Bedford, NH  - The Girl Scouts of Swift Water Council’s Camp Farnsworth, celebrating a century of all-girl camping this month, will benefit from a $25,000 gift from RiverStone Resources LLC of Manchester, New Hampshire.

Camp Farnsworth, in Thetford, Vermont, encompasses 300 acres of forest, trails and meadows on Lake Abenaki. Before it was a Girl Scout camp, it was Camp Hanoum, an all-girl camp established 100 years ago by Dr. Charles and Charlotte Farnsworth.

The donation will go toward rebuilding the program center at the camp. The Keushk (pronounced kirschk) was the main gathering place, containing a large open area, a stage and piano for performances, with a farmer’s porch. But the building was beginning to sink and deemed unsafe.

The 2500-square-foot program center is being rebuilt in a different location and will contain a raised platform for performances, office space, a kitchenette, flush toilets and a shower. It will be heated for winter use. The current office adjacent to the new building will become the new trading post.

The rebuilding project comes in the 100th summer of camping at Farnsworth, which began as a camp for young college women who spent the entire summer there. Many were daughters of privilege from New York, Philadelphia, Detroit, Boston and Buffalo.

Today hundreds of Girl Scouts from New Hampshire and Vermont ages 5-17 enjoy the horse barn and two riding rings, woodshop and the Mud Hut (pottery studio), and swim and paddle on the 45-acre private lake. Financial aid is available to allow all girls to attend the weekly summer sessions which offer programs ranging from the arts to outdoor adventure, horsemanship and white water rafting to publishing a newspaper.

Swift Water Council is holding a 100th celebration and reunion from August 15-17 at the camp and all alumnae are invited. Several generations of women in some families will be attending, including some who jokingly asked via e-mail, “Is a horse-drawn cart still the best way to get to camp?” For more on the reunion, contact Martha Netsch at mnetsch@swgirlscouts.org or call her at Swift Water Council: 800-654-1270.

Swift Water Council, 14,000 girls strong in New Hampshire and eastern Vermont, is also celebrating a milestone: 50 years of building girls of courage, confidence, and character who make the world a better place. GSSWC headquarters are in Bedford, NH.

RiverStone Resources LLC is a highly specialized insurance company focusing on managing run-off claims. RiverStone Resources’ worldwide headquarters is located in the historic Manchester Millyard in Manchester, New Hampshire.