Editing Scouting in Connecticut (section)

===== Lake of Isles Scout Reservation =====
The Lake of Isles Scout Reservation (LOISR) was developed by the Charter Oak Council and had its first summer camp season in 1960, the Jubilee Year of the Boy Scouts of America.<ref>[http://www.loisr.com/ Lake of Isles Scout Reservation]</ref> The plan was to develop four camps on the more than {{convert|1100|acres|0|abbr=on}} that surrounded Lake of Isles, located in North Stonington, Ledyard and Preston townships of rural southeastern Connecticut. For 1960, Camps Pequot and Apache had been the only ones built. A third camp, Camp Cherokee, opened in 1970. This camp was designated an "Explorer Base" (although the Boy Scouting program was the only program that really used the camp as the Exploring program underwent drastic changes by the early 1970s) and featured patrol cooking with a central commissary. The fourth camp never got beyond the planning stage.

The Charter Oak Council merged with four other Councils in 1972 to form Long Rivers Council. By the mid-1970s, with a declining Boy Scout-age demographic nationally and declining Boy Scout membership in general due to the expanding list of organizations for adolescent boys, Long Rivers Council was faced with shutting down a number of their camps to the summer camping experience. For instance, Camp Nahaco closed to regular summer camping after 1977 (although it would occasionally re-open for long-term camping with specialty themes such as "Enviro-Camp"). Camp Tadma was closed in 1977, but a couple of years later opened again as a long-term Webelos Camp.

The plan for LOISR was to close Camp Pequot for two years and run Camp Apache for two years, then switch the status of the camps for the following two years. They expected this to reduce the impact of a summer camp season on the land by spreading out the wear and tear. So in 1975 and 1976, Camp Pequot was placed in "conservation status", and Camps Apache and Cherokee ran during those two summers. In 1977, Camp Apache was placed in conservation status and Camp Pequot was re-opened. However, for 1979, Long Rivers Council management changed its plan and decided to keep Camps Pequot and Cherokee open permanently.  For 1981, Camp Cherokee's patrol cooking operation was moved to Camp Pequot, as an option for troops who preferred this. Thus, while still a reservation of multiple camps, by the 22nd year of operation of LOISR, only Camp Pequot remained as a summer camp.

The summer camp season also shortened as time went on. In the 1960s, both Pequot and Apache opened for eight weeks of summer camp use. By the mid-1970s, this was down to six weeks for Camp Apache. By the late seventies, Camp Pequot was only open for summer camping three weeks out of the summer. With the closure of Camp Cherokee after the 1980 season, Camp Pequot's season expanded back to five weeks.

With the construction of the Mashantucket Pequot Casino in 1991–1992, the natural beauty and surroundings had been damaged enough to make Long Rivers Council consider selling the property to the Native American tribe and this was done in 1992. The Mashantucket nation has since converted the land into a golf course.

======Camp Apache&nbsp;– Lake of Isles Scout Reservation======
Camp Apache had the largest capacity of the three camps, serving as many as 400 Scouts a week at its height in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It had a large dining hall and a huge reservation chapel. It also was closest to the reservation entrance on the western shores of Lake of Isles. The Reservation Family Housing (on "Knob Hill") and the Reservation Health Lodge were also located in Camp Apache.

In 1975 and 1976, Camp Apache ran for the last time during two summer seasons. In 1977, it was placed in conservation status and was never opened again as a Boy Scout Camp. Occasionally, it was rented by other groups and Scouts would continue to use Camp Apache for short-term Camporees and other district events. However, the reservation itself was not within the geographic boundary of Long Rivers Council, making other Council camps closer to the Council membership. Thus, Camp Apache was never used as much as it could have been.

