By Will Chavez
Staff Writer 

TAHLEQUAH, Okla. – Despite tighter budgets, the J.D. McCarty Center in Norman is moving forward with plans to build Camp ClapHans in honor of the late Sammy Jack Claphan, a Cherokee Nation citizen. 

Camp ClapHans will be the first summer camp of its kind in Oklahoma, McCarty Center officials said. It will have the usual summer camp activities such as swimming and horseback riding, but it will be unique in that the camp will be accessible to children 8 to 16 years old with disabilities and/or in wheelchairs. 

Uwe von Schamann, J.D. McCarty director of Development and former University of Oklahoma Sooners kicker, said the organization has funding to build two cabins at the Norman-based camp this year. The Cherokee Nation is financing and building one cabin in honor of Claphan, who was von Schamann’s teammate at OU, while the Chickasaw Nation is financing the other cabin. 

“I’d say within six months we are going to break ground (for the cabins), but it’s definitely going to happen this year. Hopefully, next year we’ll start having one-week camps. So that’s kind of where we are,” von Schamann said.

He said he is working other Oklahoma tribes to raise funds for two more cabins and a mess hall to be named after Claphan. In the meantime, he said, the camp would use its multi-purpose building for a temporary mess hall. 

State and national economy woes have slowed fundraising for more cabins, the mess hall and a swimming pool. State budget cuts took away some of the surplus money the J.D. McCarty Center once had, von Schamann said. 

Construction costs have also risen since October 2008 when ground was broken for the project. The camp’s initial total cost of $4.5 million has doubled, he said. 

“We can’t build the whole camp right now, but we can at least get started,” he said. 

The McCarty Center is also focused on raising money for scholarships to help disabled children attend summer camps. A bowling event is set for May 6 to raise scholarship endowment funding. Four-person teams can participate in the seventh annual “Gutter Dance” fundraiser by paying $200 per team or $50 per person. The cost includes a meal and two games. People can also sponsor a bowling lane for $100, and corporate sponsorships are $500. 

Claphan died in 2001 at the age of 45. He grew up near Stilwell in Adair County and received a scholarship to play football for the Sooners in 1974. 

He was an All-American offensive guard at OU and helped the Sooners win two national championships in 1974 and 1975. The Cleveland Browns drafted him in 1979. He was later traded to the San Diego Chargers where he played offensive tackle until 1987.

After his retirement, he returned to Oklahoma where he coached football at Midwest City Carl Albert High School and Stilwell. He retired from coaching in 1999, devoting his time to being a special education teacher at Stilwell.

Initially, only a cabin was going to be named after Claphan, von Schamann said, but the sound of his friend’s last name lent a hand in eventually naming the camp after him.

Along with being teammates at OU, von Schamann said he and Claphan were competitors in the NFL because von Schamann kicked for the Miami Dolphins while Claphan played for the Chargers. 

“We were just really good friends, and during the off season we would spend time together. We were very close,” he said. 

The J.D. McCarty Center was founded in 1946 to treat cerebral palsy. Since that time, the hospital has expanded by treating more than 70 different diagnoses of developmental disabilities. 

Reach Staff Writer Will Chavez at (918) 207-3961 or will-chavez@cherokee.org