This was Blakely McCrory’s first year at Camp Mystic.
The 8-year-old was following in the footsteps of her mother, Lindsey McLeod McCrory, who “went there as a girl,” according to PEOPLE. Lindsey’s stepmother, stepsisters, and sisters also attended the Christian summer camp, which is located on the banks of the Guadalupe River in Texas Hill Country.
Lindsey, 50, describes Blakely, a “third-generation Mystic camper,” as “ecstatic” to attend. “She could not wait to be outside. It was like the biggest sleepover you could imagine as a little girl, because you are in a cabin with 11 other girls who become your best friends, right?”
“You get to do all of these exciting activities for four weeks. “You get to do horseback riding, swimming, basketball, fishing — everything she liked to do,” the Texas native says of her daughter.
So, when Lindsey first learned of the flooding at the camp on Friday, July 4, she imagined her daughter spending a rainy day inside the cabins, similar to when she “was there during a flood in the summer of 1987.”
This was Blakely McCrory’s first year at Camp Mystic.
The 8-year-old was following in the footsteps of her mother, Lindsey McLeod McCrory, who “went there as a girl,” according to PEOPLE. Lindsey’s stepmother, stepsisters, and sisters also attended the Christian summer camp, which is located on the banks of the Guadalupe River in Texas Hill Country.
Lindsey, 50, describes Blakely, a “third-generation Mystic camper,” as “ecstatic” to attend. “She could not wait to be outside. It was like the biggest sleepover you could imagine as a little girl, because you are in a cabin with 11 other girls who become your best friends, right?”
“You get to do all of these exciting activities for four weeks. “You get to do horseback riding, swimming, basketball, fishing — everything she liked to do,” the Texas native says of her daughter.
So, when Lindsey first learned of the flooding at the camp on Friday, July 4, she imagined her daughter spending a rainy day inside the cabins, similar to when she “was there during a flood in the summer of 1987.”
“I thought, ‘Oh, maybe she and one of those counselors are somewhere dry, but they are simply lost.'” ‘Maybe they are just lost, and I am not sure, but they are surviving together somehow.’ Lindsey says, “Of course you want to think these things.”
Blakely’s body was discovered on Monday night, she learned. Lindsey recalls being surrounded by loved ones and being relieved to learn what had happened to her little girl.
“I think the most terrifying part of this ordeal was the confirmation that she was unaccounted for originally,” the woman’s mother tells Petty. “Because I was always afraid of someone kidnapping her and not knowing what happened to her. The greatest fear was that of the unknown.”
“I felt comforted by everyone who loves me, and just by my faith,” Lindsey concurs.
However, she empathized with the ranger who made the call. “I know she is tough to do that job,” she remarks about the park ranger; “but to make those phone calls to the families, I can not even imagine just the trauma that she is going through, call after call, you know, have to bear witness to all this.”
“And I guess I had prepared myself mentally for that phone call, that I might get that call, that she has passed,” Lindsey elaborates. “So I remained calm. It gave me some comfort, and I knew she was in a better place, with her father, in heaven. I knew it was going to be fine.”
Blake, Lindsey’s husband and Blakely’s father, died in March at the age of 59 after “a short battle with stage 2 cancer.” Lindsey’s brother died “right before” Blakely’s death at the age of 59. Despite these tragedies, Lindsey believes her late daughter’s spirit remained strong.
“She was a live wire, just had a fun, spirited attitude, the type of child that does not stay down for long,” Lindsey tells the publication. After her father died in March, “she was sad, but she did not skip a beat—a very resilient child.”
The 8-year-old had “a contagious spirit,” according to her mother. “Everyone wanted to be around her. She was hilarious, and she was a prankster.”
In addition to her sense of humour, which manifested itself in pranks like putting her pet box turtle in her mom’s purse, Blakely was also a grounding presence, right up until the end: after the floods, one of her cabin counselors told her mom that “she encouraged the campers to not be afraid.”
Following the tragedy at Camp Mystic (at least 27 campers and counselors died at the Christian summer camp, according to officials), Blakely’s family found solace in items discovered in her cabin, including a letter she wrote to her mother.
“Dear mom, How are you? I am fine,” reads the letter, which Blakely filled out on pre-printed stationery. The 8-year-old went on to tell her mother that camp is “amazing,” and expressed her excitement about playing tennis and horseback riding.
Lindsey tells PEOPLE that having the letter was “actually very special because I knew she was having the best time of her life.”
“I am just so grateful to keep her spirit alive,” the Texas mother expresses. “I want to be the type of mother who honors her daughter and keeps her spirit close, not forgetting, not storing pictures, and not being able to look at them.” That is not me. She is so close to me, and I know she is watching me right now, keeping me safe.”
Lindsey reports that she, Brady, and the rest of the family are currently “healing together.” “It is so tough to be without her, and my husband, but we are just, we are reassured by our faith, that she is in heaven,” she says about her daughter Blakely. “She is there, and she is okay, and she is looking down on us.”
“And we are confident that it happened quickly. She did not need to suffer. I just have this feeling,” the mother explains. “She is with all of the campers and staff who died, as well as the other children. I just imagine it being a happy, peaceful place.”
