Ed Devitt
Ed Devitt was an Canadian teacher who served as a director of summer camps.[1] He served as an assistant director of Camp Kilcoo for several years, and then, in 1947, he founded Camp Comak, which he directed until 1970, when the camp's property was sold to real estate developers.
In 1933 Jean Sibelius, a Finnish composer, wrote Finlandia, a work protesting Soviet pressure on his native country.[2] Devitt provided lyrics to the song, and it became the anthem for Camp Kilcoo.
Kilcoo was on Gull Lake in Haliburton County, Ontario. Comak was located on a large island in Lake St. Nora, also in Haliburton. The University of Toronto faculty of forestry owned a large parcel of land which included the lake's entire eastern shore. Much of the western shore was owned by a college for forest rangers.
References
- ↑ "EDWARD DEVITT OBITUARY". Globe and Mail. 1998-02-23. https://www.legacy.com/ca/obituaries/theglobeandmail/name/edward-devitt-obituary?pid=189698338. Retrieved 2023-01-30.
- ↑ "“Maker of men” Then and now". The Gull Rock Gazette. 2016-. http://kilcoo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/gazette_nov2013.pdf#page=3. Retrieved 2023-01-30. "In 1899 Finnish composer Jean Sibelius wrote the symphonic poem “Finlandia” to serve as both a tribute to his homeland’s history and a subtle protest against the oppressive censorship imposed by neighbouring Russia. The last third of the poem was a hymn which, with the lyrics composed by Kilcoo’s Ed Devitt in 1933, is known to us all as our camp hymn “Maker of Men”."
