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News Articles
WKYC Welcomes Landon Clark as New Summer Session Director
After 16 years of service as Pee Wee Weekend Director, Ricky Collins decided to step down from the role. Dr. Landon Clark will take over the directorship for the 2024 summer camp season.
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Click the link to get to know the Clark family and learn more about the exciting things Pee Wee Weekend has to offer the community!
WKYC Welcomes Tyler Wunderlich as New Summer Session Director
After 23 years of service as Teen Week Director and nearly 34 as a volunteer in some capacity at WKYC, Alan Bush is stepping down from the Directorship. With his transition brings a familiar face to the role, and a new torchbearer of the Teen Week tradition: Tyler Wunderlich.
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Click the link below to read the full article about the transition.
From the ground up:
July dedication celebrates Beard legacy
“Everybody else played baseball. We built a camp,” Dan Beard said to me on his recent visit to Stan Colley’s week.
But this wasn’t just any ordinary visit, and this definitely wasn’t your average visitor. It was a reunion of many dimensions – a multi-generational celebration of the impact one couple’s generosity can have on the lives of thousands of people. Naming the paths to the new cabin sites after Floyd and Frances Beard is a small token of gratitude for their philanthropy, love for people, and hope for what the church can be.
Since 1959, WKYC has been living out its mission of building strong Christians, but it didn’t begin at 301 Youth Camp Road. In fact, WKYC first met in Dawson Springs at the same facility used by the 4-H Club. The Board of Directors had a vision for a place that campers could call their home away from home permanently. Floyd and Frances Beard rose to the occasion by donating their Crittenden County property to WKYC in the early 1960s. They saw a need, and they met it. Read the full article here.
Generosity from Generation to Generation
How should you live in your 20s? How do you redeem the time you’ve been given in a decade that many would describe as the prime of your life?
In 2016, Huffpost.com contributor Sophie Davis offered an answer symptomatic of the times in which we live. Davis’ article, titled “12 Things You Should Do in Your 20s,” captures the essence of our culture’s postmodern focus on the self in her first line: “Your 20s are your selfish years… ensure you are selfish with your time, look after yourself, pay attention to your mental health, and love the people who are important to you.”
In an act that could easily be described as countercultural given the context of that article and the prevailing culture of the day, four young WKYC alumni and their spouses took a radically different approach to redeeming the time they’ve been given by supporting Western Kentucky Youth Camp in a remarkable way: sponsoring a cabin in memory of their grandparents, Murrell and Carolyn Fitzgerald. Read the full story here.
Campaign Strengthened by Gift from Gunn Family
For more than 60 years, Western KY Youth Camp has lived out its mission of building strong Christians in partnership with area churches and their families. Together we’ve maintained a firm commitment to creating meaningful faith-forming experiences for our campers that lead to lives forever changed by the power of the Gospel.
WKYC is delighted to recognize one such partnership by highlighting a family whose generosity will continue to build strong Christians for years to come: the Gunn family.
Throughout WKYC’s history, donors have played a pivotal role in the lives of our campers, and our camp would not be where it is today without the foresight and generosity of families like Chris and Melissa Gunn. Read more about their support by downloading a PDF of their story.
1963 News Article - Opening of WKYC
The charter, impressive with its Official Seal of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, opens with the words, "To aide parents in the development of their children spiritually, mentally, socially, and physically through Bible teaching in a Christian environment." With these words as a starting point, the directors of the Western Kentucky Youth Camp have developed a fine campsite near Marion, Kentucky, for young people of the churches of Christ to enjoy the slender of the West Kentucky countryside along with the power and beauty of God's word as taught by dedicated Christians.
The campsite contains more than 40 acres, with access to some 50 acres more of rolling meadows and shady woodland. On the campsite there is a large dining hall, two completely furnished bathhouses and 5 completed cabins each of which will house 12 students and a counselor.
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