By COLlive reporter
Construction work at the parking lot of Camp Gan Israel in Parksville, NY, has landed the known Chabad boys overnight camp a rare find.
A 1940’s Dodge Woody Beach Wagon was unearthed in a hidden shed while excavating the lawn used for parking across the Parksville Road which belongs to the camp.
It is estimated that the car has been inside the shed for over 40 years. Amazingly, everything inside the car remained intact, with air in 3 of its 4 tires.
The grounds once belonged to Klein’s Hillside Hotel, one of the largest resorts in the Catskills during the Borsht Belt era. It was able to host some 350 guests.
“Klein’s was a huge hotel complex. It had professional basketball players on its staff. It booked only the best entertainers on weekends. The grounds were enormous,” Stanley Greenberg recalled in the Plainview Old Bethpage Herald.
When the camp director Rabbi Abraham Shemtov purchased the property, moving the Gan Israel from its rented grounds in Swan Lake to Parksville, the shed was part of an unused maintenance building.
It sunk some 7 feet in the ground with its roof at street level and hidden by tall trees. It was recently ordered to be demolished.
The Dodge Woody is a rare find, and is sought after by antique car collectors. A fully-restored Dodge Woody Beach Wagon can fetch a nice amount at auction.
The Woody has been carefully removed from the sunken shed and is expected to be sold.