May 4, 2021 • 48 mins
A closer look at the mythos of Anneewakee and the meaning of the crest. We hear from former patients about the child labor they were forced to do and the lack of education it’s patients received.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Camp hell an Awake is a production of I Heart Radio.
The views and opinions expressing this podcast are solely those
of the author and participants and do not necessarily represent
those of I Heeart Media or its employees. Due to
discussion of traumatic, sexual, and violent content, listeners, discussion is advised.
The whole episode was almost surreal. I moved to Atlanta
(00:23):
in X seven, became a graduate student. Needed money, so
I looked under psychologists in the phone book in the
yellow pages, and there was something called any Wakey Foundation,
and I said, what the dickens is that? This is
Roger Brenn. He was an early employee at ana Waki.
Today he's a clinical psychologist and currently practices in Huntsville, Alabama.
(00:47):
First person I talked to was Lewis Petter, and on
the phone he asked my credentials. He said, you're exactly
what I'm looking for, and so I drove out to
his offices. Lewis Heater came out and introduced himself to me,
and we sat in his office and he hired me
on the spot. I was probably there fifteen minutes. He said,
do you want to work with us? It sounded like
(01:08):
a fun exciting place I thought I could grow. He
basically made me the clinical director. There was no other
mental health person on the campus per se. Now he
had a license to practice psychology, but had been grandfather,
and he had doctor in front of his name. I
didn't know for several months what that meant, but he
(01:30):
had an honorary doctorate degree, and from that point on
I thought he was a real psychologist. When medical licensing
laws came into play in the United States, if you
already had a master's degree and had been practicing psychology
for a number of years, you were able to obtain
a license as a one time clause. Roger explained that
(01:51):
this would not fly today, but at the time you
were grandfathered in. Such was the case with Anna Waki's founder,
Lewis Petter. There was no training Number one. It was
all on the job. The boys were required to build
their own lodging. UH. They did a lot of their
own cooking. UH. They had to make sure that they
(02:12):
stayed in groups and worked in groups and teams. I've
been there about six months, and of course it took
me a while to get acclimated to the camp, and
at the same time I started thinking there were some
unusual things. Well, we started suspecting that there was some
kind of sexual misconduct. Couldn't prove it, kids wouldn't admit it,
(02:32):
so we sort of hung in there to see what
we could find out. Over the past several weeks we
have received the number of very serious allegations concerning both
the facility out there in a number of individuals involved
with him. It was just a form of their therapy.
They were told to do it, and at the time
(02:53):
he was fourteen and a half fifteen years old, they
didn't know any better. I asked him, why are you
letting this hypen? Why are you covering up for Louis Patter.
He had no answer to that question, having paid its little,
such destricable place, and to do absolutely the contrary of
(03:18):
what they should have said. I'm disturbable the fact of
something I can still got on it and I wake you.
I'm Josh Stain and this is Camp Hell Anawaki. In
speaking with former patients and employees of Anawaki, I heard
a range of experiences, some heartbreaking, some inspiring, and some
(03:40):
that were straight horrific. To understand what led to these experiences,
we need to look at how this institution was initially
set up. What were its purposes? And why were so
many parents sending their children there? I tried to find
anyone who could give me an idea of what the
early days of Annawaki were like. It was out in
the woods. Was a dirt road going into it. Outside
(04:01):
Douglasville was still a dirt road. The Aniwaki sign was
there in a path where the Abulds are going to
be built. Down below that was the small little school
room and one lodge, and then as you go down
into the campsite there was a tool room and stuff.
My name is Richard Edgerley. I got recruited there in nineteen.
(04:23):
My number was e seventy nine. That means Richard was
only the seventy nine person to attend an awake. He
says he was admitted when he was around the age
of ten or eleven. The lake was being built. It
wasn't like hite finished because I worked on that for
I would say a month before they filled it up.
The cabins had just received power. Fact the place where
(04:45):
they stuck the poles and it was still flat, so
it hadn't it time to grow up. An Awaki Lakes
still sits in Douglasville and can easily be seen on
any map. This was one of Richard's original work projects.
While attending in the beginning was that's what everybody was
working on. The lake clearance, stumps, burning the wood, the grass,
(05:05):
cutting with sling blades, lots of trail building because everything
was new. We line all our trails of the rocks.
We used to have competitions to see who could move
the biggest rock. In fact, the one my friend and
I did is still sitting there exactly where it's set.
Fifty years ago. We stay in the cabins. We built
two extensions. They weren't finished totally. A couple of the
(05:28):
cabins had the foundation for an add on to the
building and it wasn't done during my time. We knocked
down the wall and built that extension. During that time
we installed heating panels, and twenty years agoing now and
out there, they were still hanging and they were still working.
The day to day for patients at an Awaki was
set by a self planned schedule. It was to be
(05:50):
followed by the letter. On Sundays, we have to write
a schedule of everything we did for that week from
morning to night five three would bake up five forty five,
we get dressed. Six o'clock we would assemble as a group.
Six ten we would move to the lodge. We would
have to walk around the lake. Seven o'clock was breakfast,
always thirty minutes. Eight o'clock we go to the tool room,
(06:11):
check out the tools. Depending on what we had to
do that day, axes, rakes, whatever, we'd actually go to
whatever project it was, cutting grass, lining trails, building things
in the camp, helping other groups build their stuff, cleaning
out sewage ponds, painting, staining. Eleven o'clock we would stop
clean up. Twelve o'clock, lunch, one o'clock we'd go back
(06:34):
to work. At three thirty four o'clock we would stop
back to the lodge and think again what happened with dinner.
Three minutes after that, we went back to our campsites
and had a group meeting. Could range anywhere sixties seven o'clock,
and that was in the back of the campsite, split
logs around the fire pit. The group would sit there
and talk and work out our problems and say what
(06:54):
happened during the day. And then after that we'd have
free time activities. Letter writing showers ever we need to do,
and then twenty around there lights out. It wasn't that bad.
It kept you busy, and you had your friends and
bec you didn't have any time to thank nearly at all.
This rigid daily structure provided the patients of an awaki
(07:16):
with a predictable routine, a widely accepted strategy to reduce
problem behaviors in children with emotional behavioral issues. So what
doesn't mean to be diagnosed with an emotional behavioral issue?
The answer is more complicated than you may think. I
went to speak with an expert who could shed some
light on the subject. My name is Steve Trustcott. I
(07:36):
am a professor at Georgia State University in the school
Psychology program. And I'm Katherine Perkins, and I'm also a
professor in school psychology at Georgia State. I asked Stephen
Catherine to explain what it means to have a child
with emotional behavioral issues. One of the things that is
probably going to make your story complicated is that there
(07:57):
are multiple systems for determining what or a child has
an emotional or behavior disorder, and within those systems, there
are different definitions. There's a legal system. There's an educational system,
and then there's a system of psychiatric kind of disorders,
and they overlap some but they're not the same, so
(08:18):
i'll give you up. For instance, the classification using the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual identifies about ten of us population
of children notes having an emotional or behavioral disorder, whereas
the school based definition only about a little less than
one percent of kids or kids who are classified as
(08:38):
having an emotional or behavior disorder. So there's a disparity
between those and part of the disparity is that the
criteria are different. So the criteria for a special education
for the label of eb D and Georgia. That's another
thing is the labels change across the states, but in
Georgia it's eb D. The label requires there to be
an educational impact. Basically, the term emotional behavioral issue is
(09:03):
not a universal standard. What qualifies as emotionally disturbed changes
depending on the context in which it is determined, whether
it be by a school, hospital, or otherwise. This is
something that would give in a waky enough wiggle room
to claim anyone could be accepted based on the facility standards.
Emotional behavioral disturbance is the label that was given by
(09:27):
the federal government. That's in this law Individuals for Disabilities
Education Act that specifies what students qualify for special education
in public schools. That's what that label is. And then,
like my colleague pointed out, there are other labeling systems
that are more medically oriented, or you know, the judicial
(09:50):
system has their own label, which is guilty or not guilty,
and so it's a little confusing. But the federal law
for special education clearly outlines the criteria that you're looking
at to determine if a child meets that criteria for
emotional behavior of disturbance. There isn't a definitive way to
(10:14):
say this kid does and this kid doesn't have that disability.
Catherine and Steve pointed out that just because a child
is labeled as emotionally disturbed, that doesn't make that criteria
the same in Georgia as it may be in Alabama
or Florida. This term is a blanket that could be
used in a number of situations. Some of these would
(10:35):
not only include school, but also the judiciary system. The
definition in Georgia is based on five primary concerns. The
first one is an inability to build or maintain satisfactory
interpersonal relationships with peers and or teachers. An inability to
learn which cannot be adequately explained by intellectual, sensory, or
(10:58):
health factors. The third one is a consistent or chronic
inappropriate type of behavior or feelings under normal situations. The
fourth is a displayed pervasive mood of unhappiness or depression,
and the last one is a displayed tendency to develop
physical symptoms, pains, or unreasonable fears associated with personal or
(11:20):
school problems. So those are kind of the five hallmarks
of students who are identified as having eb D. So
here's how I think of it. There's typical childhood development,
you know, the way most kids grow and learn, and
then sometimes the kind of behaviors that we're talking about
when we're talking about eb D. They may be perfectly
(11:46):
typical and normal, but then if they persist into other
developmental stages, they might look very different. So, for example,
many people talk about the terrible twos, have you know,
tantrum behavior and very young children who are trying to
find their way in the world and are trying to
(12:07):
assert their power and their choice and their decision making.
