Gruesome story.
There seems to have been some clues that it was likely to occur. But back then, it was not even imaginable to even think of that happening. So they did nothing.
Fast forward to now. Stuff like happens all the time. If creepy hints and signs occur, people react.
I was a Girl Scout and spent parts or all of ten wonderful summers at Camp Scott as a child and then as a young adult, and those summers were a strong positive influence upon my life as an adult. The murders were an incredible tragedy to the families and to all of us. The problem with Camp Scott was that it was one of hundreds of traditional camps, one which had operated quite well for about 50 years way out in the sticks, so to speak. So the council operated with the ongoing assumption we were all still living in a 1950’s type Mayberry world, and the level of security reflected that. Also, after a horrific event like this one, memories do tend to get embellished, perhaps, at times, if only because we are trying to make sense of evil, and so prior warnings of the event may get discovered; don’t put too much weight on them or totally scorn them either, for the people involved were trying to understand what happened and why. Remember that this was like a bolt out of the blue for Scout camps, councils, and Scouts everywhere back then, and it totally changed Girl Scout camps into hyper-paranoid encampments, frankly, because our glorious new modern world requires that now. And Scouting itself has greatly changed, but that is another topic. The picture of the Red Barn in this article kind of takes on a symbolic look on several levels to me.