Camp
Gumby is a yearly gathering of friends who originally attended the University of Wisconsin Platteville during the early 1980's. The original 3 people who started Camp Gumby were Mark Hoffmeyer, Mike Kohn, and Tom Gombas (Gumby) for whom Camp Gumby is named.
Beginning in 1982, on Memorial Day weekend, these three fellows went to Central Wisconsin to spend the weekend camping. They went to a small commercial camp ground called Evergreen campground, which was a small campground in a pine forest with large amounts of sand, and a large number of people who drove in recreational vehicles with electric lighting, and satellite television, and believed that this was camping.
In the years following, Camp Gumby became a satire of these people who thought that this was camping. In later years, the guys went to Memorial Day garage sales and bought household items like sofas and living room carpeting, which the erected in the middle of this pine forest.
Later years included:
->Yearly burning of a Mattel Toys Big Wheel
->FM radio station WRFG
->Disco Tech Dance Floor and Ballroom
->Golf Cart to transport camp to the bars
->VW Bus to transport larger numbers of people to the bar
->School Bus to transport even more people to the bar.
Camp Gumby has been located at numerous campgrounds which have ejected Camp Gumby after noise complaints. To date Camp Gumby has been held at:
-Evergreen Camp ground at Wild Rose, WI (9 years)
-LuWISimo Lutheran Bible Camp at Wild Rose, WI
-Family Frontier Camp Ground, Waupaca, WI
-Wildlife Campground Birnamwood, WI
-Quincy Cabin, Minocqua, WI
-Triangle Farm, Fremont, WI (5 years as of 2001)
The original 3 members recruited other people who brought the numbers as high as 12. During the last 19 years (as of 2001) the number of groupies has risen from a small group of interested onlookers to a group of people varying from 175 to 200 people. Core membership count is about 10 at this time.
Camp Gumby is really about the camaraderie of friends getting together, year after year, sharing the rich experience of our lives. Some will say that Camp Gumby is about drinking, and there is probably a lot of truth in that statement. It is equally true that Camp Gumby is an exercise in stupid behavior, laughing at themselves and at the rest of the world.
Camp Gumby is also known as Gumbonia, and the members of Gumbonia are known as Gumbonians. They are led by the self-appointed leader the Grand Imperial Poobah of Gumbonia.