A Scoutmaster's Blog

Melrose Boy Scout Troop 68 does not have a building or a room to call its home, so my basement family room is the place I have created a “Scout Room”. It contains collections of Scouting coffee mugs, awards, and other stuff. The troop holds its patrol leader council meetings, committee meetings, and some training meetings there.

Photos of Troop 68 Eagle Scouts hang on the west wall. There was always a couple Scouts missing because I did not have a good picture to post on the wall. This morning I decided I needed to have photos of everyone, whether they were an actual Eagle picture or not. I searched through my photo collection and picked the best pictures of those missing Scouts, printed them, and placed them into frames.

The wall is now complete. All 21 of the Boy Scouts of Melrose Troop 68 who have earned the rank of Eagle Scout now have a place on the wall. There is even room for one more. Could that spot be filled by the Boy Scout who has an Eagle board of review on Tuesday?

By the way, do you have any idea how hard it is to take a picture of a wall of framed glass photos and not get a reflection?

I will admit that I have fallen behind on listening to the Scouting podcasts to which I subscribe, so when I recently took a trip to the Twin Cities I decided to catch up on listening to a couple episodes of the Scoutmaster Podcast found at scoutmaster cg.com. In episode #137, Clarke Green interviews author Mike Malone about his book Four Percent, a history of Eagle Scouts of the Boy Scouts of America. I really enjoyed the stories Mr. Malone shared about three of the most well known Eagle Scouts (listen to the podcast to find out who) and some of the changes to the Eagle Scout program during the last hundred years.

After listening to this podcast I wanted to get a copy of the book. Unfortunately, it is only available as an ebook through Amazon and iTunes. While I have read a couple ebooks on my iPad, I prefer to actually have a real book in my hands. I also think it would make an excellent gift for an Eagle Scout. Mr. Malone stated that his publisher is planning to publish an actual book sometime in the future but there are still some things to work out before that can happen, including getting the rights to use pictures within the book. Until then, it is the ebook or no book.

Dakota received his Eagle Scout Rank on Saturday, April 2, 2011. That means it was time to make another Eagle Scout slideshow. This is the twelfth time I have created a video for an Eagle court of honor. Ten of those were for Boy Scouts from Troop 68. Two were for Scouts of other troops. I have also been working on creating slideshows for the earlier Eagle Scouts of Melrose Troop 68.

Dakota and I sat down for the first time to plan the slideshow nearly a month ago. He is the first Scout who joined the troop after I switched to digital photography, so I have a lot of photos of him through the seven years he has been a member of the troop. Usually, I only had 200-300 photos of a Scout to sort through. I had over 900 pictures of Dakota. The two of us looked through them and began eliminating pictures. Dakota finally got it down to about 90 pictures. He choose three songs to play within the show, and surprised me with his choices. The finished video came to around ten minutes.

The guests of the court of honor enjoyed the show. It included some serious pictures along with a few comical ones. The slideshow opened with a picture of a rabbit which has special meaning for Dakota. He explained the rabbit during his speech at the court of honor.

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The Eagle Scout court of honor for Dakota was held this weekend. It went great. We had a good crowd. On the inside of the program was a little thing called, “One Hundred Scouts.” I have seen this before and I like seeing it as a part of an Eagle court of honor in some manner. Here is how it reads:

Of any one hundred boys who become Scouts, it must be confessed that thirty will drop out in their first year. Perhaps this may be regarded as a failure, but in later life all of these will remember that they had been Scouts and will speak well of the program.

Of the one hundred, only rarely will one ever appear before a juvenile court judge. Twelve of the one hundred will be from families that belong to no church. Through Scouting, these twelve and many of their families will be brought into contact with a church and will continue to be active all their lives. Six of the one hundred will become pastors.

Each of the one hundred will learn something from Scouting. Almost all will develop hobbies that will add interest throughout the rest of their lives. Approximately one-half will serve in the military, and in varying degrees, profit from their Scout training. At least one will use it to save another person’s life and many will credit it with saving their own.

