Eighteen Years Ago… The “Melrose Scouting Productions” Channel Began!
stevejb68 on January 8, 2024 in Anniversary, NewsThis is hard to believe. The Melrose Scouting Productions channel on YouTube is 18 years old. I posted the first video on January 9, 2006. The channel now contains over 200 videos featuring Melrose Troop 68 Scouts throughout the decades.
I remember when I started the channel. There were not many Boy Scout troops posting videos online yet. Melrose Troop 68 was one of the early troops to have its own channel. While the very first video was not Scouting related, it was made by one of our Boy Scouts at the time. (It was actually a school class project.)
I did not have to go far to find videos to start posting. I had been filming troop courts of honor, events, and outings since 1989 for MelTV, the local television access station. Unfortunately, the city closed down the station in the early 2010s. There were several dozen videos, on VHS tape, that could now be posted online for people and former Scouts to continue to enjoy. And, of course, there would always be more videos to create. It gave me a place to share other Scouting related videos that I had collected over the decades.
One of the most fun things I did with the channel was to bring Buttons the Boy Scout to life. Buttons was a puppet I owned that became the comic mascot of the channel. It may have been fun but it was also a lot of work bringing Buttons to life. I have not made a new video featuring Buttons since 2010, but he did have his own following of online fans during those four years.
At the time I write this article, there are 213 regular videos posted to the channel. Many of them features songs and skits from campfire programs and the troop’s Laughs For Lunch Shows. During the last few months I have began playing with YouTube Shorts. While most of these Shorts don’t receive many hits, a few have received over 2000 views. One Short even reached 8000 views!
While I have not been very good about posting videos to the channel during the last few years (only 13 videos posted in 2023), my goal is to post videos more regularly during 2024. Why not? After all, we now carry video camera in our pockets everywhere we go. It is not like I have to grab the massive old VHS camcorder anymore.
If you have not seen the channel yet, check it out at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClUOxM42AYjgLwGyoqgpx1w
