Eagle Scout, 1974. Never saw this thread before.
Eagle Scout 1967
Vigil Honor Order of the Arrow 1971
Camp Staff Camp Coker 4 summers
Assistant Scoutmaster
Scoutmaster
Eagle Dad
Troop Commitee Chair of a troop that lost their chartering organization when the BSA allowed gays. My church became the new chartering organization.
To the person who asked, “Have you seen the arrow?” It is only right.
Forgot to mention that I also completed Woodbadge
Would many of you agree with this? My son gave up scouting when he was 12 or so and did help some of the aspiring Eagle Scouts (7 years ago) with projects that seemed relatively significant, but the last 2 Eagle projects I saw this year didn’t seem to measure up–one of them was building 2 benches and installing them in a garden for senior citizens.
In fact I asked a friend who’s an Eagle Scout himself and has a son who’s one as well, “Do these sound like Eagle Scout projects to you?” and he said not really.
I made Life, entirely because my mom was my cub scout leader and as a direct consequence I earned literally everything that came down the pike, without ever caring about any of it. I was told to do stuff, I did stuff, I earned badges. Basically all the badges. (Though for the record it’s a damn crime that I got Cooking. I got it at scout camp, and I’m quite certain that the only reason I got it was that none of the food judges wanted to have to try my supposed-to-be-a-hamburger-but-was-somehow-a-liquid efforts a second time.)
So yeah, Life scout on momentum alone. Eagle, on the other hand, would have required actual work - back then you had do to some sort of backbreaking eagle project requiring coordinating teams of people doing thousands of hours of physical labor. My brother renovated an entire freaking cemetery. No freaking thanks. So I’m stalled at Life for life, and still don’t care.
Scoutmaster to my kid: “Don’t you want to get more merit badges?”
Kid: “Naaah, I’m fine. I mostly like the camping and hiking and scuba diving.”
Scoutmaster: “But one more badge and you’d progress from First-Class Scout to Star!”
Kid: “Heh, a First-Class Scout sounds pretty great. I think I’ll hold right here.”
Scoutmaster: “And I can’t talk you or Tim or Matt into wearing the uniform?”
Kid: “Nope, we love our dirty hoodies.”
Scoutmaster: “How many of your friends wear dirty hoodies?”
Kid: “All of 'em.”
Scoutmaster: “You realize those hoodies ARE a uniform…”
Kid and Tim and Matt: whoaaaa…
I grew up in one of the roughest neighborhoods in my home town. I was the youngest child in a single parent family. When I was eight, a man named Ray Ramirez came to my house one night and told my Mom: “I have hear that here is a boy here who does not have a father. I would like to invite him to my Cub Scout Pack meeting.” I joined, and was a Cub Scout, a Webelo, and a Boy Scout. As an adult, I was an Assistant Scout Master, a Scoutmaster, a Unit Commissioner, An Assistant District Commissioner and a Council Training Commissioner. I earned my Wood badge in Class NC 415. I missed Eagle by a couple of Merit Badges.
The boys that made it out of the neighborhood without jail time were all members of Troop 62. All of us were at Ray Ramirez’s funeral.
I got as far as Life when I was 13, but lost interest after that. I was also in OA, but didn’t get past vigil. I enjoyed going to camp in the summer (Camp Davy Crockett, on Lake Cherokee). I greatly appreciate the assistant scoutmaster who used half of his vacation every year to take us to camp. He’d been in the Marines, and pretended to be strict with us. The only thing he was really strict about was not letting anyone get picked on. When he caught a bunch of us out late at night our “punishments” were basically things we would be doing anyway at some point during the week (like replacing fire buckets).
I live in one of the most left-leaning areas of the country, and the scout troops are inclusive when it comes to religion and sexuality. They wouldn’t have many members otherwise.
Both my son’s troop, and my scout troop as a kid (in a very conservative area) had openly gay leaders. They were some of the best motivators I’ve ever met, and some of my key role models as a kid.