Four of the one hundred will reach Eagle rank, and at least one will later say that he valued his Eagle above his college degree. Many will find their future vocation through merit badge work and Scouting contacts. Seventeen of the one hundred boys will later become Scout leaders and will give leadership to thousands of additional boys.

One in four Eagle Scouts will earn their Bronze Palm. Only about half of these boys will earn their gold and silver palms.

Only one in four boys in America will become a Scout, but it is interesting to know that of the leaders in this nation in business, religion and politics, three out of four were Scouts.

This story will never end. Like the “Golden Pebble” of service dropped into the human sea it will continue to radiate in ever-widening circles, influencing the characters of men down through unending time.

It makes you think, doesn’t it?
100 Days of Scouting: Day 55.

This week will be a busy week for this scoutmaster in central Minnesota. It begins with this year’s first court of honor which takes place tonight at the city hall meeting rooms. There are not many awards to present, but we do have two new Boy Scouts to recognize and one Scout will receive his Tenderfoot Rank. Our district executive will give the annual Friends of Scouting presentation.

The patrol leader council will meet Tuesday night to plan for the next month’s meetings and activities. We had elections in March so we will also have to work a little training into the meeting.

Cubmaster Chris and I may record a Leaders Campfire podcast this Wednesday. I really need to make another Around the Scouting Campfire show to post on Thursday. I was able to write a script for it last week but have not got together with Buttons yet to record it.

The court of honor for this troop’s nineteenth Eagle Scout will be held Saturday afternoon. The plans are complete. The guest speakers have been contacted. The guests have been invited. I have finished the slideshow of Dakota’s Scouting years but I still have to burn it to a dvd. I also need to write a short speech.

This is just a list of the Scouting related items on the agenda. I need to find time to get work done around the house, and eat the Thin Mint Girl Scout cookies that have arrived.

When Mike Rowe attended the 2010 National Jamboree Arena Show the Boy Scouts went nuts! At that moment he was more popular then a rock star. And to top it off, he is an Eagle Scout. Did you know that a couple of Scouts had the chance to interview him while he was at The Hill? Yes they did. They asked him why he was not wearing his uniform. They asked him why he did not use all his powers to get a Dirty Jobs merit badge passed by the national office. They even got him to sing a song he remembered from his days as a Boy Scout. In other words, it was a fun video to watch.

100 Days of Scouting – Day 8

If you have been following me for awhile you are aware the I have a Flickr account to which I have posted thousands of pictures featuring over thirty years of Scouting in Melrose. I also belong to several Flickr Scouting themed groups, and I am the administrator for the Flickr Wood Badge Photos group.

I wanted to recently find a group to share photos from Eagle Scout ceremonies and celebrations. I did a search and to my surprise I did not find a public group. So I decided to start one. I decided to name it simply “Eagle Scouts”. It can be found HERE.

I invite you to share your photos of your troop’s Eagle Scout courts of honor and celebrations. Be sure to join the group. Let’s make this a great group to showcase those special Boy Scouts who have attained the rank of Eagle.

The Eagle Scout theme continues with Around The Scouting Campfire #15. The show begins with Buttons, the radical Boy Scout, looking through the Troop 68 photo albums. This leads to Scoutmaster Steve explaining his methods of creating a slideshow to be shown at an Eagle Scout’s court of honor. Michael, an Boy Scout from Troop 68, shares his thoughts and a story or two about how he became an Eagle Scout. Buttons shares some facts about Eagle Scouts, along with a few jokes. Then it is time for a scoutmaster conference about a Scout being cheerful.

Steve and Buttons thank PTC Media (http://www.ptcmedia.net) for allowing this program to be a part of the family of Scouting related podcasts. We also thank the Boy Scout Store (http://boyscoutstore.com) for sponsoring this show. Be sure to take a moment to check out their website. Finally, we would like to thank you, our listeners, for downloading Around The Scouting Campfire.