Forest Junction, Wisconsin welcomes you!
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Camp Forest
Camp Forest
is located in Northeast Wisconsin and is situated on a wooded site near
the intersection of Highways 10 and
57 in Forest Junction. It was a former revival campground and is now
owned and operated
as a non-profit corporation.
We firmly believe that the teachings of the Bible are relevant to today's society and to traditional family values. Camp Forest is to be used to initiate and continue faithful growth in following Jesus Christ as outlined in the Bible.
We encourage children, youth, and adults to become followers of Jesus Christ as they live in the world today. We support youth retreats, concerts, and other opportunities to promote faithful discipleship.
We want to be a viable part of the community and encourage fellowship between people of various denominations.
Please contact us by calling (920) 989.1606. Our mailing address is P.O. Box 31; Forest Junction, WI 54123. And you may email us by clicking HERE or emailing campforest@forestjunction.org
Our History
Located at the western edge of the village is the assembly ground which was previously governed by the Appleton District Camp meeting Association. For ten (10) days every summer it had been the rendezvous for the approximately 60 evangelical congregations of the Appleton district. The grove of nearly 7 acres with its 70x100' tabernacle, surrounded by dormitories and cottages, attracts the attention of tourists who pass the place on highways 10 and 57. For 50 weeks of the year the place was unoccupied but filled with hundreds of visitors annually over the last two Sundays in August. Originally a part of a fairly heavy tract of woodland on the farm of Henry Ott, from whom the site was at first annually rented.
Like in some other denominations, camp meetings were a prominent part of the activities of the Evangelical Church. Early camp meetings, as primitive as the lives of the early settlers, had the leafy canopy of the trees of the forest overhead with rough planks laid over falled logs for seats and with torches of burning pine knots or bonfires for illumination at night.
By the middle of the 1890's, the Forest Junction congregation belonged to a Fond du Lac district group possessing a collection of tents, which were shipped from place to place on the district where congregations undertook to sponsor a camp meeting.
In 1906, two years after the establishment of the Appleton district, the Forest Junction congregation organized an association of its own. The organizational meeting was held in the church in the evening of May 3, 1906. It was attended by about 50 members, with the Rev. G. Fritsche, then presiding elder of the district as chairman, and J.C. Hawker, a local layman, as secretary. Articles of organization were set up for "The Forest Junction Circuit Camp Meeting Association" and a board of seven directors was elected consisting of John Otto, secretary; John Seybold, treasurer; Manrow Schubring, Henry Ott, and John Huebner. The board was authorized to purchase some tents, the Henry Ott grove was selected as a camp site, and by the end of June that year a camp meeting was in progress and has been held annually at the same place ever since. The end of June was retained as the date for the annual event until in 1920, when a small-pox epidemic in this area made it necessary to postpone the meetings until the latter part of August which was date has been unchanged up to 1943.
With the enlargement of the assembly, the tent of 1906 was becoming too small to accommodate the growing number of worshipers and in 1924 the present tabernacle was constructed and dedicated by Bishop S.P. Spreng of Napierville, IL who was the guest speaker for the gathering that year.
Our Mission is based on Christian principles and values. The mission of Camp Forest is to provide facilities for youth, adults, families, churches, and the community to have life enrichment activities, social events, or to just have a place of peaceful serenity.
Our
Goals
are to encourage children, youth, and adults become followers of Christ
as they live in the world today. We
support youth retreats, concerts, and other social opportunities to an
extended
community so that faithful
discipleship and pleasure of life with a Christian influence will be a
net result of using Camp
Forest.
Our Unique Identity
We are a non-denominational Christian church camp located in northeastern Wisconsin. We are a provider of facilities for Christian organizations for outreach, evangelism, and discipleship.We firmly believe that the teachings of the Bible are relevant to today's society and to traditional family values. Camp Forest is to be used to initiate and continue faithful growth in following Jesus Christ as outlined in the Bible.
We encourage children, youth, and adults to become followers of Jesus Christ as they live in the world today. We support youth retreats, concerts, and other opportunities to promote faithful discipleship.
We want to be a viable part of the community and encourage fellowship between people of various denominations.
Please contact us by calling (920) 989.1606. Our mailing address is P.O. Box 31; Forest Junction, WI 54123. And you may email us by clicking HERE or emailing campforest@forestjunction.org
Our History
Located at the western edge of the village is the assembly ground which was previously governed by the Appleton District Camp meeting Association. For ten (10) days every summer it had been the rendezvous for the approximately 60 evangelical congregations of the Appleton district. The grove of nearly 7 acres with its 70x100' tabernacle, surrounded by dormitories and cottages, attracts the attention of tourists who pass the place on highways 10 and 57. For 50 weeks of the year the place was unoccupied but filled with hundreds of visitors annually over the last two Sundays in August. Originally a part of a fairly heavy tract of woodland on the farm of Henry Ott, from whom the site was at first annually rented.
Like in some other denominations, camp meetings were a prominent part of the activities of the Evangelical Church. Early camp meetings, as primitive as the lives of the early settlers, had the leafy canopy of the trees of the forest overhead with rough planks laid over falled logs for seats and with torches of burning pine knots or bonfires for illumination at night.
By the middle of the 1890's, the Forest Junction congregation belonged to a Fond du Lac district group possessing a collection of tents, which were shipped from place to place on the district where congregations undertook to sponsor a camp meeting.
In 1906, two years after the establishment of the Appleton district, the Forest Junction congregation organized an association of its own. The organizational meeting was held in the church in the evening of May 3, 1906. It was attended by about 50 members, with the Rev. G. Fritsche, then presiding elder of the district as chairman, and J.C. Hawker, a local layman, as secretary. Articles of organization were set up for "The Forest Junction Circuit Camp Meeting Association" and a board of seven directors was elected consisting of John Otto, secretary; John Seybold, treasurer; Manrow Schubring, Henry Ott, and John Huebner. The board was authorized to purchase some tents, the Henry Ott grove was selected as a camp site, and by the end of June that year a camp meeting was in progress and has been held annually at the same place ever since. The end of June was retained as the date for the annual event until in 1920, when a small-pox epidemic in this area made it necessary to postpone the meetings until the latter part of August which was date has been unchanged up to 1943.
With the enlargement of the assembly, the tent of 1906 was becoming too small to accommodate the growing number of worshipers and in 1924 the present tabernacle was constructed and dedicated by Bishop S.P. Spreng of Napierville, IL who was the guest speaker for the gathering that year.