Hiram House Today

“Horses on Parade!” 2006 Benefit

Celebrate summer at Hiram House with "Horses on Parade!" on Saturday, July 22, from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. Families welcome, fun for all ages, bring the kids and grandkids!

Join us for a delicious ribs and chicken barbecue dinner by The Winking Lizard, cocktails, a silent auction with fabulous prizes, a raffle to win a session at Summer Day Camp 2007, a parade of horses from our stables, plus fascinating balloon, bubble and magic shows and entertainment for both children and adults by Zap Entertainment LLC, a bonfire and more!

The event will benefit the Hiram House Horseback Riding Program and scholarship fund for youth in need.

Reservations are required. Adult’s and children’s tickets are now available. Please call Hiram House for more information at (216) 831-5045. Sponsorship opportunities are also offered. Please inquire for details.

Volunteers are welcome to assist the benefit committee with decorations, silent auction, tickets and other related activities. Please contact the camp office if interested.

Paul Newman, George Steinbrenner-New York Yankees, Alcoa and Murch Foundations Donate Thousands to Aid Hiram House Camp

Hiram House recently received several generous donations from two internationally- known Cleveland area natives, noted actor and philanthropist Paul Newman and George Steinbrenner owner of the New York Yankees baseball team and the New York Yankees Tampa Foundation, as well as from two prominent charitable foundations, Murch Foundation and Alcoa Foundation.

Our sincere thanks to Mr. Newman who donated $30,000, to Mr. Steinbrenner and the New York Yankees Tampa Foundation who donated $15,000, to Murch Foundation which donated $20,000 and to the Alcoa Foundation that donated $16,000.

Their gifts will benefit the 110 year old camp and help support its many recreational and educational facilities and programs which serve thousands of children and adults in Northeast Ohio each year!

Hiram House Board of Trustees Elects 2006 Leadership, Names Four New Members at Annual Meeting

The Hiram House Board of Trustees elected officers and four new Board members at the annual meeting in December.

Officers re-elected for 2006 are John M. Fulton President; John D. Barrett, Vice President-Finance and Treasurer; Susan Walter Cargile, Vice President-Development; and Russell R. Grundke, Secretary. Barrett was also nominated and elected as President-Elect to succeed Fulton when his term ends at the end of this year.

Fulton, a resident of South Russell, is retired after a career in banking and finance. He was Senior Vice President of the Commercial Real Estate Division of Charter One Bank, in Cleveland. Barrett is Senior Vice President & Head of the Commercial Banking Division of LaSalle Bank in Cleveland. He is a resident of Hudson. Cargile is Chair of the Hiram House Campaign and resides in Beachwood. Grundke is Executive Director of Hiram House, the non-profit organization operating Hiram House Camp.

Newly elected trustees are business leaders and area residents Priscilla Moore, Edward Y. Moore III, John Velotta and Emerald Velotta.

John Velotta and Emerald Velotta are residents of Willoughby Hills. John is President of Design Your Own, Inc. in Cleveland and Emerald is the company’s Bookkeeper.

John received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Marketing & Business Administration from Baldwin Wallace. Emerald is a graduate of John Carroll University and has a Bachelor of Arts degree. Both are actively involved as volunteers in the community and with their two children.

Edward Y. Moore III, a resident of University Heights, is a Vice President and Equity Research Analyst with National City Bank in Cleveland. He earned his Masters in Business Administration degree from Indiana University.

Priscilla Gilliam Moore, of Shaker Heights, is a Realtor with Prudential Select Properties in Pepper Pike. She holds an Associate in Arts degree from Centienary.

The Moore family has a long tradition of dedication and service to Hiram House. David Moore, of Shaker Heights, husband of Priscilla and father of Edward, is a longtime member of the camp’s current Board of Trustees and has served as a past Vice President-Finance. Moore is also with Prudential Select Properties in Pepper Pike. Their daughter Lisa Moore Mayer also serves on the Hiram House Board.

Board President John M. Fulton, with newly elected Trustee Emerald Velotta (on right). New Trustee John Velotta is not shown in photo.

New Hiram House Trustees (left to right) Edward Y. Moore and Priscilla G. Moore, with current Board Member David Moore.

Meet Former Hiram House Camper, Now Camp Unit Leader: Tammara Williams — “Making a Difference for the Next Generation”

Tammara Williams, Unit Leader (center), surrounded by Hiram House Summer Campers. To help a child in need attend Summer Camp, please donate to the Hiram House “Campership Fund.”

As a young child growing up, the adults, places and experiences in our lives can have a huge impact. Their influences can make a positive difference in the kind of adults we will someday become, even if our own lives were less than ideal. Sometimes, we are given the opportunity to return those life lessons to the next generation. That was certainly the case for former Hiram House camper, now Camp Unit Leader, Tammara Williams.

Placed into the foster care system when she was only three years old, Tammara is a true example of how, given ample doses of love, support and determination, one can overcome life’s adversities and the odds to become a real success story. She credits Hiram House with making a difference in her young life and she is now a role model for current campers.

Tammara also credits her parents Deloris and Henry Williams. She was fortunate to be sent to live with the Williams family when she was just six years old after having been in several different foster homes. They adopted her at age 14. They provided Tammara and her foster siblings not only with a loving home of their own, but with a supportive extended family.

While Tammara doesn’t dwell on the all too real hardships she experienced as a small child with her birth family and others who cared for her before her adoptive foster family took her in, it profoundly affected her life. Still, this remarkable young woman managed to rise above it and is now happy, focused, and intent on “giving back to today’s children.”

