So not each tent every hour, but through each unit every two hours?
I honestly don't see much difference.
Well, maybe that was me who mentioned it.
I do see difference between looking into each tent every hour and going through each unit every two hours checking out the area but prefferences may vary.
Also, it was the 1970s. Pre-internet. We lived happily unaware of child predators except for the occasional (read: once a decade or so) local example.
To be unaware of something a person has to not know about it, never experience anything like that and in general see everything as like that particular thing they are unaware of never existed.
Right?
Looking back to that time through today's clearer lenses seems anachronistic to me.
Yes, looking back to any time through today or in fact any other time lenses isn't useful and does no justice to people from that time.
But what if these lenses are not from today?
I mentioned that I asked my mum and yeah, her experience may be unusual and not a well representation of how things were back then. Of course.
But since I learned about this case years ago I've read many books, usually older ones, written and published since late XIX till late '80, some journals, some biographies.
This story cames back to me each time when protagonists or people reminiscing past events are camping, setting tents in the wilderness or sleeping rough are wary of their surroundings and if it's more than few people they usually try to arrange things in a way that will let him guard their camp, tent, base or whatever.
How came that they - while living back then or being fictional characters invented back then, by authors with their times mindsets had that in their minds but people in general had no idea that wild animals and for example thieves existed?
Gossips were also not invented yet? People were illiterate? Had amnesia with every blink of an eye?
What internet have to do with anything? The biggest difference internet made is that people focused more or random stuff like watching movies, scrolling pictures of random cats, listening to music and quarelling about politics with some anonymous people which they won't ever met in their lifetime.
Weren't people BIG into local gossip back then? Way bigger than they are now? Wasn't that one of their interests while interactng with others and entertaining themselves daily? Or were they too naive and innocent to do that despite of World being much darker and crueler back then?
Sorry that I'm writing this much now, it's not as much about your post (even thou I'm somewhat replying to it) as just about my thoughts.
Girls in those days--as in the counselors--weren't taught to be self-reliant or to trust their own instincts. I guarantee you that if I had been a counselor that night and had heard a weird noise, I would have done everything in my power to convince myself it was nothing, or my imagination.
Yeah... kids, counsellors, people who were managing the camp...
I have no issue imagining and understanding how they all tried their best and found themselves hopeless in aftermath of this tragedy that was totally unforseen to them.
Kids were kids, counsellors were just bit older kids, and people who were managing the camp were likely just doing their job. What else they could do? Employ some security guards with their pocket money? Take a brief look at Kiowa and rearrange tents by pulling fundaments off the ground with their bare hands to move them in more reasonable positions?
It's not where I was aiming with that.
It's easy to look back now and say Camp Scott should have had better security. And the adults in charge should have done a lot more. And they behaved abominably with regard to the victims' families after the fact.
Adults in charge should have done some things differently.
That's fact.
Just not those adults who were in charge of Camp Scott - because after taking that easy look back it's quite easy to see that they would likely need some supernatural skills to stop this killer.
I also doubt that they were really in charge of the drill and able to change it even if any of them thought "
hey, that's not right, we should arrange some more guardind with each unit right now!" since it usually isn't with power of people who work on the spot.
Are we assuming that those who were really in charge with how things work in scout camps were so blissfully unaware of all the burglaries, trespassings, accidents, attacks and wildlife to work on more responsible arrangements, appropriate to a goal which should be to teach kids how to act while spending time outdoors?
Were boy scout camps different?
With activities and safety precauscious intended to offer not only short-term entertainment but also valuable experience for those who actually could and likely will be hiking and camping in wilderness in their future?