THE MALDEN ADVOCATE–Friday, March 24, 2023 Page 15 MTEC Camping Field Trip a Fun Success O ver February vacation 19 teens from the Malden Teen Enrichment Center (MTEC) traveled on a threeday excursion to Cardigan Lodge in Alexandria, New Hampshire. Cardigan Lodge is next to the 5,000-acre Mount Cardigan State Forest and is located on a 1,200-acre reservation owned by the Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC). MTEC has gone on many trips in the past – enjoying camping in the summer and hiking during the spring and fall. MTEC can provide teens the opportunity to have these experiences through its ties with the AMC, which helps provide them with training and outdoor gear for use on the trips. AMC provides Outdoor Leadership Training to MTEC teens to equip them with the tools and skills necessary to lead students out in nature, including activities like snowshoe training. They then have access to the specific gear and equipment necessary for the activities. MTEC staffer Jacob Mullin-Bernstein said, “This is a great partnership and gives kids an opportunity free of charge, and at a discounted rate for MTEC, to take part in activities that would otherwise be costly.” As the trip began, MTEC Coordinator Cathy MacMullin announced that the students would be learning Malden High’s “Fight Song” during the trip. Mayor Gary Christenson also stopped by to wish the students a successful and safe journey as they headed 100 miles North into the mountains of rural New Hampshire. The students thoroughly enjoyed their experiences, which included hikes by the river, snowshoeing, sledding, playing lots of games and sitting by the outdoor fireplace. They look forward to more outdoor experiences and collaborations with AMC. Malden Reads and author Steve Kluger talk baseball I t’s spring in New England, and that means mud, occasionally snow, and baseball. To talk all things baseball, including his efforts to restore the baseball field at Manzanar Internment Camp, Malden Reads is pleased to host a best-selling author and baseball enthusiast, Steve Kluger. Kluger, the author of several books, including “Last Days of Summer” and “Changing Pitches,” will visit the Malden Public Library on Thursday, April 6, 2023, at 7 p.m. to discuss baseball, the Red Sox and his involvement in lobbying the U.S. government to restore the baseball field at Manzanar Internment Camp in Manzanar, Calif. In the aftermath of Japan’s bombing of Pearl Harbor, the U.S. government ordered 120,000 Japanese Americans to be imprisoned in hastily built camps. They were given 48 hours to sell their homes, businesses and possessions and could take only what they could carry – typically two suitcases per adult. These camps were surrounded by barbed wire, equipped with search lights and patrolled by armed guards. JapSteve Kluger Author anese-American citizens’ draft eligibility was reassigned as 4C (enemy alien status) in the process. “They Called Us Enemy” by actor/author/activist George Takei, the Malden Reads selection for our 13th season, takes place during those years. This book is a memoir of Takei’s youth while incarcerated during World War II in an internment camp, and tells not only his personal story, but chronicles a difficult time in American history. Life in the camps was hard, and people were looking for This shows a baseball field at the Manzanar Internment Camp in Manzanar, Calif., in the 1940s. (Photo credit: Ansel Adams) distractions to keep their spirits up. Baseball had been introduced in Japan in the 1870s and was very popular there as in America. Baseball teams were formed within seven of these camps, and four of the teams were able to travel to play each other. “Without baseball, camp life would have been miserable,” said George Omachi, a prisoner who later became a scout for Major League Baseball. In 2000, although the Department of the Interior began restoring Manzanar as a historic landmark, this project did not include the renovation of the baseball field. Kluger joined a group lobbying the U.S. government to begin that restoration process, which was approved in 2022. To quote Mr. Kluger, “A memorial to Manzanar without its baseball diamond is like the Pledge of Allegiance without the flag...baseball was perhaps one of the few aspects of the lives they’d led prior to incarceration that they were allowed to keep with them after everything else had been taken away. The inclusion of a diamond might achieve what reparations alone couldn’t facilitate: healing.” This talk is free to the public and will be held at the Malden Public Library’s Converse Art Galleries from 7-8 p.m. with a Q&A following. Light refreshments will be served.
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