Jake Provizer of

Farmington Hills on
the soccer field

July reunion to mark
day camp's 40th
summer.

Bill Carroll

Special to the Jewish News

H

appy campers for almost 50
years, Lorraine and Arnie
Fisher of West Bloomfield are
preparing for their 40th summer as own-
ers of Willoway Day Camp in Milford.
Childhood camping experiences became
a lifetime of camping fun and a highly
successful family business for the Fishers.
"It all started as a dream in the 1960s
and became a reality for over 20,000
campers and counselors in the past 40
years," said Lorraine, who compares the
operation to a mom-and-pop-type fam-
ily business, where children can thrive
and develop in a safe, non-competitive,
family-like environment."We're proud
that, over the years, many of our Jewish
community's leaders have looked back
at camp with good feelings as they get
their own children ready for the `Willoway
rience:"
Arnie Fisher graduated from Detroit
Central High. School in 1948, eventually
becoming an administrator in the Detroit
Public Schools. Lorraine is a 1954 gradu-
ate of Detroit Mumford High.
Arnie borroWed $200 from the teach-
rs" ,.. gedit union to buy a bus and the
Fishers operated the old Thunderbird
ay Camp near Kensington Metro Park
s. They then took a five-year
iks as Arnie continued to work for the
Detroit schools and Lorraine was a stay-
at-home mom, raising three children.
The Fishers then opened Willoway
on the 16-acre site of the former Camp
Totem Pole at 12 Mile and Beck roads in
Novi.
"We all loved willow trees — there are
many legends about willows and native
Americans, so someone in our family
came up with the Willoway name': Arnie

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