[basso profundo hetero voice] **And we all turned out great! **[/bphv]
I think the difficulty of Eagle projects varies greatly with who in the local council is in charge of approval. In the sixties, when I did mine, it was something that I could do alone. Now, the emphasis is on the scout planning and directing others. Sometimes what may appear small takes a lot of planning and organizing. I had scouts that had to get, building permits, permission from planning departments, and other things that you just don’t think about when you say, “I will make benches and put them in the park.” They acquire materials either by donation or fundraising. The projects that my son and other scouts I led were much more difficult than the project I did.
I am proud to say my nephew made Eagle just last year, as did his older brother seven years before. My BIL was involved with the troop since the older boy started Cub Scouts, and plans on keeping up with it even though the younger is going away to college.
I was just asked the other day by a non-Scout if I’m an Eagle, and was proud to say that I am. I still serve on the troop committee of our second son’s troop, several years after he left Scouting for other interests. I also serve as a counselor for five merit badges locally: Citizenship in the Community, Nation and World; American Heritage; and Law.
I must have missed this the first time around.
I’m an Eagle Scout, class of 1985, with two Eagle palms. I was the Senior Patrol Leader (SPL) in my troop for a year, and was elected to the Order of the Arrow (OA), now a Brotherhood member. After my year as SPL, I finished out my time in the troop as Junior Assistant Scoutmaster (JASM).
My son started in Cub Scouts as a Wolf back in 2004. (We missed Tiger Cubs.) He got his Arrow of Light in 2008, and earned his Eagle Scout award in 2014. He had enough merit badges for four palms, but didn’t have enough time to get any before he turned 18 years old. [They’ve recently changed the rules so that you automatically get all Eagle Palms you are entitled to at the time you get Eagle Scout with no time requirement, but the rule change is only effective going forward (i.e. (not retroactive).] My son was also elected Senior Patrol Leader for a year (as the dark-horse candidate in a three-way highly contested election), and is an OA member.
I’ve been a Scout Leader since 2004, including serving as Scoutmaster for two years, and am still active in my son’s troop. In fact, I’m going on a 75-mile High Adventure canoe trip with the troop in a couple of weeks. (My son can’t go, because he doesn’t have enough vacation yet after starting his new job as an engineer after graduating from college in May.) I’m planning to go up for the evening one day this week to visit the troop at summer camp.
The award was likely renamed because of confusion with the First Class rank in Boy Scouts (which is a more junior rank that is considerably easier to get). I remember seeing an application once (for an ROTC scholarship) that had a bubble to fill out if you had earned Eagle Scout, and another bubble to fill out if you had earned First Class. That was a little confusing for me, since I had earned both ranks in Boy Scouts. I later realized that the second bubble was actually for the Girl Scout award.
Of course, now that girls can join BSA troops (as of February 2019), they will be able to earn the Eagle Scout award, too.
Queen Scout
Baden Powell Award
Wood Badge
Just a shout out from down under!
Probably Queen Scout, that’s the equivalent of an Eagle Scout and the Venturer level.
Yes. I was made an Eagle Scout on the same night as my friend Danny. He is in Federal jail now as he went on to become the national president of a motorcycle club. From time to time, I suppose both of us regret the paths we took in life.
I was a very active Cub Scout, and my mom was also a Den Mother. Then I became a Boy Scout, and even went on an overnight camp, in which I was a cook. A month after I joined, the troop dissolved, for whatever reason.
We don’t blame you.
Eagle Scout 1995. My summer camp was where they filmed Friday the 13th: Camp No-Be-Bos-Co aka “Camp Crystal Lake.”
I earned Eagle Scout, graduated high school, and the NJ Devils won their first Stanley Cup all within three weeks.
Tripler
Good times.
No. I joined the scouts two or three times, but somehow it never appealed.
My wife was a Brownie and wanted to be a girl scout, but in her small town (Salem, NJ) that was by invitation only and somehow Jews never got invited. My two sons were never interested but my daughter was a Guide (in Canada) for a number of years and earned quite a few merit badges, but I don’t know what rank she attained. Although they met in a church basement, there was no religious aspect to it.