Washington Crossing Council

Washington Crossing Council is a Scouting America council serving Pennsylvania’s Bucks County, and New Jersey’s Mercer and Hunterdon counties. The council was founded as Bucks County Council on August 13, 1928, and changed its name to Washington Crossing Council after receiving portions of the dissolved Central New Jersey Council.

The council has four districts:

Ockanickon Scout Reservation is located in Pipersville, Bucks County, Pennsylvania. The camp was founded in 1941 and named after a Lenape chief who assisted William Penn in the exploration of the Bucks Country area. The camp is run as a weekend camp during spring, fall and winter, and as a full-time summer camp during the summer. There are seventeen separate camp sites, and a wide range of activities and programs including the first ever Scout Science Center.

Camp Ockanickon contains 16 campsites which are available to troops during the summer, and a seventeenth which is occupied by staff during the summer but is available for camping during the off-season. Currently, the camp hosts about four hundred Scouts and adult leaders during each of seven weeks of summer camp. Camp Ockanickon is notable for the GE Betz Science center, its air-conditioned dining hall, and the numerous awards it has received from the BSA National Office for excellence. Camp Ockanickon is approximately 240 acres in size and offers one of the largest merit badge programs in the Northeast Region with 80 badges offered at summer camp.

When Bucks County Council was formed in 1927, one of the first considerations was securing land for a suitable camp. A committee under the chairmanship of Henry Palmer visited about 33 sites within the radius of one hundred miles of Bucks County. The committee finally chose land in Sunnyside, New Jersey about 7 miles north of Flemington on the south bank of the Raritan River. The camp was called Buccou (Buc for Bucks and Cou for County). Camp Buccou was occupied until 1940, but the Scouts of Bucks County wanted a camp in their county and a determined effort was made to find suitable land. The Scout Executive and the Camping Committee visited 77 possible sites. In March 1940, the first parcel of land was purchased for the price of $17,500 from Mr. Charles Larsen. This Bucks County site was selected next to Ralph Stover State Park. The flag pole from Camp Buccou was erected on the parade ground of the present camp that summer. At the suggestion of Mr. Edward Barnsley of Newtown Pennsylvania, and with much discussion, the camp was named Ockanickon to honor the Lenni Lenape Indian Chief Ockanickon who was one of the conveyors of Bucks County land to William Penn in 1682. A contribution from the family of the late Henry Palmer enabled the camp to renovate the back of the old carriage house into a kitchen for the dining hall and designated the building Palmer Lodge in his memory. This served as the camp’s dining hall until the construction of Foster Hall in 1995. In the fall of 1940, a fireplace in memory of Mr. Bruce Ford was built in Palmer Lodge through the generosity of Mrs. Bruce Ford.

In 1941 Mr. Charles J. Matthews gave council $5,000 toward the construction of a swimming pool in memory of his wife Clara Matthews. The balance of $8,000 was donated by friends of the Boy Scouts of Bucks County.

In 1946 a log cabin in the Tohickon Valley was purchased for the use of Explorers and named Uncas Lodge. At the beginning of the 1948 camp season, the rostrum in the chapel was dedicated by Dr. A.J. Strathie to the memory of his wife and son. The benches and the shrubbery in the chapel are dedicated to the memory of those designated on plaques that can be found at the entrance.

In July 1950 the Health Lodge was dedicated to the memory of Morrisville Mayor Thomas B. Stockham by Mrs. Stockham and the Stockham family. A brass memorial plaque on the building lists his services to Scouting and the nation.