The “little red schoolhouse” of Camp Glenwood is more than just a stop for PCT hikers looking to rest, refill their water, or spend the night—it has a story of its own. Originally built as a school and later repurposed as a Boy Scout cabin, it now stands as a familiar trail marker, with a constant flow of modern-day thru-hikers passing through.

In the 1950s, inmates working on the final section of the Angeles Crest Highway were housed at Camp 37 in Cedar Springs, just west of the Mount Williamson tunnels. This facility operated as a minimum-security prison honor camp. The tunnels were part of the final stretch in the completion of the Angeles Crest Highway, a project 27 years in the making, spanning from La Cañada to Big Pines.

Cedar Springs Camp 37 featured a separate administrative area that provided housing and office space for civilian employees. It also housed a one-room schoolhouse for the children of the staff. Known as the “little red schoolhouse,” it served all elementary grades, with qualified teachers provided by the Pasadena City School District. By establishing the school within the camp, the family were spared a 74-mile round trip that would have been necessary if they had to attend school in La Cañada.

Glenwood Dad’s Club Inc.

Glenwood Dad’s Club Incorporated was established and operated Camp Glenwood since 1956 by Bill Hayes and a dozen other men whose children attended Glenwood Elementary School, in Sun Valley, California.

Once the Angeles Crest Highway was completed, Camp 37 needed to be razed:

Bill Hayes, met the road construction crew as they were in the process of removing an old abandoned school house. The building was destined to be demolished or sold off for a $1000.00, because it stood in the way of the proposed road work. Bill Hayes, a WWII vet, went to the VFW in Sun Valley and requested a donation to have the school house moved and converted to a Youth Group and Scout cabin for winter camping in the nearby San Gabriel Mountains. The VFW scrounged up $2000.00 in support of Hayes’s proposal.

Mr. Hayes made a side deal with one of the road crew workers to move the building to a location 3 miles west down an old logging road for an additional cost of $1000.00. The move began on a Saturday. All was well as the tractor pulled the trailered building over the dirt path until the building got stuck, pinched by a great tree on the sharp right turn down the narrow logging road. You can still to this day see the smashed metal roofing on the east side of the building. The Crewman was embarrassed of his miscalculation and said he would get another tractor during the week and finish the move. At last, the school house arrived and Mr. Hayes along with several volunteers, set up a temporary resting place for the Cabin on a bed of 55 gallon drums.

Mr. Bill Hayes obtained a 50 year lease from the forestry department and the Glenwood Dad’s Club was born. It took two more years for volunteers of the Club to create the raised concrete foundation that the cabin sits on today. The volunteers of the Glenwood Dad’s Club gather twice annually, as they have for the past 60 years, to lend their time, tools and materials for the repairs and maintenance of the old Cabin that has served generations of youth so well.

—Glenwood Dad’s Club

Since1956, Camp Glenwood has long been a passionate and committed youth camp, dedicated to fostering a love for the outdoors and instilling values of conservation.

Entrance sign at road into Camp Glenwood