======Camp Pequot&nbsp;– Lake of Isles Scout Reservation======
Camp Pequot was the southernmost camp on the reservation. It was mainly flat along the shoreline with a rapid rise of hills on the western side of the camp. It had a dining hall which served as many as 350 Scouts a week during the camp's heyday in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It was only slightly smaller than Camp Apache. The camp had an outdoor basketball court, which was rather unusual for most camps. Originally, the camp had eight summer campsites. Down on the flat, it included Buccaneers, Aquanauts, Mohegan, Woodsmen and Rocky Trails. The "higher elevation" campsites included Stockade, Bailey Hill and Hickory Hill. Later, Blueberry Hill was developed. Even later, the staff's central campsite, near the dining hall, was converted to a campsite called Braves, with the staff lodging being dispersed so that they lived near their program areas. The Braves campsite was mainly used for boys who wanted to come to camp, but no adult leader from their troop could. The camp staff would "provide" the adult leadership and thus the campsite was for what was known as the "provisional" troop.

In the mid-1970s, the plan for LOISR was to close Camp Pequot for two years and run Camp Apache for two years, then switch the status of the camps for the following two years. So in 1975 and 1976, Camp Pequot was placed in "conservation status" and Camps Apache and Cherokee ran during those two summers. In 1977, Camp Apache was placed in conservation status, and Camp Pequot was re-opened. However, for 1979, Long Rivers Council management changed its plan and decided to keep Camps Pequot and Cherokee open permanently. By 1981, Camp Cherokee's patrol cooking operation was moved to Camp Pequot, as an option for troops who preferred this. Thus, while still a reservation of multiple camps, only Camp Pequot remained as a summer camp.

The summer camp season also shortened as time went on. In the 1960s, Pequot opened for eight weeks of summer camp use, which was reduced by the end of the 1970s to only three weeks. However, with the closure of Camp Cherokee after the 1980 season, Camp Pequot's season expanded back to five weeks.

======Camp Cherokee&nbsp;– Lake of Isles Scout Reservation======
Camp Cherokee opened in 1970. This camp was designated an "Explorer Base" at first and featured patrol cooking with a central commissary. However, the designation as an Explorer Base quickly disappeared, as Exploring became more vocationally oriented in the early 1970s, especially in Connecticut with its Police Explorer Posts. Camp Cherokee was the only camp opened on the eastern shores of Lake of Isles, which had been formed by damming a small stream. The original channel ran through the Camp Cherokee waterfront, making the drop-off between the non-swimmers' area and the beginners' area huge.

At Camp Cherokee, campsites were further subdivided into patrol sites. Each patrol site had a sheepherders stove and wall tents on wooden platforms with bunks and mattresses provided. Scouts would have to make the trek to the commissary three times a day to pick up food for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and then cook it themselves. This was the logical camp in the council to hold Youth Leader Training, whether it was called JLTC, TLD or TLTC, as it had the patrol cooking arrangements. There were six troop sites throughout Camp Cherokee's history: Sassafrass Hill, Timbertrails, Haven, Wilderness, Tunxis and Pyquag.

Camp Cherokee had all the usual program features for Scouting: a nature area, a waterfront, a place to practice scoutcraft, a rifle range and an archery range. The lower part of the camp, along the Lake of Isles shoreline, included the campsite Tunxis, the nature area and the waterfront. It was a steep climb up to the rest of the camp, which included the trading post/camp office and commissary and the other five campsites. Some needed amenities were provided at the Reservation level, such as a health lodge and lodging for families of married staff.

From 1970 until 1978, Camp Cherokee was open the same weeks as the other camps, which allowed some friendly competition between camps on opposite sides of the lake, reaching from softball games to a tug of war. Most popular was a battle between "war canoes", where two 12-plus person canoes, representing each camp, headed out on the lake, determined to swamp each other by splashing water into the opponents' canoe. Another favorite activity was to out-shout the other camp during campwide campfires on Sunday evening and Friday evening.

In 1979 and 1980, with continuing declining attendance, Camp Cherokee was open for only three weeks, followed by Camp Pequot for the next three weeks. This allowed the same staff to be hired for both camps. By 1981, Camp Cherokee's patrol cooking operation was moved to Camp Pequot. Thus, despite being the most modern facility on the Reservation, Camp Cherokee was closed for good as a Boy Scout summer camp.