And then if they don't get their way, they let
you know they're not happy about that. But that same
tantrum behavior that would be typical with a two year
old starts looking very different in a school aged child.
And so it's when these behaviors persist with frequency, intensity,
(12:33):
and duration beyond that that is seen in typically developing children,
that's when we start saying, Oh, that's problematic. And how
do parents react when faced with this type of situation?
And how did so many come to the conclusion that
Anna Waki was the answer. I spoke with Richard Dressler.
(12:56):
He part time serves as a motivational speaker helping family
deal with crisis. His son was also sent to an
awake as a team. I asked him what it was
like dealing with a child with emotional behavior issues and
how he came to the conclusion to send him to
an awake. Oh. Desperation, helplessness, anxiety, frustration. When people ask
(13:20):
me that question about being a parent, and I tell him, look,
we're not giving any guide books to read how to
be a parent. Okay, it's a daily experience. It's a
constant struggle between your head and your heart and knowing
what you should do, what you don't want to do.
There was no place, because I look back, that I
(13:41):
felt I could go to that could really help me.
There are more programs today that are more advanced. There's
more advancements about drug abuse. There's more what I would
call openness in society. So the only thing you could
do back then is trust your psychiatrist, who also was
(14:04):
duped and knew nothing about what was going on at
any of these places like an Awake. Richard says in Awake,
he was first presented to him by his son's psychiatrist.
This would often be how children would get referred to
an Awaki through a doctor or teacher. If I remember right.
He described it as a psychiatric institute that can help
(14:24):
him adjust or change his personality and behavior on a
long term treatment program. Okay, and I accepted that. Richard
and his wife visited the Anawaki campus for a tour
before deciding whether to send their son there. This is
how the Anawaki staff explain their treatment center. They talked
about the fact that it was a psychiatric facility. They
(14:47):
forewarned us about the possibility of some of the incidents
that occurred, and that is we have to break down
their personality we're gonna read all the letters that come in,
all the phone calls. There was no privacy, and we
hope you expect that will probably complain about some of
these issues. All these things are normal. At that point
(15:09):
I accepted it, knowing what I briefly knew about these
kind of programs. Looking back now, I think it was
one great anticipated thing they did so that you wouldn't
question what they were really doing. So when your son
came home and complained they're abusing me and I want
(15:30):
to leave and this is happening to me, you would
just go back, well, look he's got these psychiatric problems
and needs treatment, and I'm assuming that what they told
me is true, which we did. In retrospect, I have
to say that, based on my experience, they probably like
to us. For parents dealing with an adolescent with emotional issues,
(16:07):
they can often feel like they have nowhere to turn.
Annawaki was the solution for many of these parents in
Georgia in the nineteen sixties through the nineteen eighties. What
was Antawaki doing to treat these children put into their control?
Psychologist Roger Brinn explains the origins of wilderness therapy. It's
been a rule of thumb that if you get kids
(16:29):
into the woods and impel them into some type of adventure, uh,
they do better. And that if they have delinquent proclivities,
if they're going to break the law or to become oppositional,
if they do much better, and that it's a great treatment.
And since then we found that that probably is a
case if it's structured correctly and done right. There was
(16:50):
a book called Wilderness Road, and as I recall, there
was a businessman's club in Dallas, Texas that sponsored the
original residential treatment center for kids, particularly boys. In Our
program at Antawaki was supposed to be designed after that program,
and it was similar. The boys were required to build
(17:11):
their own lodging, they did a lot of their own cooking.
They had to make sure that they stayed in groups
and worked in groups and teams, and putting the kids
in the woods made sense. Wilderness Road, published in nine
five by Campbell Loch Miller, has served as the manual
for much of what we know today as wilderness therapy.
(17:32):
Camp Woodland Springs was started in by Lock Miller as
an expansion of a summer camp program. He began with
the Salesman's Club of Dallas, a group of business and
professional men from the area. The parallels between Woodland Springs
and Antawaki are numerous, from a campground setting where the
children are in charge of their own lodging and meals,
(17:54):
to isolating patients into groups, and even alluding to Native
American terminology. Lock Miller was known around his camp as
Chief Lock. The following is an excerpt from Wilderness Road.
We find the camp environment good because it accords more
fully with the child's nature and provides ample opportunity to
(18:15):
satisfy the desire most boys have for adventure and exploration
in the outdoors. Small group living in this environment encourages
original experimentation and provides the widest possible variety of direct
experience with the natural surroundings. Such a life calls into
play numerous individual skills, provides an outlet for almost any
(18:36):
ability a boy may have, and constantly encourages new and
ever broadening experiences of the individual and the group. Life
in this setting provides for the maximum variety, freshness, and
intensity in the daily experience of each boy. Most of
Anawaki's therapy consisted of a daily group meeting at the
(18:57):
end of each day, a time where the always in
your work or school group would sit around the fire
and address any issues they encountered in their day. After dinner,
we had group therapy on logs and that was just
about every night. I worked with the staff. Everybody had
two staff leaders to group leaders in each group, so
(19:18):
you have about eight kids and two adults, maybe ten kids,
and they would do group therapy and work on what
went on that day in process to day. Mark Butler
attended in Awake from four to He remembers the group
therapy which was still taking place during his time there.
The guidance counselors would kind of push you along and
(19:41):
you know, I begin to things and it was also
time to go over the day. What happened? Were there
any incidents? Why did this happen? Because people got in
trouble all the time. These groups would serve an integral
part to the in Awaki program. Children were separated based
on different factors such as age and whether they were
(20:02):
in a work group or school group. Staying on brand,
These groups were all given Native American names, names such
as Tawanka, Kirkeeed, and Wahonka. Most of the groups of
Anuwaki were done by age limits. Like Wahonka was the
older groups, the one they went to school, alf campus
had the cars. Twanka was the youngest and arranged from
(20:26):
eight till like twelve or thirteen. Then you had other
groups that were ranging groups like maybe twelve, fifteen and
fifteen and sixteen or eighteen. Tuanka where I was at,
was literal translations to attempt or undertake a difficult task.
And like Antawaki is supposed to be the land of
the friendly people. Here's journalist Albert Edgin who reported on
(20:50):
in Awaki extensively for the Tallahassee Democrat. They were broken
up into groups, and the groups were are designed for
therapy and also for growth, so they had tasks they
had to perform in the groups monitored the behavior of
(21:14):
the kids in the group. The groups were independent. They
were not supposed to cross polony. They were not supposed
to talk to each other. Mark Butler recalls this group
structure and how it functioned during his time there. I
classify him into two groups, the word groups and the
school groups. The word groups are always working. The school
groups are always going to school. When I was there,
(21:37):
I believe there's about tended twelve working groups and there
was no socializing between the groups. Of course we did
a little bit in anyway. I guess they kept thinking
that if they kept the groups smaller and more contained,
and it's much easier to handle, I guess. But then
there was things like football where they would have to
(21:57):
be group mixing. You know, Okay, football players come from
different groups, so there was always some kind of talk
between the groups. The work group model would serve two functions.
At in Awaki to build what would become the largest
medical facility in the state, and second to help break
(22:19):
down the patients so they could be remolded into the
inn Awaky way of life. That was the idea at least,
here's Mark Sublett, another former in Awaky patient. So if
you had a building group, they might come in and
you might do all the masonry. Okay, so you're the
masonry group. So he cleared all the land, poured all
the concrete foundations, hauled all the block out there, laid
(22:43):
all the block next, all the mud, did all the plaster,
did it all and then another group might come behind
you and they might be a carpentry group. So that's
what they would do, And it seemed like sometimes the
groups would split off and would help the electrician and
be the electrical groups they've thing pulling wire doing all
this stuff. I think an Awakes look on it was
(23:06):
that they wanted to tell you, like, what we're gonna
do is make your life real shitty and you're gonna
hate it. So what would you want to do to
get out of your shitty, hated life? And they told
you that from the beginning, like, hey, from here on out, boy,
you're gonna have to work the rest of your life,
and you better get used to it. That's your life
from here on out. Unless you go to school and
(23:26):
get that education, then you might be able to do better.
So kind of right off, their feeding that into your mind.
This separation between work groups and school groups was the
beginning of an involved hierarchy at an Awaki. It was
only after one had proven themselves through a series of
tasks and personal development that they would receive a rite
(23:48):
of passage. All of the attendees were expected to achieve
to get your crest. I don't think I've ever cried
as much in my life as when he stood up
when he got his crest, which is a certain achievement,
and said, I'd like to thank my parents for letting
me enough to send me here. The crest would serve
as one of the key elements of Anawaki's mythos. An
(24:11):
Anawakee document called Legend of the Crest reads as follows,
The pine tree and red hill are the materials found
in nature, which man may use, according to his ability
and ambition, to improve the state of his existence in nature.
