Boy Scouts

I don't remember how old I was, but must have been around 8 yrs. old. My dad drove me to our first meeting which was around 15 miles away. We lived out in the country and it was too much for my dad to take us to the meetings after working on the farm all day. I really would have liked to have been involved. I still consider myself a boy scout, if only for a day.
 
i still am in scouts all the gear is the normal outdoor stuff, although all the troops tents are from wallmart so they all leak and once i woke up in 4" of water
 
lk3331 said:
i still am in scouts all the gear is the normal outdoor stuff, although all the troops tents are from wallmart so they all leak and once i woke up in 4" of water
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Just as long as you weren't like one of the geniuses in our troop who staked down their tent in a drainage ditch during a storm. If I'm not mistaken, it was the same one who threw a gallon of water on a grease fire.
 
Once a Scout...your always a scout. I still use what I learned in the field camping and hiking. I learned fire making skills as a Scout.
 
I qualify. I am old, and I was a Boy Scout.

The most vivid memory was from back in about 1957. Our leader took 6 of us on a weekend camp out on the banks of Lake Tohopekaliga. The first afternoon, while he was showing us how to use an ax, the blade slipped and sliced into his calf.
Well, blood went everywhere, and Mr. X hit the ground screaming.

Good thing he was with Boy Scouts though. We quickly put a compress on his wound, tied a tourniquet above his knee, and loaded him into the back of the pick up truck.

I drove him the 20+ miles back into town, to the hospital, where they were able to fix him up. One of the town cops asked how we got back. Since we were all 10 and 11, none of us fessed up as to who the driver was. :D
 
Was a member of a very active troop in Memphis, TN, but we moved again before I could do my Eagle project. Joined another troop after the move, but didn't like it, and rarely showed up for anything but campouts.

With the TN troop, we went all over the place, Vicksburg in MS, part of the Natchez Trace in LA, places in Arkansas, along with national, state, and military parks in TN.
I remember a blizzard hitting a park we were at in Arkansas, and temperatures dropping into the teens when the weather was supposed to be clear with temps from 40-60 degrees. I had ice forming in my cheap Coleman sleeping bag, and ended up sneaking over to a glorified outhouse that had power, with a light and space heater in it, and sleeping on the floor.
Absolute worst experience: A farmer in northern MS had given us a large wooded portion of his land to use, where our patrols built trails and individual campsites. One exceptionally dry summer ~24 years ago, 2 Eagle Scouts were laying in hammocks, and the story was: One rips up a clump of sage grass, comments to the other that if it ever caught on fire we'd never get it out, lights it with his lighter to demonstrate, burns his hand while trying to blow it out, drops it, and takes out almost 50 acres of the farmer's land. The volunteer firefighters had us getting water from a lake, and wearing Igloo coolers on our backs with brass pump sprays and shoulder straps from old lawn chair material. That's the day I found out that pine trees explode...
 
I was a scout. I made Life rank and Vigil in OA. Went to Philmont and the National Jamboree. Wish I would have made more of an effort to get Eagle, but Girls, Football, and building Hot Rods got in the way.
 
Eagle Scout here. Loved Scouting. My best memories were backpacking trips in the High Uintas (specifically, Ryder Lake). I just had a cheap external frame backpack and a Slumberjack mummy bag. I always carried a SAK Super Tinker and sometimes a Buck lockback. Luckilly, one of the first things I learned was how to stay dry. Never spent a night wet. Here's a picture of Ryder Lake (not my picture).
ryder07-019.jpg

I've caught more fish in Ryder Lake than everywhere else I've fished combined.
 
Eagle from the mid 50's. We borrowed a deuce and 1/2 from the local NG for long distance trips from Midland TX. One year we pulled into Santa Fe NM about dark with no place to camp. Our plight was explained to a local LEO who made a phone call to the Mayor and we were allowed to camp on the court house lawn. The early morning raisers were treated to the sight of GI shelter half's and groggy boys looking for breakfast. I wonder if the NG would loan a truck today and I am pretty certain camping on the court house lawn would be out.:( Good times!:D
 
A Cub Scout and Boy Scout, late '50's & early '60's, Life & OA, Patrol Leader. Favorite memories: our Scoutmaster was a timber cruiser for International Paper Company and he had access to all their lands in the Florida panhandle. Our favorite camping spot was a high piece of ground in a swamp accessible only via an old timber rail line (the cross ties and rail had been pulled up years ago) after passing through three or four locked gates and an hour hump into the site, about 30 acres of knee high wire grass and two foot diameter pines - the high spot had never been logged - looked like a park. Worst memories: the dad of one of the kids walked into a branch at night and lost the sight in one eye; and, some numb skull tossed an 'empty' propane can for a lantern into the fire which exploded throwing shrapnel and burning embers for 30 feet in all directions.. I still can hear the sound of the shrapnel going past my ear.. and then our Scoutmaster,whom I had never heard raise his voice, became.. hmmm, shall I say, a bit unpleasant! The final worst memories.. one the Dad's chewed tobacco and you learned real fast.. don't sit behind him with the window down.. nasty! All in all, good memories.
 
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