Camp Louise

Camp Louise is a Jewish girl’s camp located in Cascade, MD within the Catoctin Mountains of Western Maryland. Each camper is housed in a bunk containing an average of 10-14 campers. Two or more college-aged counselors live in each bunk with the campers. Each bunk contains beds, bunk beds, closets, clothes dressers, and a bathroom, with private toilet and shower facilities.Over a sprawling 400 acres, Camp Louise’s modern facilities include: Arts & Crafts complex, including separate studios for pottery, copper enameling, and glass fusion • Digital video production studio • Air Conditioned Dining hall capable of seating over 600 people • Outdoor adventure center, featuring our high ropes and initiatives course, 500′ zipline, and 27′ climbing wall • Multiple athletic fields, including two with lighting for evening programming • Multiple dance and drama workshop rooms, including a dance studio with special flooring and mirrored walls • Multiple music studios for classes and personal instruction • Outdoor amphitheater with seating for over 600, fully outfitted with lighting and sound capabilities • Radio station • Traditional 35mm photography lab • Two swimming pools, including a shallow water pool and an Olympic-sized deep water pool.
Camp Louise has full-time security staff on duty 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Staff is given bar-coded identification cards to properly identify themselves when going in and out of camp. Each visitor entering Camp Louise must be pre-registered with the Camp office.
Camp Louise has multiple physicians and registered nurses on staff at all time to fulfill medical needs for our campers and staff. This includes dispensing of medication. The Camp Louise Health Center has modern, air conditioned private rooms for those campers who may become ill while at camp.
Camp Louise strives to create a meaningful, supportive Jewish community by encouraging campers to share their own beliefs and practices, explore life’s questions, learn from and listen to one another. Through Shabbat celebration, Israel programming, acts of social justice, and opportunities for personal growth, campers learn and explore what Judaism means to them. Camp Louise is an inclusive Jewish community that brings together campers and staff with a wide range of practice, knowledge and family make-up.
BAT MITZVAH- If your camper is celebrating her Bat Mitzvah after camp and will need to practice, sign up on Drop-off Day for private lessons. Your camper will be paired with a knowledgeable staff member who will listen to your camper and make small corrections at an arranged time once a week.
Camp Louise was established in 1922 by Lillie and Aaron Straus to offer Baltimore’s immigrant women a week’s respite in the sunshine from crowded working conditions. A cottage was originally rented for these much needed, one-week, fresh-air summer vacations. Ida Sharogrodsky (“Miss Ida”), a social worker for the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, was asked to supervise the camp program for these women. When the cottage rental no longer became an option, Miss Ida approached Lillie Straus – who then asked her husband Aaron – to purchase a former hotel in Cascade, Maryland as a permanent summer retreat for young women. The Melvue Hotel (currently Camp Louise’s White House) was then renovated and Camp Louise was born.