The scroll depicts the democratic concept of the value of
(24:33):
the individual and also the importance of one's relationship to
other individuals. The winding path to the rising sun signifies
the importance of striving toward a goal in life, using
the self discipline necessary to overcome obstacles which may present
themselves in reaching of that goal. The praying hands show
(24:55):
the need for a religious concept, the recognition of a
power in the universe which is higher than the individual.
The dovel with the olive branch was selected from the
story of Noah in the Bible to show that a
new life in a clean, new world is possible. The
crest was not only a symbol of personal improvement an
(25:18):
advancement in the program, but it was also required before
a child could advance from a work group to a
school group. Here's Stephen, another former in a wiki patient.
I was pretty much in a word group most of
the time. That's another one of those themes, getting your
crest or getting into a school group. It was a privilege,
(25:40):
you had to work for it, so on and so forth.
And I witnessed that some of these so called privileges
didn't turn out too well for for other people. When
I received my crest, they had a special Christmas dinner
because I believe it took me longer to get the
(26:01):
crest than anybody, and ant like the history, and you
know there again, it was because I saw the guys
that had worked towards that and it didn't turn out
too well for them. Once a patient had proven themselves
worthy of getting their crest, they would then move on
to one of the school groups. The time frame from
(26:23):
admittance until moving into a school group could often take
a year's During this time, no real schooling was a
part of the child schedule. In turn, grades would be
caught up to in a span of months, even weeks,
rather than years. In the beginning, there was not a school.
The little building in front of the lodge was a
one little classroom. It had the possibility of being a school.
(26:47):
At some point they did get a teacher, but I
never finished third, never went the fourth, ever went the fifth,
never went the sixth, ever went to seventh. And when
I got out of an Awoki, I should have before
my age, gone into the ninth, but it put me
back in eighth because it hadn't been in school for
so long. So when I went to high school started
out of eighth grade, You're willing to do whatever it
(27:08):
took to get out of that work group. I mean,
who wanted to haul block or sling blade four miles
of road or whatever chore they would have four to
you that day. Of course you're gonna want to get
out of that because you're a teenage kid and you
know so that you'd be like, oh, what do I
have to do to get into the school group? The
school groups did no physical labor. All they would do
(27:30):
is go to school. Now, they would tell you this
crazy story how you could do four years of education
in one year. At Annawaking. By the time I got
the school group, I was already three years behind. So
when I got out of there and tried to enroll
in public school and whatever my records were that came
(27:52):
back from that. I was supposed to be a senior,
but I'd be having taken ninth grade English, eighth grade, this, tenth, eleventh,
twelfth grade that. So it was just kind of screwed up.
But that's how they would treat their school as a privilege,
a higher group of an Awaki kid that's what you
wanted to achieve. The Anawaki program worked like a ladder
(28:15):
with a different rung for every advancement, giving more perks
and power the further up you climbed. This hierarchy would
go past the advancement of getting your crest and being
promoted to a school group. Students could work their way
up to becoming a group leader or even a paid
counselor do you have one group and everything works from
the head of leader of that group, and you also
(28:37):
have a hierarchy of the kids. The new kid has
to be taught by the next kid up what he's
just learned. The next kid up has to be teaching
that second kid down what he's just learned. Sort of
a cascading system of learning. And it's important to remember
that these were children. They may have been adolescents, but
they were children. The counselor might have been sixteen years
(29:00):
old responsible for a group of fifteen or twenty youngsters,
probably more likely as eighteen years old, but not that
much more mature, and certainly not experienced beyond the walls
of an awaki or bringing any real experience to the situation.
There are all sorts of stories that they would tell
(29:21):
you that I learned later, where activity would stop when
somebody acted out, and sometimes with supervision from the group leaders,
sometimes with leadership from the members of the group, they
would counsel the recalcitrant kid, whoever he may be. It
was all integrated system. It was innovative, but it was
(29:44):
also subject for severe abuse in the sense that if
you have a situation where the people that are being
counseled are empowered to enforce rules, then you have to
have stop gap measures, and I'm not sure they had
those stop gap manages. You have to supervise the children
(30:05):
that have been given these responsibilities. So one of the
things that deteriorated through the years was that the management,
and by management I mean Louis Petter, would promote children
to the status of counselor, and that appeared to be
(30:25):
in many cases without any substantial training. The fact is
is that a lot of these children who became counselors
were incapable of dealing with situations because they hadn't been
trained to and having a kid manage a situation that
can only come from the kid's gut. It can't come
(30:45):
from training or any kind of knowledge. It was an
ad hoc system. I'm here to talk about an Awake
(31:11):
and Louis Petter. This is Robert. He worked at in
Awaki as a group leader in the late nineteen sixties.
I'm Robert Augustino. I'm a law professor at John Marshall
Law School, and I've been there since where I came
in as i was dean in president for five years
and now I'm just a mere professor sitting in my
(31:33):
corner office, not being pastored by the administration. Robert originally
heard about Anawaki through social work with a branch of
local government called the Department of Family and Children's Services,
or as it is known de Facts. Probably sixty eight
or sixty nine. I've been a social worker and I
had heard about treatment centers for allegedly delinquent boys, someone
(31:57):
who weren't really delinquent. They just had done him home
to go to had a very bright patient. I guess
I should go him who had no place to live,
and I said, well, I gotta put him someplace. I
heard about Anawaki through the social work, through the information
held by the Department of Family, Mansial and Services, and
so I went to see Anuwaki. I met Louis Petter
and we talked about the program, and Petter maybe an offer.
(32:20):
He offered me a position there as a teacher because
I had by teaching credentials I had taught in high schools.
Robert says the idea of working with at risk youth
in an outdoor setting was something that interested him right away.
When I first started to work there, I had a
group and we lived in tents in Douglasville in the
Anuwaki real estate. And I had that job, and I
(32:42):
also was the head teacher. And as it turned out,
I was the only teacher as far as training was concerned,
there wasn't any I had co counselor with me, and
with the boys. There's like tennor Troll boys in in
that group. He had boys separated into different groups, maybe
five or six different groups. So I was directly in
(33:02):
charge of one group when I was the teacher for
all the groups solely but surely. The first thing I
did out there was supervised the boys in building. It
was really a lot of fun. And I'm not very skilled,
but I can carry things around and hammer and nail.
And after we built the building, it was time to
go in the canoe trip. Better had talked about taking
(33:23):
a bunch of boys on an outward bound type trip,
and we talked about the Swannee River. I always wanted
a canoe the whole Swanny. I'd been down there and
go and behold I did. We had started at the
Okifinoki Swamp and went down to the Gulf of Mexico.
So off we go. So I'm gone for the next
three weeks or more because at the end of the
(33:43):
canoe trip we stayed at a motel owned by an
Awaki and Carabelle or Is either owned by an Awakey
Lewis Petter robert Is referring to Carrabelle, Florida. This was
the beginning of what would become a second campus for
an Awaki. At the time, it was no more in
a motel on the Gulf of Mexico in the Panhandle
region of Florida. Robert says it was during his time
(34:06):
on this canoe trip that he first started to think
something wasn't right with Petter and his relationship with some
of the boys. I had an inkling of that down
at Carabelle. I thought that some of the behavior of
Louis Petter was probably inappropriate to its touching. I mean,
it's one thing to, you know, give a kind of
fatherly hug. It's another thing to put your hands on
(34:29):
people a little bit too much. Roger Wren, when we
first heard at the beginning of this episode, also worked
with Robert at Anawaki. At this time, they both began
to sense that something was off. Bob was hired about
seven months after I had arrived, maybe six, and he
and I became immediate friends. He's really a fine human being,
(34:52):
and Bob and I saw all right, I and we
started talking and saying, what you think is going on?
And then we started having some strong suspicions that things
were awry and what we thought was going on in
therapy was really not therapy at all. One thing that
first fed the suspicion was the fact that certain children
(35:12):
would stay at Lewis Petter's house on the weekend. I
didn't like it that the kids would go to his house.
A specific kid would go to his house and spend
a weekend or maybe a week with him. I questioned
several staffmanbers, like, what's that's all about, And well, he
gives them special therapy on the weekends. There was one
fellow there I thought was very ethical, very competent with
(35:33):
the kids, and he really ran the day to day
program there and he was just about as fine as
he could be. And I asked him about it, and
he said, he said, I think he does individual therapy
with him. The counselor Roger is referring to is Brett Baxley,
or as he was known on campus, Mr b. Everyone
(35:54):
I've interviewed says that Baxley was a stand up guy
who really cared about the kids and teaching them. Baxley's
history with Petter went back to the beginning of Anna Waki.
