Friday, March 2, 2012

Vintage Brochure of Sebago Basin Tenting Area, North Windham, Maine



Brochure consisting of one sheet of 8-1/2" x 11" paper, folded in thirds.  There's no date, but the $10 a week camping fee that someone wrote on it might be a clue to someone familiar with the area.  I'm guessing the 1950s/1960s era.


Sebago Basin Tenting Area is or was located at North Windham, Maine, 1/2 mile above the village on Route 302.  While researching it, I found an obituary for one of its founders, George Keef, an man of varied interests who sounds like the kind of host who would keep campers coming back year after year.






Someone has noted areas of interest: a place to find Indian relics, a beaver dam and the locks on the Eel Weir Canal.






A map of Sebago Lake, with Sebago Basin on the North Windham shore:


View Larger Map



Thanks for stopping by!

15 comments:

  1. My family and I watched the moon landing in 1969 on a Sony 6" television plugged in to the cigarette lighter in our Chrysler while camping in Sebago basin. Spent many summers there.. great memories.

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    1. hi... my family also camped at the basin for many
      years..started in 1965... my brother dated the owner's daughter for 3 or 4 years but I cannot remember their names... we had great times there..do you remember the nightly softball games..adults vs kids.. email back if you wish... Jamaicahome2@gmail.com

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  2. Thank you for your comment! I can somewhat imagine your excitement at watching the moon landing, as, not wanting to miss the 1996 Summer Olympics, I dragged a similar tiny tv to meet my Appalachian Trail thru-hiking son on the Maryland/Pennsylvania border. Hikers were gathered around the tv at Gardners, PA to watch Michael Johnson shine.

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  3. So many great memories there with my family! We camped there for over 30 years right up to the sad day they closed...even have one of the wooden campground "Number" signs...and a brochure that's not as old as this one but old...really miss camping there!

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  4. Thanks for your comment, Karen. The brochure made the place sound wonderful, and it's nice to hear that validated.

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  5. I now camp at Point Sebago, but I miss Sebago Basin. Camped there from when I was i kid in the 70's and 80's up until Summer 1987. The summer before I was a freshman in high school. Wish I could find more old pictures and things from there online.

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  6. Thanks for your comment adding to what others have said. I'm sure it was a lovely place all on its own, but it sounds as though the owners made it all the more so.

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  7. My family stayed at that campground every summer in the mid '70s. Now it's Wal-Mart and Lowes...memories

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  8. Oh, no, Peter... Too bad it couldn't have morphed into a town or state park where future memories could have been made, though it sounds as though the Keef family were integral to the positive camper experience.

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  9. Any way u could find a photo of that huge house out front that walmart moved back?

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  10. the huge house was actually an early cape and a large barn that had been moved twice: From the Dutton Hill Road in Windham to Rt. 302, then cape and large barn were moved back beside where Lowes is now and then the cape was moved to the Sebago Basin Road in Windham. The barn was torn down but the large barn doors were reused in the new shed the owners built.

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  11. My family camped at Sebago Basin every summer! I have so many wonderful memories!

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  12. Do you still have this item, and is it for sale? I am the leader of a middle school history club in windham and would love to have this to share with them!

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    1. Contact information is at the top of the blog and also under Inquiries in the right margin, near the top. I think I still have it - will have to check for sure.

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