, the dining hall, health lodge, trading post, a shower house, and waterfront were in place and ready to go, along with rifle and archery ranges below the dam.

      The camp dedication was held July 23, 1960. The Will Abney Chapel was completed and dedicated in 1962, and the handicraft lodge appeared at about the same time. Other additions to the camp since then include an OA building, a new waterfront, and a steel deck bridge leading to the campfire circle on the opposite side of the lake from the main camp. A commissary was built in the 1970s to store four weeks of frozen food for hundreds of hungry boys during the summer resident camps. It also has bunks and a wood burning stove for Scouts who enjoy "Polar Bear" camping in the winter. The old shower house has been replaced and an additional one built, a new rifle range was constructed in the 1980s, a new archery range was completed in the early 1990s, and a shotgun range was added in 1999.

      Romie Hughart, now an adult leader with Troop 82 in Huntington, was an 11-year old Boy Scout with Troop 68 in Cross Lanes when he attended his first resident camp at Dilley's Mill during its opening year. "The first year I was there everything was new. We checked in and then set up in wall tents with wooden platform floors," Hughart remembers. "We had metal cots with metal springs across. After setting up camp we marched to the waterfront and took our swimming test. Then during the week we went to merit badge classes and the rifle range. They cooked for us in the dining hall, but one evening a week we cooked for ourselves." Hughart has a son, 12-year old Alex, who follows much the same routine now when he attends summer resident camp at Buckskin Reservation.

My days were filled with newfound skills.
I felt the spirit of the hills!
New friends and old.
I am at home.

      So what makes a week at resident camp so much fun at Buckskin Reservation? After troop setup on Sunday, a typical day includes early morning flag raising, a hearty breakfast in the dining hall, up to three hours of Scout skill training (first aid, nature study, knot tieing, wood tool safety, among many others), a big lunch in the dining hall to keep the energy going, an afternoon of merit badge instruction (everything from insect study to wilderness survival to outdoor cooking to basket weaving to Indian lore), one more fuel stop at the dining hall, then an evening of campfire programs, worship service, or free time.

      Many times during the week, troops or merit badge classes will travel off the reservation to visit such nearby attractions as Cass Scenic Railroad State Park and the Greenbank National Observatory, or to go fishing in the Greenbrier River, or to go hiking and biking along the Greenbrier River Trail.

      Anytime during the day, boys are encouraged to fish in the 15-acre lake. Other water-related activities include swimming, small boat sailing, canoeing, snorkeling, and life saving training. A camp legend involves Gargantua, a giant toe-eating turtle that older Scouts tell newbies lives in the lake. Each Friday, as the camp begins to wind down, the troops compete for ribbons and bragging rights in the popular water carnival.

      Friday night is the final campfire, as troops gather around to perform funny or corny skits and to enjoy, for just a little while longer, the fun and fellowship of Scouting and the company of new friends. OA members, in full Indian regalia, cross the lake in a canoe with torches and perform an impressive final ceremony to reinforce the values of the Scouting program and respect for the outdoors. Saturday morning it's pack-up time and the trip home to begin planning for next year's return.

My last night ended by the fire.
The Scouting Spirit took me higher.
When I go home,
I'll take it there.

      It's a long road to Dilley's Mill, but more than worth the effort to get there. A week in the outdoors each summer with friends and nature is something boys remember for a lifetime. There's no better place to do it than Buckskin Reservation, where, if it's not "almost Heaven," it's as close to Scouting Paradise as you can get. It's been that way for four decades, and as long as boys enjoy being in the outdoors, learning to be self-reliant, and exhibiting the Scout Spirit, it will continue.

      Hoy Murphy is the Public Information Officer for the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources. He was never a Boy Scout, but is an Assistant Scoutmaster and has attended resident camp the past four years with his son, Patrick. Neither has been "lucky" enough to have received a nocturnal visit by a skunk in his tent during that time.

It's a long road to Dilley's Mill
a-winding steep and high.
But when you laugh with joy,
with the wind in your hair
and cover the earth
with the songs you sing,
the days fly by.*

Editors Note: To celebrate the 40th anniversary of Buckskin Reservation, Governor Cecil H. Underwood will be participating in a rededication ceremony June 20, 2000, West Virginia Day, and the public is invited to attend. All adult leaders who have participated in Woodbadge training are invited to join a reunion party that day at the Reservation. For information, please call the Buckskin Council Office at (304) 340-3663.

*Lyrics by Steve McGowan, Eagle Scout and Assistant Scoutmaster for Troop 68 in Cross Lanes, West Virginia.