He even helped with the original land acquisition. What Baxley
and Petter's relationship was like is still a bit of
a mystery. What we do know is that, for whatever reason,
(36:14):
Baxley never questioned Petter's actions. Roger Wren and Robert Agostino
co chaperoned the canoe trip down the Swanee River. It
was at the destination in Caribelle, Florida that their suspicion
of abuse came to a head. Bob Camp and I'd
used his name, but he was down there and he
was There was a relationship between Louis Petter and Bob Camp,
(36:36):
which I thought was a little off, that something was
wrong again, the touching, Bob Camp's demeanor. At one point,
Roger rental or Bob Camp and Louis Petter and bed together.
Roger Wren initially saw this incident with Petter. He quickly
grabbed Bob Agostino to confirm what his own eyes had seen.
(36:56):
They were lying down together in the same bed, even
though was plenty of beds around. Kind of start wondering
what the heck was going on. But that was the
first inkling, and it happened early on, I must say,
but it took me a while to really figure out
exactly what was going on. Roger Wren remembers this incident firsthand.
(37:17):
Bob and I found him in the morning in bed
with one of the kids, and I don't want to
get a graphic, but it was. It was pretty rough,
and that's when Bob and I sort of said, oh,
then we knew there was no question. I've absolutely had
nightmares about it for several years. If I think about
it now, I get the e B gbs. It's just
not a pleasant thing. The day in which that occurred,
(37:42):
I just went per sirk. I mean, I was not myself,
and I'm usually fairly well controlled, but I was so emotional.
I couldn't stop Bob too. Bob and I were both mad,
and he just flat denied it, kept denying it and said,
that's not what you saw, and that's when we sort
of agonized. I said, I'm going to get out of
here it. Bob and I decided how are we going
(38:02):
to protect these children? Because they were thirteen year old
kids and there were something that were even eleven, and
I thought, I just I can't leave them here. After that,
I was trying to ask Bob. Bob was asking me
what should we do? Should we quit or should we
stay here? And trying to help the kids. What's what's
our role? Da Gastino and Wrin both decided to stay
(38:22):
on at in Awaki for the time being. They needed
to find out what else was going on. When I
got back there, I had a lot of work to
do on the way he's setting up to school and
all that sort of stuff, and so, you know, things
went on maybe a month or so. I got to
school going mostly I was with the group of the
school back and forth. Then I started to notice that
(38:45):
Louis Petter had this group of boys around him. It's
the same group. I said to one of them, why
are you what was with Dr? How to call him
Dr petti because that's what he wanted to be called,
you know. He said, no, PhD. He said, well, we
live with Dr Pettick. I said what he said, Yeah,
three or four of them we lived at his house
with him. I said, who lived with his house with him?
(39:07):
Is this just temporarily or been there for a long time?
And at least two of them said no, they've been
there for quite a while. They literally for quite a while. Well,
next time there, I started to watch every time he
came on campus. I kept my eyeball on Petter, and
I talked to Roger and Wren, who also had a
groups assigned to him besides being a psychologist and my
(39:27):
group and Rodgers group were off bounds. He couldn't go
near him. I wouldn't let him near my group. It's
worth noting here that Petter was an amputee from childhood
with a wooden leg where his limb once was. There
was one incident where my group was assigned a new kid, tall,
good looking fella, kind of muscular. And I can remember
(39:48):
this incident really well. There was a gang shower. Each
group would going in to have a gang shower, and
because Louis was prone to, let's say, walk into the
gang shower, supervised things. My groups in the gang shower,
and I know Louie is zeroing in on this new kid.
And Louis was about to go into the shower and
(40:10):
I said, Dr Petter, I don't think you should go
in there. He said, oh not. I said, it's my
group in there. And remember I told you before my
group is under my protection. You're not going in there.
And I know what you're going in there for. And
I said, Louis, I'm gonna tell you something. You go
in there and you touch that kid and you try
to abuse that kid, you know your wooden leg, I'm
(40:32):
gonna saw her off and throw it in the lake.
While Rinnandagostino knew that Petter was having inappropriate relations with students.
There were other counselors they were afraid may also be
taking advantage of the children. Look, some of the counselors
out there were bringing Roger, of course was good. There
was another counselor who I thought was really top flight,
(40:53):
and I think he was a homosexual, but I know
he never touched the kids. I still know what Petter
had on Baxley, and why Baxley, who was a decent
human being in every other way, would have cooperated with
the Petter what he was doing. I just don't understand it.
Never could. There was no indication that actually ever abused anyway.
(41:16):
And then there was Sam. There's a couple of other
ones out there who were just bad news. Sam was
the worst, Sam Singleton. Sam Singleton was a counselor and
a serial abuser of the kids. And I brought that
up with loud Petter, and of course his reaction was, well,
I'll talk to him, don't worry about it. Don't worry
about it. I'm an old social worker. I could tell
(41:38):
what's going on. And I eventually confronted Sam Singleton about
this in fact, I kicked him off the campus. I
had no authority, but I kicked him off campus anyway,
and Louis, of course brought her back. A couple of
weeks later. To three weeks later, he brought her back.
Sam was after this kid might Apparently Sam just I'd
(42:00):
have the hots for him, and I told Sam at
one point that if he touched Mike, I would break
his neck. He just walked away. He knew I was serious.
Shortly after this time, Roger Wren had reached his breaking point.
He recalls his resignation with the petter. After a while,
(42:20):
it became apparent that he and I were going to
be completely persona non grata. We were not going to
be allowed to do anything, and we had no power.
I said, I can't tolerate this, and he said goodbye.
After that, I got out of there. Roger was not
the only one who had had enough. Dagostino remembers the
mood at an Awaki at the time. Miss Ogiltree, who
(42:42):
was then the social worker. She was a delightful woman
and she was a good, good social worker, a good person.
When she figured out that that wasn't one of the
bad guys, she said to me soon she finds a
new job. She's getting out of there. Miss Ogiltree had left,
she had fled. Roger Wren had quit. So my allies
(43:03):
were gone, and Baxley would do nothing. The head counselor
I asked him, I said, why why are you letting
this happen? Why are you letting this happen? Why are
you covering up for Louis Petter? And he he had
no answer to that question. Well, I said, why are
you allowing Louis to do this stuff? Why are you
(43:23):
allowing this? This could be a good place, this could
be a wonderful place, but it's not because of what
louis doing. And you can stop him, you can keep away.
Robert says his relationship with Petter remained tense during his
last days at Ain't AWAKEI l after I threatened to
(43:43):
cut his leg off. Let's say our relationsister came around
the frosty and interesting enough. Of course, he didn't fire
me because he really thought he was untouchable. Eventually Robert
left the camp as well. He and Roger knew that
something had to be done about what they had witnessed.
It in a week and that's when we started making
(44:05):
as much effort as we could. And we were young,
remember with twenty five year old kids, and we're scared,
and the whole process was was frightening from a personal
point of view. Because I'm a graduate student. I don't
have any power, but we did have enormous amount of
energy and we tried everything we could. Because I probably
(44:27):
left unawake, I went to Defects and complained about what
was going on. We went to the sheriff I believe
his name was Abercrombie uh and remembering that Louis Petter
was also a Baptist minister and he had a strong
standing in the community in Douglasville. We brought eighty kids
(44:50):
to church every Sunday, to the Baptist church, so it
was it was a big deal. And nothing happened at
the sheriff's office. Nothing happened. We went to the States
our welfare program. They didn't want to hear it. We
went to the newspaper, to the Atlanta Journal. We went
to an attorney all by ourselves, and we went in
and the assays, there's you know, he didn't want any
(45:12):
part of it. Raynondagastino had made up their minds something
had to be done about the abuse taking place at Annawaki.
It seemed everywhere they turned, nobody would listen to their story.
That is, until a patient would finally come forward next
time on Camp how and Awake. I just thought that
(45:35):
people would be really upset about this. I thought people
would rise up and do something about it. Nothing was done.
We were involved in trying to find some way to
extricate him from the camp. You cannot imagine knowing something
that is horrendous in telling people, in fact screaming and
(45:55):
nobody listening. It's very meticulous about maintaining relationships with the
people who were in positions of power. To Department of
Family and Children's Services actually placed boys in that camp
even though they knew about what he did in Savannah.
And finally, I think they were embarrassed at the point
(46:16):
where they had to hold the hearing. The defense lawyers
for Annawaki for the accused used information about their pathologies
to discredit them, to question their credibility, and to humiliate them.
In last week's episode, you heard from Dale Strickland, one
(46:39):
of the very first attendees of an Awake. We were
recently informed that Dale passed away shortly after his interview
before the podcast was able to come out. We would
like to dedicate this episode to Dale and his memory
and thank him for his involvement in the podcast. Camp
hell Anawaki was created and hosted by Josh Thane, with
(47:01):
producer Miranda Hawkins and executive producers Alex Williams and Matt Frederick.
The soundtrack was written and performed by Josh Thane and
Adrian Barry. This episode featured the voices of Matt Frederick
and Ben Bolan. Archival footage provided by ws B and
CBS News. Find us on Instagram at camp hell Pod.
(47:22):
That's c A M p h E L l p
O D educate yourself about the issue of child abuse
and things that you should look for at the Darkness
to Light website D two ll dot org. That's d
the number two l dot org. Camp hell ana Waki
is a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts
(47:43):
from my heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Camp hell an Awake is a production of I Heart Radio.