A 2005 graduate of John Carroll University and Shaw High School in 2001, Tammara now holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications and would eventually like to have a career in that field. But first she felt it was time to do something else important to her. So, her path took her to Hiram House.

Summer 2005 was Tammara’s first year on the staff at Hiram House, where she became Unit Leader for “Indian Girls”, a Summer Resident Camp group of 10 to 13 year olds. There she supervised four counselors with 8 campers per group, plus three specialists.

But last season was not Tammara’s first time at Hiram House. She was there before when she was just eight and nine years old, in 1991 and 1992, as a former Summer Resident Camper. She and her adoptive brother and sisters, as well as her foster brothers and sisters, all came to Hiram House too as children and loved it. Her older adopted siblings, brothers talked so much about camp she couldn’t wait to go herself.

Her adoptive mother used to joke when they came back home she was tired of constantly hearing “camp songs”, but, they had so much fun, they couldn’t stop singing. Some of her favorite memories of her days at camp were eating ice cream at the camp store, exploring the train caboose, riding horses at the barn, sleeping in log cabins and raising the flag at assembly. She also loved the swimming pool, pond and camp songs.

Simple pleasures, but they were a departure from the life she had known before. Some of the most important things to her as a child at camp and to those campers she later oversaw were often those simple things that we sometimes take for granted.

Things like the stability and security that Hiram House provides. “You don’t realize unless you’ve been there how amazing it is just to have two weeks where when you go to sleep at night you wake up to find the same people there in the morning,” she said. “Sadly, that has not always been the case for some of these children.” Even the sense of freedom to play, explore, roam in the great outdoors were wonderful since many of the youth most in need at camp, both then and now, didn’t have back yards at home.

She could relate to many of the resident campers, who had hard lives, and found parallels in her own background and experiences that gave her greater credibility with them. They were more willing to listen to or take advice from her and give back of themselves as a result. Camp teaches kids good “life lessons,” she said, like the importance of honesty and personal relationships. It stresses responsibilities, with simple daily chores, like making your bed, keeping your cabin clean, and setting the table for “family style” meals.

“Meal times can be especially important at camp” Tammara explained. While she had the benefit of eating meals together with her adoptive family, not all her co-campers did, nor do the campers she sees today. “Some of these kids just fend for themselves when it comes to eating and grab whatever they can,” she said. “Fortunately, there is always plenty of good food for them at camp and good manners learned.”

Other subtle differences she noticed when she was a camp unit leader herself were in the children’s demeanor when they first arrived and when they left camp. Some of those who were very shy are the ones “who have been through a lot.” She added, “These kids are so beautiful inside, but too often they are afraid to show themselves and just keep things bottled up. The warm, caring, friendly atmosphere at camp helps relax that barrier and allows their true personalities, spirits, and abilities to shine through.”

Challenges of dealing with today’s kids are the same in many ways as in the past, but different in others, Tammara said. But, she finds that “old fashioned” values of a smile, a hug, a friendly face and environment still go a long way in reaching a child.

After dinner, nights usually included an evening program with the kids and staff, such as campfires, setting up scavenger hunts, song contests, or other fun activities. By nightfall, she laughed that she was usually exhausted but the kids were still ready to go. She stayed in the log cabins with the children overnight. Everyone was in bed, with “lights out”, but there was normally talking which went on “long after.” To help settle the children, she read them books, like “Finding Fish” by Cleveland native Antwone Fisher, now a best-selling author and Hollywood screenwriter.

She met Antwone Fisher, who himself was a camper at Hiram House with his school group thirty years ago, when she was presented with a “Rising Up and Moving On” award in 2001 by Cuyahoga County Department of Children and Family Services. Fisher, who was also a foster child and abandoned, abused, and neglected in his youth, was the keynote speaker. Tammara said she found similarities in the story of his early life to her own in his book and the screenplay he wrote about it that was made into a movie starring Denzel Washington. Fisher too re-visited Hiram House in 2003 following his film’s Cleveland premiere and fondly recalled his time spent here.

Tammara recommends the Hiram House experience for both kids and staff to others she meets. She is grateful for the Hiram House “Campership Fund”, which not only provided some “Camperships” for her own family, but offers financial support each year to enable hundreds of Greater Cleveland youth in need to attend Summer Camp. She said her mother used to tell her and her siblings how thankful they should be to go to summer camp and that someone special was making it possible for them to be there having fun.

Sadly, her adoptive mother Deloris died in April, 2005 at age 72 years. Her father, Henry, 70 years, still lives in the home they shared. While the loss of her mother is hard for Tammara and her family, she is consoled by the fact that her mother lived a great life. Her parents boarded dozens of foster children from 1978 to 2001, “until it became too difficult for them in their later years.” They too received an award from the county for reaching out to so many children. Tammara smiled as she recalled “what a difference they made in so many young lives and what big hearts they had”.

The day before her mother died last spring, Tammara sent in her acceptance letter to work at Hiram House Camp last summer. She had received her mother’s blessing too. Mrs. Williams reflected that “Hiram House was a wonderful place and was so good to all you kids over the years.”

Tammara agrees and was pleased to be part of the present camp staff and enjoyed its “family atmosphere.” “We have a great staff and everyone loves being here,” she said about her co-workers, “it’s a great mix. We are making friends for life.”

As summer days at camp came to a close, Tammara looked forward to her own bright future and the many wonderful opportunities ahead of her. But, she will never forget all that was given to her, by Hiram House, her adoptive family, and others, and all that she wants to give back to other children less fortunate.