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Part II of The Portly Political Summer Reading List 2026 will be out next week! If you missed Part I, read it here. —TPP

Minecraft Camp was this past Monday through Thursday, and it was another fun week of crafting and King’s Hawaiian Rolls. I can never quite remember when the first Minecraft Camp was, but it was likely either the summer of 2013 or 2014, which means the camp has been going on for over a decade.

When it began, a former colleague of mine got us setup with this gloriously old version of MinecraftEDU, based on Minecraft 1.7.10. That ancient version, one of my knowledgeable counselors informed me, was right before a number of major updates to the game. It’s fun seeing kids come in each year and trying to figure out why their preferred building material and/or mechanic isn’t available (no dolphins, sorry). That said, they all come to adapt to the older version; indeed, many of the veterans insist that we keep it.

Our version is also based on an old Java install that exists on a handful of USB sticks and a backup hard drive. Microsoft purchased Minecraft and MinecraftEDU some years ago, but our school computers at the time lacked the proper version of Windows to run it (I think we needed Windows 10 and our computers were running Windows 7). I’ve kept using this version out of inertia and, again, due to popular demand. I just did a search, and it seems it is available for download, so if you want to try the version we play, download and give it a shot.

All technical talk aside, let’s get into the heart of this year’s camp.

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