The views and opinions expressing this podcast are solely those
of the author and participants and do not necessarily represent
those of I Heeart Media or its employees. Due to
discussion of traumatic, sexual, and violent content, listeners, discussion is advised.
The whole episode was almost surreal. I moved to Atlanta
(00:23):
in X seven, became a graduate student. Needed money, so
I looked under psychologists in the phone book in the
yellow pages, and there was something called any Wakey Foundation,
and I said, what the dickens is that? This is
Roger Brenn. He was an early employee at ana Waki.
Today he's a clinical psychologist and currently practices in Huntsville, Alabama.
(00:47):
First person I talked to was Lewis Petter, and on
the phone he asked my credentials. He said, you're exactly
what I'm looking for, and so I drove out to
his offices. Lewis Heater came out and introduced himself to me,
and we sat in his office and he hired me
on the spot. I was probably there fifteen minutes. He said,
do you want to work with us? It sounded like
(01:08):
a fun exciting place I thought I could grow. He
basically made me the clinical director. There was no other
mental health person on the campus per se. Now he
had a license to practice psychology, but had been grandfather,
and he had doctor in front of his name. I
didn't know for several months what that meant, but he
(01:30):
had an honorary doctorate degree, and from that point on
I thought he was a real psychologist. When medical licensing
laws came into play in the United States, if you
already had a master's degree and had been practicing psychology
for a number of years, you were able to obtain
a license as a one time clause. Roger explained that
(01:51):
this would not fly today, but at the time you
were grandfathered in. Such was the case with Anna Waki's founder,
Lewis Petter. There was no training Number one. It was
all on the job. The boys were required to build
their own lodging. UH. They did a lot of their
own cooking. UH. They had to make sure that they
(02:12):
stayed in groups and worked in groups and teams. I've
been there about six months, and of course it took
me a while to get acclimated to the camp, and
at the same time I started thinking there were some
unusual things. Well, we started suspecting that there was some
kind of sexual misconduct. Couldn't prove it, kids wouldn't admit it,
(02:32):
so we sort of hung in there to see what
we could find out. Over the past several weeks we
have received the number of very serious allegations concerning both
the facility out there in a number of individuals involved
with him. It was just a form of their therapy.
They were told to do it, and at the time
(02:53):
he was fourteen and a half fifteen years old, they
didn't know any better. I asked him, why are you
letting this hypen? Why are you covering up for Louis Patter.
He had no answer to that question, having paid its little,
such destricable place, and to do absolutely the contrary of
(03:18):
what they should have said. I'm disturbable the fact of
something I can still got on it and I wake you.
I'm Josh Stain and this is Camp Hell Anawaki. In
speaking with former patients and employees of Anawaki, I heard
a range of experiences, some heartbreaking, some inspiring, and some
(03:40):
that were straight horrific. To understand what led to these experiences,
we need to look at how this institution was initially
set up. What were its purposes? And why were so
many parents sending their children there? I tried to find
anyone who could give me an idea of what the
early days of Annawaki were like. It was out in
the woods. Was a dirt road going into it. Outside
(04:01):
Douglasville was still a dirt road. The Aniwaki sign was
there in a path where the Abulds are going to
be built. Down below that was the small little school
room and one lodge, and then as you go down
into the campsite there was a tool room and stuff.
My name is Richard Edgerley. I got recruited there in nineteen.
(04:23):
My number was e seventy nine. That means Richard was
only the seventy nine person to attend an awake. He
says he was admitted when he was around the age
of ten or eleven. The lake was being built. It
wasn't like hite finished because I worked on that for
I would say a month before they filled it up.
The cabins had just received power. Fact the place where
(04:45):
they stuck the poles and it was still flat, so
it hadn't it time to grow up. An Awaki Lakes
still sits in Douglasville and can easily be seen on
any map. This was one of Richard's original work projects.
While attending in the beginning was that's what everybody was
working on. The lake clearance, stumps, burning the wood, the grass,
(05:05):
cutting with sling blades, lots of trail building because everything
was new. We line all our trails of the rocks.
We used to have competitions to see who could move
the biggest rock. In fact, the one my friend and
I did is still sitting there exactly where it's set.
Fifty years ago. We stay in the cabins. We built
two extensions. They weren't finished totally. A couple of the
(05:28):
cabins had the foundation for an add on to the
building and it wasn't done during my time. We knocked
down the wall and built that extension. During that time
we installed heating panels, and twenty years agoing now and
out there, they were still hanging and they were still working.
The day to day for patients at an Awaki was
set by a self planned schedule. It was to be
(05:50):
followed by the letter. On Sundays, we have to write
a schedule of everything we did for that week from
morning to night five three would bake up five forty five,
we get dressed. Six o'clock we would assemble as a group.
Six ten we would move to the lodge. We would
have to walk around the lake. Seven o'clock was breakfast,
always thirty minutes. Eight o'clock we go to the tool room,
(06:11):
check out the tools. Depending on what we had to
do that day, axes, rakes, whatever, we'd actually go to
whatever project it was, cutting grass, lining trails, building things
in the camp, helping other groups build their stuff, cleaning
out sewage ponds, painting, staining. Eleven o'clock we would stop
clean up. Twelve o'clock, lunch, one o'clock we'd go back
(06:34):
to work. At three thirty four o'clock we would stop
back to the lodge and think again what happened with dinner.
Three minutes after that, we went back to our campsites
and had a group meeting. Could range anywhere sixties seven o'clock,
and that was in the back of the campsite, split
logs around the fire pit. The group would sit there
and talk and work out our problems and say what
(06:54):
happened during the day. And then after that we'd have
free time activities. Letter writing showers ever we need to do,
and then twenty around there lights out. It wasn't that bad.
It kept you busy, and you had your friends and
bec you didn't have any time to thank nearly at all.
This rigid daily structure provided the patients of an awaki
(07:16):
with a predictable routine, a widely accepted strategy to reduce
problem behaviors in children with emotional behavioral issues. So what
doesn't mean to be diagnosed with an emotional behavioral issue?
The answer is more complicated than you may think. I
went to speak with an expert who could shed some
light on the subject. My name is Steve Trustcott. I
(07:36):
am a professor at Georgia State University in the school
Psychology program. And I'm Katherine Perkins, and I'm also a
professor in school psychology at Georgia State. I asked Stephen
Catherine to explain what it means to have a child
with emotional behavioral issues. One of the things that is
probably going to make your story complicated is that there
(07:57):
are multiple systems for determining what or a child has
an emotional or behavior disorder, and within those systems, there
are different definitions. There's a legal system. There's an educational system,
and then there's a system of psychiatric kind of disorders,
and they overlap some but they're not the same, so
(08:18):
i'll give you up. For instance, the classification using the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual identifies about ten of us population
of children notes having an emotional or behavioral disorder, whereas
the school based definition only about a little less than
one percent of kids or kids who are classified as
(08:38):
having an emotional or behavior disorder. So there's a disparity
between those and part of the disparity is that the
criteria are different. So the criteria for a special education
for the label of eb D and Georgia. That's another
thing is the labels change across the states, but in
Georgia it's eb D. The label requires there to be
an educational impact. Basically, the term emotional behavioral issue is
(09:03):
not a universal standard. What qualifies as emotionally disturbed changes
depending on the context in which it is determined, whether
it be by a school, hospital, or otherwise. This is
something that would give in a waky enough wiggle room
to claim anyone could be accepted based on the facility standards.
Emotional behavioral disturbance is the label that was given by
(09:27):
the federal government. That's in this law Individuals for Disabilities
Education Act that specifies what students qualify for special education
in public schools. That's what that label is. And then,
like my colleague pointed out, there are other labeling systems
that are more medically oriented, or you know, the judicial
(09:50):
system has their own label, which is guilty or not guilty,
and so it's a little confusing. But the federal law
for special education clearly outlines the criteria that you're looking
at to determine if a child meets that criteria for
emotional behavior of disturbance. There isn't a definitive way to
(10:14):
say this kid does and this kid doesn't have that disability.
Catherine and Steve pointed out that just because a child
is labeled as emotionally disturbed, that doesn't make that criteria
the same in Georgia as it may be in Alabama
or Florida. This term is a blanket that could be
used in a number of situations. Some of these would
(10:35):
not only include school, but also the judiciary system. The
definition in Georgia is based on five primary concerns. The
first one is an inability to build or maintain satisfactory
interpersonal relationships with peers and or teachers. An inability to
learn which cannot be adequately explained by intellectual, sensory, or
(10:58):
health factors. The third one is a consistent or chronic
inappropriate type of behavior or feelings under normal situations. The
fourth is a displayed pervasive mood of unhappiness or depression,
and the last one is a displayed tendency to develop
physical symptoms, pains, or unreasonable fears associated with personal or
(11:20):
school problems. So those are kind of the five hallmarks
of students who are identified as having eb D. So
here's how I think of it. There's typical childhood development,
you know, the way most kids grow and learn, and
then sometimes the kind of behaviors that we're talking about
when we're talking about eb D. They may be perfectly
(11:46):
typical and normal, but then if they persist into other
developmental stages, they might look very different. So, for example,
many people talk about the terrible twos, have you know,
tantrum behavior and very young children who are trying to
find their way in the world and are trying to
(12:07):
assert their power and their choice and their decision making.
