35 years ago, Kathy Hall was a single mother of three in search of a male role model for her then 7 year-old son. She decided to enroll him in her neighborhood Boy Scout troop, under the Grand Towers district. When she found out that there were no parents whatsoever involved in the troop, she…continue reading

Julian Kulski was a Polish Boy Scout when the Nazis invaded his nation in 1939. He was only 10 years old when the war began. After the invasion the Nazis directed that all schools be closed and that any patriotic clubs and organizations be disbanded under penalty of death. Concerned about his son’s safety, Kulski’s father…continue reading

This blog post from the Smithsonian Institute's Museum of National History is a peek into their collection of Scouting artifacts. One is this tunic dated between 1911-14, just a year into the founding of the BSA. I have a similar tunic to the one pictured but mine is probably from the mid twenties. I would…continue reading

From an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal; Boy, the Scout Handbook Keeps Changing by Tony Woodleif, a succinct and thoughtful evaluation of what Scouting means to a Scout and his family: I suppose a handbook won’t determine whether my sons have an enriching Scout experience. Their troop’s leaders will. And I will. ”Troops,” says an Eagle…continue reading

Sir Robert Baden Powell had a very simple idea: The aim of the Scout training is to improve the standard of our future citizenhood,especially in Character and Health; to replace Self with Service, to make the ladsindividually efficient morally and physically, with the object of using that efficiencyfor service for their fellow-men. Baden Powell's Aids…continue reading

An unofficial archive of Boy’s Life Magazine that features many scans of old Boy’s Life covers like the one above. The first issue of Boys’ Life appeared in March of 1911… not too many years later it became the official magazine of the Boy Scouts of America, and it has since gone on to over…continue reading