Each house is strongly identified with a family name, and family members gather each year from all over the country at Salem to talk, play and pray together. A single house may contain as many as 30 people or more. Prominent families are known not only by the number of generations they have been camping at Salem, but also by the size of the family groups they attract each year to the campground. For those without a tent or not wanting to stay in the small cottages, there is also a small hotel on the campgrounds where campers can have a simple room and meals very inexpensively.
Families tend to use camp meetings as a way to mark the passage of their lives.
Campers are quick to tell visitors how many years they have been attending the camp. Recently one family marked the passing of one of their members, who, it was said, never missed a camp meeting in the more than ninety years she lived. My life and the life of my family have been closely tied to Salem Campground on Salem Road between Conyers and Covington.