And then if they don't get their way, they let
you know they're not happy about that. But that same
tantrum behavior that would be typical with a two year
old starts looking very different in a school aged child.
And so it's when these behaviors persist with frequency, intensity,
(12:33):
and duration beyond that that is seen in typically developing children,
that's when we start saying, Oh, that's problematic. And how
do parents react when faced with this type of situation?
And how did so many come to the conclusion that
Anna Waki was the answer. I spoke with Richard Dressler.
(12:56):
He part time serves as a motivational speaker helping family
deal with crisis. His son was also sent to an
awake as a team. I asked him what it was
like dealing with a child with emotional behavior issues and
how he came to the conclusion to send him to
an awake. Oh. Desperation, helplessness, anxiety, frustration. When people ask
(13:20):
me that question about being a parent, and I tell him, look,
we're not giving any guide books to read how to
be a parent. Okay, it's a daily experience. It's a
constant struggle between your head and your heart and knowing
what you should do, what you don't want to do.
There was no place, because I look back, that I
(13:41):
felt I could go to that could really help me.
There are more programs today that are more advanced. There's
more advancements about drug abuse. There's more what I would
call openness in society. So the only thing you could
do back then is trust your psychiatrist, who also was
(14:04):
duped and knew nothing about what was going on at
any of these places like an Awake. Richard says in Awake,
he was first presented to him by his son's psychiatrist.
This would often be how children would get referred to
an Awaki through a doctor or teacher. If I remember right.
He described it as a psychiatric institute that can help
(14:24):
him adjust or change his personality and behavior on a
long term treatment program. Okay, and I accepted that. Richard
and his wife visited the Anawaki campus for a tour
before deciding whether to send their son there. This is
how the Anawaki staff explain their treatment center. They talked
about the fact that it was a psychiatric facility. They
(14:47):
forewarned us about the possibility of some of the incidents
that occurred, and that is we have to break down
their personality we're gonna read all the letters that come in,
all the phone calls. There was no privacy, and we
hope you expect that will probably complain about some of
these issues. All these things are normal. At that point
(15:09):
I accepted it, knowing what I briefly knew about these
kind of programs. Looking back now, I think it was
one great anticipated thing they did so that you wouldn't
question what they were really doing. So when your son
came home and complained they're abusing me and I want
(15:30):
to leave and this is happening to me, you would
just go back, well, look he's got these psychiatric problems
and needs treatment, and I'm assuming that what they told
me is true, which we did. In retrospect, I have
to say that, based on my experience, they probably like
to us. For parents dealing with an adolescent with emotional issues,
(16:07):
they can often feel like they have nowhere to turn.
Annawaki was the solution for many of these parents in
Georgia in the nineteen sixties through the nineteen eighties. What
was Antawaki doing to treat these children put into their control?
Psychologist Roger Brinn explains the origins of wilderness therapy. It's
been a rule of thumb that if you get kids
(16:29):
into the woods and impel them into some type of adventure, uh,
they do better. And that if they have delinquent proclivities,
if they're going to break the law or to become oppositional,
if they do much better, and that it's a great treatment.
And since then we found that that probably is a
case if it's structured correctly and done right. There was
(16:50):
a book called Wilderness Road, and as I recall, there
was a businessman's club in Dallas, Texas that sponsored the
original residential treatment center for kids, particularly boys. In Our
program at Antawaki was supposed to be designed after that program,
and it was similar. The boys were required to build
(17:11):
their own lodging, they did a lot of their own cooking.
They had to make sure that they stayed in groups
and worked in groups and teams, and putting the kids
in the woods made sense. Wilderness Road, published in nine
five by Campbell Loch Miller, has served as the manual
for much of what we know today as wilderness therapy.
(17:32):
Camp Woodland Springs was started in by Lock Miller as
an expansion of a summer camp program. He began with
the Salesman's Club of Dallas, a group of business and
professional men from the area. The parallels between Woodland Springs
and Antawaki are numerous, from a campground setting where the
children are in charge of their own lodging and meals,
(17:54):
to isolating patients into groups, and even alluding to Native
American terminology. Lock Miller was known around his camp as
Chief Lock. The following is an excerpt from Wilderness Road.
We find the camp environment good because it accords more
fully with the child's nature and provides ample opportunity to
(18:15):
satisfy the desire most boys have for adventure and exploration
in the outdoors. Small group living in this environment encourages
original experimentation and provides the widest possible variety of direct
experience with the natural surroundings. Such a life calls into
play numerous individual skills, provides an outlet for almost any
(18:36):
ability a boy may have, and constantly encourages new and
ever broadening experiences of the individual and the group. Life
in this setting provides for the maximum variety, freshness, and
intensity in the daily experience of each boy. Most of
Anawaki's therapy consisted of a daily group meeting at the
(18:57):
end of each day, a time where the always in
your work or school group would sit around the fire
and address any issues they encountered in their day. After dinner,
we had group therapy on logs and that was just
about every night. I worked with the staff. Everybody had
two staff leaders to group leaders in each group, so
(19:18):
you have about eight kids and two adults, maybe ten kids,
and they would do group therapy and work on what
went on that day in process to day. Mark Butler
attended in Awake from four to He remembers the group
therapy which was still taking place during his time there.
The guidance counselors would kind of push you along and
(19:41):
you know, I begin to things and it was also
time to go over the day. What happened? Were there
any incidents? Why did this happen? Because people got in
trouble all the time. These groups would serve an integral
part to the in Awaki program. Children were separated based
on different factors such as age and whether they were
(20:02):
in a work group or school group. Staying on brand,
These groups were all given Native American names, names such
as Tawanka, Kirkeeed, and Wahonka. Most of the groups of
Anuwaki were done by age limits. Like Wahonka was the
older groups, the one they went to school, alf campus
had the cars. Twanka was the youngest and arranged from
(20:26):
eight till like twelve or thirteen. Then you had other
groups that were ranging groups like maybe twelve, fifteen and
fifteen and sixteen or eighteen. Tuanka where I was at,
was literal translations to attempt or undertake a difficult task.
And like Antawaki is supposed to be the land of
the friendly people. Here's journalist Albert Edgin who reported on
(20:50):
in Awaki extensively for the Tallahassee Democrat. They were broken
up into groups, and the groups were are designed for
therapy and also for growth, so they had tasks they
had to perform in the groups monitored the behavior of
(21:14):
the kids in the group. The groups were independent. They
were not supposed to cross polony. They were not supposed
to talk to each other. Mark Butler recalls this group
structure and how it functioned during his time there. I
classify him into two groups, the word groups and the
school groups. The word groups are always working. The school
groups are always going to school. When I was there,
(21:37):
I believe there's about tended twelve working groups and there
was no socializing between the groups. Of course we did
a little bit in anyway. I guess they kept thinking
that if they kept the groups smaller and more contained,
and it's much easier to handle, I guess. But then
there was things like football where they would have to
(21:57):
be group mixing. You know, Okay, football players come from
different groups, so there was always some kind of talk
between the groups. The work group model would serve two functions.
At in Awaki to build what would become the largest
medical facility in the state, and second to help break
(22:19):
down the patients so they could be remolded into the
inn Awaky way of life. That was the idea at least,
here's Mark Sublett, another former in Awaky patient. So if
you had a building group, they might come in and
you might do all the masonry. Okay, so you're the
masonry group. So he cleared all the land, poured all
the concrete foundations, hauled all the block out there, laid
(22:43):
all the block next, all the mud, did all the plaster,
did it all and then another group might come behind
you and they might be a carpentry group. So that's
what they would do, And it seemed like sometimes the
groups would split off and would help the electrician and
be the electrical groups they've thing pulling wire doing all
this stuff. I think an Awakes look on it was
(23:06):
that they wanted to tell you, like, what we're gonna
do is make your life real shitty and you're gonna
hate it. So what would you want to do to
get out of your shitty, hated life? And they told
you that from the beginning, like, hey, from here on out, boy,
you're gonna have to work the rest of your life,
and you better get used to it. That's your life
from here on out. Unless you go to school and
(23:26):
get that education, then you might be able to do better.
So kind of right off, their feeding that into your mind.
This separation between work groups and school groups was the
beginning of an involved hierarchy at an Awaki. It was
only after one had proven themselves through a series of
tasks and personal development that they would receive a rite
(23:48):
of passage. All of the attendees were expected to achieve
to get your crest. I don't think I've ever cried
as much in my life as when he stood up
when he got his crest, which is a certain achievement,
and said, I'd like to thank my parents for letting
me enough to send me here. The crest would serve
as one of the key elements of Anawaki's mythos. An
(24:11):
Anawakee document called Legend of the Crest reads as follows,
The pine tree and red hill are the materials found
in nature, which man may use, according to his ability
and ambition, to improve the state of his existence in nature.
