Melissa Fitzgerald is the owner and director of a sleepaway camp. Her own kids attend the camp, but she makes sure they have the same experience as other campers. Her kids don't always find it easy being the camp owner's kids.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Melissa Fitzgerlad, owner and director of Camp Highlander . It has been edited for length and clarity. I'm a huge believer in the sleepaway camp experience and that sending kids to camp is a gift.
I grew up in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and my parents sent me to an all-girls camp in North Carolina every summer. While I loved it and always planned on sending my kids to camp so they could have the same experience I did, I never imagined I'd own a camp , and my kids would be campers there. In 2019, my parents decided to sell Camp Highlander, a co-ed sleepaway camp for 6 to 16-year-olds in Henderson County, Western North Carolina, which they'd owned for almost 20 years.
They wanted to retire, and their dream was to continue their legacy and pass down the camp from generation to generation. I had started working at the camp soon after they bought it, and after my husband left the Navy, he also began working there. He had always wanted to own a sleepaway camp , and as we both loved working at Camp Highlander and had plenty of experience, we decided to buy it.
We now live at the camp year-round. My kids started at Camp Highlander when they were 5 years old My kids have spent every summer at Camp Highlander sin.