History Spotlight - Harold Clark
As I shared in church on January 26th I recently had the pleasure of hearing a presentation by Ann Callaghan Allen on her book Holocaust Refugees in Oswego. She mentioned in her presentation about Harold Clark who was the leader of Troop 19 here at our church and with some of those Boy Scouts started a troop at Fort Ontario with refugees staying there at what came to be called Safe Haven. Just a little background 982 Holocaust refugees were housed at the Fort Ontario Emergency Shelter during WWII here in Oswego. (August 1944 to February 1946).
I want to share directly from Ann’s book some of her information about our very own Harold Clark. She reports that many hundreds of spectators crowded along the fence on the East Ninth Street side of the fort as the refugees left the train they had arrived on. Among them was machinist Harold Clark, who looked out on the survivors of Hitler’s horrors and asked himself what he might possibly do to help. Within a matter of weeks he joined Kenneth Lawrence, a civilian employee at the shelter who was also a local scoutmaster and Ferdinand Kaska, the youth director of the shelter, to form Boy Scout Troop 28, the first international Boy Scout Troop. Kaska recalled that Clark “came even in the worst possible of Oswego weather to work with our boys and the boys in turn are as fond of him as of a brother.” Clark and three or four of his Scouts would drive to the fort weekly. In the early weeks of the troop while still in need of an interpreter, they were able to play games and engage in the typical Scouting activities.
Ann talks about the camping experiences that Troop 28 had with the Minetto troop in Minetto along the railroad tracks in Minetto. The excitement of Scouting ultimately spilled over to the girls of the shelter as well and a Girl Scouts Troop was also formed.
May 1945 saw the end of the war in Europe . It was news received with great joy and great trepidation at the Emergency Refugee Shelter. President Roosevelt had died and President Truman was left with the question of what to do about the 982 “guests of the United States “ at Fort Ontario, the majority of whom wanted to remain in the US despite having signed the declaration form stating they would return to their home countries after the war. Ann outlines the hearings held about the refugees and I found it very interesting that it was 14 members of Troop 28 that testified to plead their case to be able to remain in the US. It took awhile but they were finally given permission to stay in the US if they chose to do that. Once the shelter did close, Harold Clark’s Boy Scouts continued to correspond with him. Several sought out troops in their new cities and asked to keep in contact with news of Minetto Troop 19. Harold Clark won the Silver Beaver Award for his leadership of Troop 28, which was the highest honor given in Boy Scouting. Ann lists the amazing careers that many of Clark’s former Boy Scouts went on to have and many of them acknowledge their positive roots in Scouting.
Harold Clark continued with his advocacy for bringing the lessons of Scouting to underserved populations when each summer Oswego was home to migrant workers and their families who relocated temporarily to harvest local crops. Clark again enlisted members of Minetto’s Troop 19 to assist in these scouting programs.
There are a lot more accomplishments talked about in Ann’s Holocaust book about Harold. I’m thinking that maybe we should read this book after we finish After the Last Border for the Tuesday morning book club. But Harold Clark who was married to Mildred Clark and daughters were Linda Douglas and Grace Rae’s is definitely an angel among us at Minetto UMC!