The scroll depicts the democratic concept of the value of
(24:33):
the individual and also the importance of one's relationship to
other individuals. The winding path to the rising sun signifies
the importance of striving toward a goal in life, using
the self discipline necessary to overcome obstacles which may present
themselves in reaching of that goal. The praying hands show
(24:55):
the need for a religious concept, the recognition of a
power in the universe which is higher than the individual.
The dovel with the olive branch was selected from the
story of Noah in the Bible to show that a
new life in a clean, new world is possible. The
crest was not only a symbol of personal improvement an
(25:18):
advancement in the program, but it was also required before
a child could advance from a work group to a
school group. Here's Stephen, another former in a wiki patient.
I was pretty much in a word group most of
the time. That's another one of those themes, getting your
crest or getting into a school group. It was a privilege,
(25:40):
you had to work for it, so on and so forth.
And I witnessed that some of these so called privileges
didn't turn out too well for for other people. When
I received my crest, they had a special Christmas dinner
because I believe it took me longer to get the
(26:01):
crest than anybody, and ant like the history, and you
know there again, it was because I saw the guys
that had worked towards that and it didn't turn out
too well for them. Once a patient had proven themselves
worthy of getting their crest, they would then move on
to one of the school groups. The time frame from
(26:23):
admittance until moving into a school group could often take
a year's During this time, no real schooling was a
part of the child schedule. In turn, grades would be
caught up to in a span of months, even weeks,
rather than years. In the beginning, there was not a school.
The little building in front of the lodge was a
one little classroom. It had the possibility of being a school.
(26:47):
At some point they did get a teacher, but I
never finished third, never went the fourth, ever went the fifth,
never went the sixth, ever went to seventh. And when
I got out of an Awoki, I should have before
my age, gone into the ninth, but it put me
back in eighth because it hadn't been in school for
so long. So when I went to high school started
out of eighth grade, You're willing to do whatever it
(27:08):
took to get out of that work group. I mean,
who wanted to haul block or sling blade four miles
of road or whatever chore they would have four to
you that day. Of course you're gonna want to get
out of that because you're a teenage kid and you
know so that you'd be like, oh, what do I
have to do to get into the school group? The
school groups did no physical labor. All they would do
(27:30):
is go to school. Now, they would tell you this
crazy story how you could do four years of education
in one year. At Annawaking. By the time I got
the school group, I was already three years behind. So
when I got out of there and tried to enroll
in public school and whatever my records were that came
(27:52):
back from that. I was supposed to be a senior,
but I'd be having taken ninth grade English, eighth grade, this, tenth, eleventh,
twelfth grade that. So it was just kind of screwed up.
But that's how they would treat their school as a privilege,
a higher group of an Awaki kid that's what you
wanted to achieve. The Anawaki program worked like a ladder
(28:15):
with a different rung for every advancement, giving more perks
and power the further up you climbed. This hierarchy would
go past the advancement of getting your crest and being
promoted to a school group. Students could work their way
up to becoming a group leader or even a paid
counselor do you have one group and everything works from
the head of leader of that group, and you also
(28:37):
have a hierarchy of the kids. The new kid has
to be taught by the next kid up what he's
just learned. The next kid up has to be teaching
that second kid down what he's just learned. Sort of
a cascading system of learning. And it's important to remember
that these were children. They may have been adolescents, but
they were children. The counselor might have been sixteen years
(29:00):
old responsible for a group of fifteen or twenty youngsters,
probably more likely as eighteen years old, but not that
much more mature, and certainly not experienced beyond the walls
of an awaki or bringing any real experience to the situation.
There are all sorts of stories that they would tell
(29:21):
you that I learned later, where activity would stop when
somebody acted out, and sometimes with supervision from the group leaders,
sometimes with leadership from the members of the group, they
would counsel the recalcitrant kid, whoever he may be. It
was all integrated system. It was innovative, but it was
(29:44):
also subject for severe abuse in the sense that if
you have a situation where the people that are being
counseled are empowered to enforce rules, then you have to
have stop gap measures, and I'm not sure they had
those stop gap manages. You have to supervise the children
(30:05):
that have been given these responsibilities. So one of the
things that deteriorated through the years was that the management,
and by management I mean Louis Petter, would promote children
to the status of counselor, and that appeared to be
(30:25):
in many cases without any substantial training. The fact is
is that a lot of these children who became counselors
were incapable of dealing with situations because they hadn't been
trained to and having a kid manage a situation that
can only come from the kid's gut. It can't come
(30:45):
from training or any kind of knowledge. It was an
ad hoc system. I'm here to talk about an Awake
(31:11):
and Louis Petter. This is Robert. He worked at in
Awaki as a group leader in the late nineteen sixties.
I'm Robert Augustino. I'm a law professor at John Marshall
Law School, and I've been there since where I came
in as i was dean in president for five years
and now I'm just a mere professor sitting in my
(31:33):
corner office, not being pastored by the administration. Robert originally
heard about Anawaki through social work with a branch of
local government called the Department of Family and Children's Services,
or as it is known de Facts. Probably sixty eight
or sixty nine. I've been a social worker and I
had heard about treatment centers for allegedly delinquent boys, someone
(31:57):
who weren't really delinquent. They just had done him home
to go to had a very bright patient. I guess
I should go him who had no place to live,
and I said, well, I gotta put him someplace. I
heard about Anawaki through the social work, through the information
held by the Department of Family, Mansial and Services, and
so I went to see Anuwaki. I met Louis Petter
and we talked about the program, and Petter maybe an offer.
(32:20):
He offered me a position there as a teacher because
I had by teaching credentials I had taught in high schools.
Robert says the idea of working with at risk youth
in an outdoor setting was something that interested him right away.
When I first started to work there, I had a
group and we lived in tents in Douglasville in the
Anuwaki real estate. And I had that job, and I
(32:42):
also was the head teacher. And as it turned out,
I was the only teacher as far as training was concerned,
there wasn't any I had co counselor with me, and
with the boys. There's like tennor Troll boys in in
that group. He had boys separated into different groups, maybe
five or six different groups. So I was directly in
(33:02):
charge of one group when I was the teacher for
all the groups solely but surely. The first thing I
did out there was supervised the boys in building. It
was really a lot of fun. And I'm not very skilled,
but I can carry things around and hammer and nail.
And after we built the building, it was time to
go in the canoe trip. Better had talked about taking
(33:23):
a bunch of boys on an outward bound type trip,
and we talked about the Swannee River. I always wanted
a canoe the whole Swanny. I'd been down there and
go and behold I did. We had started at the
Okifinoki Swamp and went down to the Gulf of Mexico.
So off we go. So I'm gone for the next
three weeks or more because at the end of the
(33:43):
canoe trip we stayed at a motel owned by an
Awaki and Carabelle or Is either owned by an Awakey
Lewis Petter robert Is referring to Carrabelle, Florida. This was
the beginning of what would become a second campus for
an Awaki. At the time, it was no more in
a motel on the Gulf of Mexico in the Panhandle
region of Florida. Robert says it was during his time
(34:06):
on this canoe trip that he first started to think
something wasn't right with Petter and his relationship with some
of the boys. I had an inkling of that down
at Carabelle. I thought that some of the behavior of
Louis Petter was probably inappropriate to its touching. I mean,
it's one thing to, you know, give a kind of
fatherly hug. It's another thing to put your hands on
(34:29):
people a little bit too much. Roger Wren, when we
first heard at the beginning of this episode, also worked
with Robert at Anawaki. At this time, they both began
to sense that something was off. Bob was hired about
seven months after I had arrived, maybe six, and he
and I became immediate friends. He's really a fine human being,
(34:52):
and Bob and I saw all right, I and we
started talking and saying, what you think is going on?
And then we started having some strong suspicions that things
were awry and what we thought was going on in
therapy was really not therapy at all. One thing that
first fed the suspicion was the fact that certain children
(35:12):
would stay at Lewis Petter's house on the weekend. I
didn't like it that the kids would go to his house.
A specific kid would go to his house and spend
a weekend or maybe a week with him. I questioned
several staffmanbers, like, what's that's all about, And well, he
gives them special therapy on the weekends. There was one
fellow there I thought was very ethical, very competent with
(35:33):
the kids, and he really ran the day to day
program there and he was just about as fine as
he could be. And I asked him about it, and
he said, he said, I think he does individual therapy
with him. The counselor Roger is referring to is Brett Baxley,
or as he was known on campus, Mr b. Everyone
(35:54):
I've interviewed says that Baxley was a stand up guy
who really cared about the kids and teaching them. Baxley's
history with Petter went back to the beginning of Anna Waki.
