Hell, it was so common – and expected of kids – that I went to a summer camp about five miles from my house. Spent an entire summer there (1964, IIRC).
I also went to a day camp the year before, and went to another for five years (though that was one week a year instead of the entire summer). Other kids in my area also went to camp.
Enright, my grandfather, dad and brother both attended and worked offseason at Philmont! It’s awesome, and so are Lost Valley and Grace Valley.
I was in Girl Scouts, so I went to camp for several summers, either at Camp Joe Sherman or Rawhide. We would stay for 2 weeks and take care of the horses and ride every day, along with the standard arts & crafts, campfires, swimming, etc.
This would have been the very late 70’s to early 80’s.
Sending kids off to camp wasn’t just to get them out of Mom’s hair. As most people have related, the kids really liked camp. I know I did. I went to a summer day camp in the 60s (mostly we were only at camp for the day for a few weeks, and the last couple of days we slept at camp). Summer camp was something to look forward to. It also wore us out for a while, which is not something to be taken lightly.
I’ve been to camp… first time I went was to a YMCA camp… Camp Chief Hector… 2 weeks… most of which was spent on out trips in the mountains… 5 days hiking, 5 days horseback riding a total of 4 days in camp… not even
Then I went to Camp Okotoks… a week long camp that I enjoyed more. I like the mountains well enough but hiking for 5 days wasn’t my thing. Day hikes are more my speed.
I spent every summer at the same camp from age 6 to 15. This was in the 1980s and early 90s.
I went to church camp for a week every summer, and loved it. But the WHOLE summer? I can’t imagine what that would be like for a kid… I was homesick being away for a week.
Mr. Adoptamom (age 50) went to church camp for 1-2 weeks every summer of his youth.
I attended camp only one summer and loved it.
Our children have gone to camp every summer (the same one Mr. Adoptamom attended) and will continue to until they choose differently. They look forward to it all year long.
Best summer camp of my life was 2july75 through 28oct75. Island off the coast of South Carolina. Lots of hiking, running, classes in first aid and history. Taught all of us how to handle a rifle(never a gun). All in all a good time.
Summer sleepaway camps, although not of the Indian-name variety (but probably pretty similar in nature - sports, nature hikes, etc) are very commonly attended amongst Orthodox Jewish pre-teens and teens. I myself went to Camp Mogen Avrohom (boy, there’s an Indian name, eh? ;)) and its teen affiliate, Camp A. C. Heller, from 1980-1988 (the last three of those as a staff member rather than as a camper). My wife was a counselor in Camp Sternberg until the summer of 1994 and likely would have continued had she not married me after that.
Summer camps are also quite popular among non-orthodox Jews. The one I went to for nine summers was mostly populated by Reform and non-religious Jews.
In the mid 90’s, I worked on the staff of two Boy Scout summer camps. Ten Mile River in Upstate New York, and Eagle River in Southeast Alaska. Had a wonderful time. Too bad the Boy Scouts are raving lunatics now.
I went to Ten Mile River in the '60s. Kernighan (? - I think I’m confusing it with Brian 
Probably Kernikan. ) and a kosher camp when my father started up a troop at our temple. TMR was gigantic, with lots of lots of subcamps and miles of trails.
My older daughter went to an arts camp in Southern New Jersey for two years, my younger one has gone to various horse camps for four years.
Camps are still popular - my wife has written tons of articles on summer camps for various parenting publications. They want them because they get tons of ads in their summer camp issues.
Oh, I almost forgot, One summer I spent a week or so canoeing down the Illinois River with my Boy Scout troop. It was a lot of fun, except for the sunburn. We’d find a campsite every evening and settle down for the night. It was great fun.
E3
Boy Scout camp Ben DeLatour in 1987 - 90 degree days in the mountains until the day we had to ditch our canoes in the lake for the Canoeing merit badge. THEN, it dropped below 30 degrees over a matter of hours, and minutes before we had to ditch and tow our canoes to shore it started snowing (middle of June). Fortunately the water stayed a constant 58 degrees or so, so it actually FELT warmer than when it was hot out. But damn if it didn’t seem a lot colder on the 1.5 mile hike back to the shower!
I went to a knights of columbus camp in the seventies , several years in a row for a week , in ontario
columbus boys camp
six or eight of us to a cabin , with a counselor and a trainee counselor
had a blast , parents probably had a sanity oasis for a week
Declan
Summer Church Camp that lasted a week from 1977 to 1980 - central Indiana. A week of crafts, evangelism, sports, evangelism, mediocre food (it got better every year tho), evangelism, some kids first sexual experiences (alas, not mine), evangelism…
oh yes, and evangelism! L
It peaked Friday night with an End-of-the-World movie, an intense Come to Jesus message in which if ya didn’t get saved or rededicate you were pretty much hopeless, hence a lot of temporary committments (and some that actually lasted), and then retiring back to cabins &, depending on one’s personality, a night of pranks or deep discussions or intense sexual experiences or exahusted sleep as we all had to get up early to go on the long trek home.
That Sat morn was a lot of tearful huggy goodbyes in which addresses were exchanged (with few lasting correspondences)
and Bosomy Girls were targeted for special hugging, but even geeks & nerds (including me -remember that alas earlier) got hugs.
Btw, since that was the 1970s, before the Fundy world got really phobic about scary stuff- one night we were taken on a hike & told a tale about a serial killer in the woods from 20 years prior (with a counselor disappearing, a chainsaw sound, and then the counselor seen all bloody & hanging from a tree)- it was cool & scary & lotsa fun & years later I found the story we were told was a mix of Texas Chainsaw Massacre & the real case of Ed Gein.
I wrote a song about it that was a requested classic for 3 years- the Church Camp Cannibal. That was as big a hit as my one-man Spike Jones routine.
My brothers and I grew up on a farm and we went to camp for two weeks every summer (Camp Piankitank). Ther reason - so our mother wouldn’t kill us and we wouldn’t dry her completely insane.
I went to summer camp for a week around the age of 10: Camp Samac just north of Oshawa. Don’t remember all that much about it, other than throwing up outside the door of the cabin.
The camp is still there, but the suburbs and the new university are surrounding it. A taste of country life? They’re going to have to move a bit further north now. Like Algonquin Park.
I would go to summer camp for a couple weeks when I was a kid. (mid-late 1980’s) Boyscouts for a few days, and then this camp: http://www.ondessonk.com/ for a week, sometimes two.
Great time usually, and I’m sure my parents liked it!
Hail to Thee, Kamp Krusty.
B’Nai B’Rith runs a bunch a Jewish summer camps. I went to the one near Montreal in August 1976 and August 1978.