Scouting for Boys is now in fourth place in the all time best sellers list, behind the Bible, the Koran and Mao-Tse-Tung’s Little Red Book.
“It is a movement, because it moves forward. As soon as it stops moving, it becomes an Organisation, and is no longer Scouting.” — B-P.
At the out-set the one thing Scouting could not be called was an Organisation, as it was far from organised. B-P. was still an active soldier, organising the Territorials in Northumberland, which kept him far from the hub of Scouting in London. The initial rush for membership was handled by Messers C. Arthur Pearson & Co., the publisher of Scouting for Boys and many of the subsequent Scouting publications, and the newly published Scout magazine.
It was soon seen that some break from the publisher would have to be achieved to get the Movement the status it deserved. The Movement slowly evolved, being very democratic at the grass-roots level, with the Scout Leaders having a fairly free reign with what they did, as long as it was within the ideals of Scouting.
The next year the Scout Association opened its first offices in Victoria Road, finally breaking the strong bonds it had with Pearsons. In 1910 B-P. retired from the Army to devote his time, effort and money (all his royalties from Scouting for Boys were ploughed back into the movement) into Scouting. This year also saw the first census of Scouts in the UK, indicated over a hundred thousand Scouts in the UK. So, in less than three years, Scouting had a firm footing.
As early as 1908 Scouting was starting in many of the British outposts of the Empire. After a trip to South America, Scouting started in Chile, and it was already crossing the channel into Europe. The big step across the Atlantic, and into the United States came more by chance. In 1909, an American business man, William Boyce, was lost in the fog of London, when a small boy approached him, and offered to take him to his hotel. Once there, the boy refused any offer of money for the service, saying that it was his good turn as a Boy Scout. Boyce was intrigued by this and tracked down B-P. before he left London to discover more of this. When he got back to the U.S.A. he went about setting up the Boy Scouts of America. By 1918, its numbers had risen to 300,000, and had reached the million mark before the end of the twenties.B-P. spent much of the rest of his life on World-tours, initially organising Scouting throughout the world, and later attending the World Jamborees, which have become an integral part of international Scouting. The first of these was in 1920 in London, at Olympia, it was more an exhibition of Scouting, held inside. The second Jamboree, four years later, in Copenhagen, set the model for the modern Jamboree, a major international camp for Scouts from all over the World.
Originally B-P. had envisaged Scouting as a movement for boys between the ages of 11 and 18. As early as 1909 Scoutmasters were facing the problem of younger brothers wanting to join in the fun. Some just turned a blind eye to the age of some of the boys, others formed Patrols and Troops of Junior or Cadet Scouts. The problem wasn’t just confined to younger brothers, but also to sisters as well. In 1909 at the Crystal Palace Rally, B-P. came across a Patrol, who claimed to be Girl Scouts.Initially B-P. was all in favour of allowing girls to become Scouts (in separate troops), but had to change his mind due to the pressures of Edwardian society. It was not considered right that young ladies should be out-and-about, camping, hiking, etc., (remember this was about the same time as the Suffragette movement). He addressed this problem by setting up the sister movement the Girl Guides in 1910, with (initially) the help of his sister, Agnes, and then with the help of his wife, Olave.
Dear Scouts – if you have ever seen the play ‘Peter Pan’ you will remember how the pirate chief was always making his dying speech because he was afraid that possibly when the time came for him to die, he might not have time to get it off his chest. It is much the same with me, and so, although I am not at this moment dying, I shall be doing so one of these days and I want to send you a parting word of goodbye.
Remember, it is the last time you will ever hear from me, so think it over.
I have had a most happy life and I want each one of you to have a happy life too.
I believe that God put us in this jolly world to be happy and enjoy life. Happiness does not come from being rich, nor merely being successful in your career, nor by self-indulgence. One step towards happiness is to make yourself healthy and strong while you are a boy, so that you can be useful and so you can enjoy life when you are a man.
Nature study will show you how full of beautiful and wonderful things God has made the world for you to enjoy. Be contented with what you have got and make the best of it. Look on the bright side of things instead of the gloomy one.
But the real way to get happiness is by giving out happiness to other people. Try and leave this world a little better than you found it and when your turn comes to die, you can die happy in feeling that at any rate you have not wasted your time but have done your best. ‘Be Prepared’ in this way, to live happy and to die happy – stick to your Scout Promise always – even after you have ceased to be a boy – and God help you to do it.