He even helped with the original land acquisition. What Baxley
and Petter's relationship was like is still a bit of
a mystery. What we do know is that, for whatever reason,
(36:14):
Baxley never questioned Petter's actions. Roger Wren and Robert Agostino
co chaperoned the canoe trip down the Swanee River. It
was at the destination in Caribelle, Florida that their suspicion
of abuse came to a head. Bob Camp and I'd
used his name, but he was down there and he
was There was a relationship between Louis Petter and Bob Camp,
(36:36):
which I thought was a little off, that something was
wrong again, the touching, Bob Camp's demeanor. At one point,
Roger rental or Bob Camp and Louis Petter and bed together.
Roger Wren initially saw this incident with Petter. He quickly
grabbed Bob Agostino to confirm what his own eyes had seen.
(36:56):
They were lying down together in the same bed, even
though was plenty of beds around. Kind of start wondering
what the heck was going on. But that was the
first inkling, and it happened early on, I must say,
but it took me a while to really figure out
exactly what was going on. Roger Wren remembers this incident firsthand.
(37:17):
Bob and I found him in the morning in bed
with one of the kids, and I don't want to
get a graphic, but it was. It was pretty rough,
and that's when Bob and I sort of said, oh,
then we knew there was no question. I've absolutely had
nightmares about it for several years. If I think about
it now, I get the e B gbs. It's just
not a pleasant thing. The day in which that occurred,
(37:42):
I just went per sirk. I mean, I was not myself,
and I'm usually fairly well controlled, but I was so emotional.
I couldn't stop Bob too. Bob and I were both mad,
and he just flat denied it, kept denying it and said,
that's not what you saw, and that's when we sort
of agonized. I said, I'm going to get out of
here it. Bob and I decided how are we going
(38:02):
to protect these children? Because they were thirteen year old
kids and there were something that were even eleven, and
I thought, I just I can't leave them here. After that,
I was trying to ask Bob. Bob was asking me
what should we do? Should we quit or should we
stay here? And trying to help the kids. What's what's
our role? Da Gastino and Wrin both decided to stay
(38:22):
on at in Awaki for the time being. They needed
to find out what else was going on. When I
got back there, I had a lot of work to
do on the way he's setting up to school and
all that sort of stuff, and so, you know, things
went on maybe a month or so. I got to
school going mostly I was with the group of the
school back and forth. Then I started to notice that
(38:45):
Louis Petter had this group of boys around him. It's
the same group. I said to one of them, why
are you what was with Dr? How to call him
Dr petti because that's what he wanted to be called,
you know. He said, no, PhD. He said, well, we
live with Dr Pettick. I said what he said, Yeah,
three or four of them we lived at his house
with him. I said, who lived with his house with him?
(39:07):
Is this just temporarily or been there for a long time?
And at least two of them said no, they've been
there for quite a while. They literally for quite a while. Well,
next time there, I started to watch every time he
came on campus. I kept my eyeball on Petter, and
I talked to Roger and Wren, who also had a
groups assigned to him besides being a psychologist and my
(39:27):
group and Rodgers group were off bounds. He couldn't go
near him. I wouldn't let him near my group. It's
worth noting here that Petter was an amputee from childhood
with a wooden leg where his limb once was. There
was one incident where my group was assigned a new kid, tall,
good looking fella, kind of muscular. And I can remember
(39:48):
this incident really well. There was a gang shower. Each
group would going in to have a gang shower, and
because Louis was prone to, let's say, walk into the
gang shower, supervised things. My groups in the gang shower,
and I know Louie is zeroing in on this new kid.
And Louis was about to go into the shower and
(40:10):
I said, Dr Petter, I don't think you should go
in there. He said, oh not. I said, it's my
group in there. And remember I told you before my
group is under my protection. You're not going in there.
And I know what you're going in there for. And
I said, Louis, I'm gonna tell you something. You go
in there and you touch that kid and you try
to abuse that kid, you know your wooden leg, I'm
(40:32):
gonna saw her off and throw it in the lake.
While Rinnandagostino knew that Petter was having inappropriate relations with students.
There were other counselors they were afraid may also be
taking advantage of the children. Look, some of the counselors
out there were bringing Roger, of course was good. There
was another counselor who I thought was really top flight,
(40:53):
and I think he was a homosexual, but I know
he never touched the kids. I still know what Petter
had on Baxley, and why Baxley, who was a decent
human being in every other way, would have cooperated with
the Petter what he was doing. I just don't understand it.
Never could. There was no indication that actually ever abused anyway.
(41:16):
And then there was Sam. There's a couple of other
ones out there who were just bad news. Sam was
the worst, Sam Singleton. Sam Singleton was a counselor and
a serial abuser of the kids. And I brought that
up with loud Petter, and of course his reaction was, well,
I'll talk to him, don't worry about it. Don't worry
about it. I'm an old social worker. I could tell
(41:38):
what's going on. And I eventually confronted Sam Singleton about
this in fact, I kicked him off the campus. I
had no authority, but I kicked him off campus anyway,
and Louis, of course brought her back. A couple of
weeks later. To three weeks later, he brought her back.
Sam was after this kid might Apparently Sam just I'd
(42:00):
have the hots for him, and I told Sam at
one point that if he touched Mike, I would break
his neck. He just walked away. He knew I was serious.
Shortly after this time, Roger Wren had reached his breaking point.
He recalls his resignation with the petter. After a while,
(42:20):
it became apparent that he and I were going to
be completely persona non grata. We were not going to
be allowed to do anything, and we had no power.
I said, I can't tolerate this, and he said goodbye.
After that, I got out of there. Roger was not
the only one who had had enough. Dagostino remembers the
mood at an Awaki at the time. Miss Ogiltree, who
(42:42):
was then the social worker. She was a delightful woman
and she was a good, good social worker, a good person.
When she figured out that that wasn't one of the
bad guys, she said to me soon she finds a
new job. She's getting out of there. Miss Ogiltree had left,
she had fled. Roger Wren had quit. So my allies
(43:03):
were gone, and Baxley would do nothing. The head counselor
I asked him, I said, why why are you letting
this happen? Why are you letting this happen? Why are
you covering up for Louis Petter? And he he had
no answer to that question. Well, I said, why are
you allowing Louis to do this stuff? Why are you
(43:23):
allowing this? This could be a good place, this could
be a wonderful place, but it's not because of what
louis doing. And you can stop him, you can keep away.
Robert says his relationship with Petter remained tense during his
last days at Ain't AWAKEI l after I threatened to
(43:43):
cut his leg off. Let's say our relationsister came around
the frosty and interesting enough. Of course, he didn't fire
me because he really thought he was untouchable. Eventually Robert
left the camp as well. He and Roger knew that
something had to be done about what they had witnessed.
It in a week and that's when we started making
(44:05):
as much effort as we could. And we were young,
remember with twenty five year old kids, and we're scared,
and the whole process was was frightening from a personal
point of view. Because I'm a graduate student. I don't
have any power, but we did have enormous amount of
energy and we tried everything we could. Because I probably
(44:27):
left unawake, I went to Defects and complained about what
was going on. We went to the sheriff I believe
his name was Abercrombie uh and remembering that Louis Petter
was also a Baptist minister and he had a strong
standing in the community in Douglasville. We brought eighty kids
(44:50):
to church every Sunday, to the Baptist church, so it
was it was a big deal. And nothing happened at
the sheriff's office. Nothing happened. We went to the States
our welfare program. They didn't want to hear it. We
went to the newspaper, to the Atlanta Journal. We went
to an attorney all by ourselves, and we went in
and the assays, there's you know, he didn't want any
(45:12):
part of it. Raynondagastino had made up their minds something
had to be done about the abuse taking place at Annawaki.
It seemed everywhere they turned, nobody would listen to their story.
That is, until a patient would finally come forward next
time on Camp how and Awake. I just thought that
(45:35):
people would be really upset about this. I thought people
would rise up and do something about it. Nothing was done.
We were involved in trying to find some way to
extricate him from the camp. You cannot imagine knowing something
that is horrendous in telling people, in fact screaming and
(45:55):
nobody listening. It's very meticulous about maintaining relationships with the
people who were in positions of power. To Department of
Family and Children's Services actually placed boys in that camp
even though they knew about what he did in Savannah.
And finally, I think they were embarrassed at the point
(46:16):
where they had to hold the hearing. The defense lawyers
for Annawaki for the accused used information about their pathologies
to discredit them, to question their credibility, and to humiliate them.
In last week's episode, you heard from Dale Strickland, one
(46:39):
of the very first attendees of an Awake. We were
recently informed that Dale passed away shortly after his interview
before the podcast was able to come out. We would
like to dedicate this episode to Dale and his memory
and thank him for his involvement in the podcast. Camp
hell Anawaki was created and hosted by Josh Thane, with
(47:01):
producer Miranda Hawkins and executive producers Alex Williams and Matt Frederick.
The soundtrack was written and performed by Josh Thane and
Adrian Barry. This episode featured the voices of Matt Frederick
and Ben Bolan. Archival footage provided by ws B and
CBS News. Find us on Instagram at camp hell Pod.
(47:22):
That's c A M p h E L l p
O D educate yourself about the issue of child abuse
and things that you should look for at the Darkness
to Light website D two ll dot org. That's d
the number two l dot org. Camp hell ana Waki
is a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts
(47:43):
from my heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
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