New Documentary Celebrates Beloved Camp Creator
For so many Jersey City kids, summers spent at Camp Liberty are magic.
Located within Liberty State Park, the Camp has provided urban kids with a Catskills-like experience for nearly 50 years. Kids get dropped off via bus or parent and enter a place that seems from another place and time. The large green expanse includes a pool, massive areas for team sports, craft corners and indoor activities including movies and cartooning workshops. Each two-week summer session includes a culminating project – an original play put on with the team effort of campers, teen counselors and the Camp’s artistic adult staff. It’s hard to name all of the people who have helped form this truly magical urban camp but thankfully a new documentary points us in the right direction.
“Man on a Mission” celebrates the life of Carmine Tabone, the artist and educator who founded Camp Liberty. The movie premiered at NJCU in April – but there are two more free public viewings coming up this month.
While he retired in 2021, Tabone’s life has been dedicated to using the arts as a way of building community and engaging young people in learning experiences. The grandson of Sicilian immigrants, Tabone grew up in the tenements and projects of the Lower East Side in NYC. After spending time there as a community organizer, he moved to Jersey City in 1974 to run a youth program. With growing ethnic conflicts taking place in Jersey City high schools, he began to bring together adolescents from different neighborhoods to do drama workshops that soon evolved into plays such as “Orpheus” and “Super Roach.” The rest is cultural history.
Here are two opportunities to view this important, feel-good doc:
Thursday, May 18 at 6 pm: The Miller Branch of the Jersey City Public Library (JCPL), 489 Bergen Ave.
Saturday, June 3 at 2 pm – The Five Corners Branch of the JCPL, 678 Newark Ave.
For more information on Camp Liberty: https://www.educationalartsteam.org/camp-liberty-faqs