Boy Scouts at Camp Fawcett, Texas

December 15, 2013

One day a couple of months before Christmas I got an email from my high school friend, Brad Bradley, asking if there was any way possible for me to bring my chuck wagon down to Camp Fawcett, in South Texas, to do some chuck wagon/Dutch oven demonstrations for a bunch of Boy Scouts during their Frontier Days celebration at the camp. Camp Fawcett is located in South Texas on the cool waters of the beautiful Nueces River.  Erasmus Keys Fawcett, born in 1865 and became very interested a newly formed organization called the Boy Scouts.  He took and active role in "scouting" and spent much time helping to develop the organization.  He established Camp Fawcett as a place where the teachings of  the Boy Scouts of American could carry on thier traditions.

I thought going to cook for the Scouts was particularly interesting however the one-way  trip of 500 miles gave me cause to think about it for a bit.  I considered the fact that I would be traveling alone to the camp and don’t always relish those long trips pulling the goose neck trailer and chuck wagon.  I thought that if I could entice my long time friend Steve Woods, from Denton, Texas, to meet me there ….I would agree to do it.  After talking to Steve and us considering the Boy Scouts need for some outdoor cooking, we agreed to go.  My drive was about 8 hours and Steve’s, about 6.  We arrived at Camp Fawcett within ten minutes of each other. There to greet us was Brad Bradley, Jimmy Bradley, Billy Connor, Jim Maxiner, and Stewart Billingsley.  I have seen Brad most recently at a chuck wagon competition in Hondo, Texas a couple of years earlier and that is how my name came up in their conversations about who to invite to the camp.  Billy, I had seen about fifteen or so years ago and the rest, it had been probably close to fifty years.  Some friendships never die and only take just a bit to rekindle the old acquaintances.  

Mountain Men

Steve said several times during the time that we were there that he was truly impressed with our high school kinships and all the memories we sat around and reminisced about.  We sort of all agreed that the friendships we have in Del Rio, Texas are special and above all, LASTING.

After passing all the greetings to each other after so long apart, we all got down to the business at hand--get ready for the scouts.  Billy got busy brush hogging the grass around the area we were to set up the chuck wagon camp.  Everyone fell in and we got the wagon unloaded and set up for the first item on the agenda which was to serve the staff breakfast at 6:30 am the next morning.  All of the necessary things had to be ready to go or else we would have to get up earlier to get it all done.  We figured a wake up alarm at 4:00 am would be ample time to get dressed and to the campsite and get the fires going by 5:00.  Along about the time we were finishing our prep for the next morning many of the Scouts and their leaders were arriving and setting up camp themselves.

We arrived to a cold morning with  frost on everything a little after 5 am but soon had the cooking fires burning and the coffee on to boil.  As Steve and I were doing the preparations for breakfast several of the staff were standing around the nice warm fire, before daylight, drinking thie good old boiling hot cowboy coffee. 

Sunrise Coffee by the fire

That is truly one of my favorite times of the morning; just before daylight.  Of course I always complain about having to get up so early but I always enjoy that time. A little later we got to visit with John Martinez, Boy Scout, Executive Director and he explained to us that he had the best job in the world and that was one of being a Boy Scout 24-7.  Ahh yes, I can only amagine the pleasure his job must give him.  The best part of the job he described as being able to be out "in the field" with fellow scouts on an outing such as this one at Camp Fawcett.  I felt like someone had made a really good selection when they put this man in the ranks as an Executive Director.  Someone who is passionate about his job.

The menu for breakfast was to be Migas with flour tortillas. Migas, if you aren't aware of this Mexican dish, is a combination of things that make for a hardy breakfast that can be made into a burrito or just eaten with a fork and pushed around with a tortilla.  The recipe is as follows and as you can probably see, there are many ways you can alter the ingrediants according to your specific taste.  As for the quantities, you add the various amounts till it looks right.  Someone told me that "Migas" was Spanish for cleaning out the icebox....er a ....make that refrigerator.  So you can see the ingrediants can be just about anything.


Migas

Migas

6 dozen eggs

Diced jalapenos

Diced onions

Diced tomatoes

Diced bell peppers (three colors)

2 lbs Jimmy Dean sausage (1 hot-1 mild)

Garlic powder

Oregano

Corn Chips

Shredded Cheese

Because of the drougth all over Texas Steve and I were a little concerned about a fire getting away from us and causing a grass fire we chose to use an enclosed firebox.  The vessel we cook the Migas in is a 20” disco which is a plow disc with the hole welded up and two horseshoes welded to the sides that serve as handles.  We first cooked the sausage and moved it to the outter edge of the disc and began sautéing the vegetables.  Just a few minutes before the time approached 6:00 am we began cooking the eggs.  Everything came together for serving the meal at the designated time because a tight schedule had to be maintained throughout the day.  The way we keep the flour tortillas hot is by using what we call a poor boy double boiler and it consistsof  an old metal oil drain pan over(we cleaned it as good as we could :) ) the fire with water in it and a horseshoe inside that pan to keep the next pan placed inside the oil pan up off the bottom.  Then the tortillas are placed in the pan and another pan on top to keep in the heat.  Everyone was ready to eat and drink coffee for some warmth.  I remembered late Saturday evening that I forgot to add the cheese to the Migas.  I don’t think anyone missed them! I asked one of the scout leaders if the scouts had already eaten and he said it didn’t matter because they could and would eat anytime.  So as soon as the staff finished eating a number of scouts around close got to finish up the left overs. 

Steve and I sort of had a plan as to what we were going to do for the seven or eight groups of scouts who were going to rotate through our camp every 30 minutes during the day but it wasn’t until they started showing up just after serving the last of the Migas that we had to hump to get REALLY organized. 

This is when Steve’s expertise in teaching outdoor education to this age group came in to play.  He quickly got the group together and began to tell them about the cooking pots (Dutch ovens) and some of the other implements like biscuit cutters made out of soup or juice cans, and trivits made from horseshoes we had around the camp.  I got the Hoe cake batter ready and the Dutch oven lid on the fire and he began cooking the bite sized cakes that was served up with black strap molasses and/or honey. The lid of the Dutch oven makes an excellent griddle for this type of cooking.

Hoe Cakes (aka corn dodgers, Johnny cakes, etc)

1 cup flour

1 cup cornmeal

1 tbs sugar

1 tsp salt

2-3 tbs Crisco

2 cups of water (more or less) 

Cut the Crisco into the other ingredients then add water until the batter is like thick pancake batter.  This is another recipe that you can easily change up by adding things like jalapenos and cheese. They are quite fun to fix and the story that goes along with the cakes is interesting.  Way back when slaves picked cotton for plantation owners they would easily prepare a quick meal in the cotton fields, with the simple ingredients, by building a fire and taking the head of the hoe off of the handle and using it to cook their cakes.  So now you know how they came by their name.  

Being as close to the Christmas Holidays, we suggested to the participants that they go home and make these for their mothers and added the appreciation Moms at this time of year make bring about untold rewards.

Mike Kyle, Mike's Great Dane, Jack Johnson, Steve Woods and Scouts

I was pleased to have met up with another friend from Del Rio, Mike Kyle.  The whole experience brought back wonderful memories of my days as a Cub Scout.  I cherish the two Cub Scout books that I have in my library and when I got home I opened them and.....to my surprise.....there was Mikes's brother, Gary Kyle listed on the page as my Den Chief.  It was with great sorrow I heard of Gary's passing just recently.  RIP Gary Kyle!!!

This is the first of probably two posts on the Boy Scouts of Camp Fawcett.