Your friend,
Robert Baden-Powell
B-P. was the first and only Chief Scout of the World. No single person has held that responsibility since. The United Kingdom has seen only nine Chief Scouts since B-P.:
- Arthur Somers-Cocks, 6th Baron Somers, March 1942 -
Chief Scout of the British Empire- Thomas Corbett, 2nd Baron Rowallan, April, 1945 -
Chief Scout of the British Commonwealth and Empire- Sir Charles Maclean, later Lord Maclean, September 1959 -
Chief Scout of the Commonwealth. (He resigned as Chief Scout of the UK in September 1971, but continued as Chief Scout of the Commonwealth until August, 1975)- Sir William Gladstone, July 1972 -
Chief Scout of the United Kingdom and Overseas Territories- Major-General Michael J. H. Walsh, February 1982 -
Chief Scout of the United Kingdom and Overseas Territories- Garth Morrison (later Sir Garth), May 1988 -
Chief Scout of the United Kingdom and Overseas Territories- George Purdy, March 1996 -
Chief Scout of the United Kingdom and Overseas Territories- Peter Duncan, July 2004 -
Chief Scout of the United Kingdom and Overseas Territories- Bear Grylls, 11 July 2009 -
Chief Scout of the United Kingdom and Overseas Territories
Secondly the Scout and Scouter Uniforms were changed, out went the lemon squeezer hats and the shorts, and in came green berets, mushroom trousers, and green shirts for the Scouts, and fawn shirts for the Venture Scouts and Leaders.
Finally the training schemes changed – gone were the first and second stars, in came the Arrows; out went first class and second class, in came the Scout Standard, Advanced Scout Standard and Chief Scout Award; the Queen Scout Award was retained, but no longer was it a Scout section badge, but belonged in the Venture Unit, and no longer was it a case of earning proficiency badges, but included long term service, commitment, and a 50+ mile expedition over four days.
The changes to the training scheme brought about a modernisation of the movement, taking into account the greater variety of activities available to the youth of the sixties in comparison to the youth of the first half of the century, to changes in life style and in schooling. Many of the traditional Scouting tests were being brought into main stream education, and so more different challenges were required.
Another minor change is the age range of the section, with the usual transfer age dropping from eleven to ten-and-a-half.
In the Scout section, the Scout Standard and Advanced Scout Standard didn’t last as long as the arrows, disappearing in 1983, to be replaced by the Scout Award, Pathfinder Award, and Explorer Award. These also introduced more choice for the Scout, and yet again modernised the programme. Only minor changes to the scheme have been made since 1983, most noticeably to put traditional Scouting skills back into the core of the programme.
In the early 1980′s Scout Groups were allowed to take in boys in the 6-8 age range to Beavers although at this point the Beavers were not part of the Scout Association, only their Leaders were allowed in. This changed on April 1st, 1986 when all Beavers became Beaver Scouts overnight. Initially the section had just one badge to earn after the Beaver had been enrolled, but in 1995 a new programme introduced two new badges, imaginatively known as the First Beaver Scout Badge and the Second Beaver Scout Badge, allowing with the Beaver Scout Challenge Badge for the older Beavers.
The Venture section has, on the whole, not changed much since its inception, a few minor changes to names and requirements for the badges name change but that is all, other than the controversial decision in 1976, when young ladies were allowed to join Venture Units. The first time that girls had been allowed into the youth of the Movement since B-P. started up the Guide Movement in 1910.
The B-P Guild on has all but vanished, being replaced by the Scout Fellowship, a branch of IFSG, the International Fellowship of Scouts and Guides.
Two controversial changes were also made. The first in the late 80′s saw the Uniform review, which saw the sad death knells for the Cub cap and Scout beret, which although they have been gone for over five years still seem to crop up as symbols for the movement. It also gave Packs and Troops the option to decide on a uniform nether garment (remembering the image of the movement). The second (very controversial) saw Groups given the option of whether to allow girls in Scouting in all sections.
The only proviso was that if you allowed girls into a Group that was it, there was no turning back, and they had to have the option of staying in Scouting. So, if a Cub Pack went mixed, then the Troop and Unit it fed into had to be mixed, but not necessarily the Beaver Colony that fed it. At the moment approximately 5-10% of Groups in the Country are mixed.
There are six countries where Scouting, to WOSM’s knowledge, does not exist; in some it would not be allowed. These are: Andorra, People’s Republic of China, Cuba, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Lao People’s Democratic Republic and Myanmar.
In all it is believed that the total membership over the last 100+ years of Scouting (and Guiding) is somewhere in the region of half-a-billion, and that its effects have touched many more.
This article originally appeared on the ScoutBase website.
