NWScouter

I worked at Boeing in the late 90's and I saw a acronym book that was at least 2 inches tick and bound. If you worked in say the 777 program you could have an acronym that was the same letters in the 747 program but stand for something else. If you knew enough history of the manufacturing processes you could figure out where the leaders of the new program had worked before by the acronyms they had their new program using.

Right up there with petitions that have been circulated on college campuses to ban or repeal women's suffrage.

The ice cream sundae is a great idea. No need to cut a pipe in two. Clean up a rain gutter from the regatta.

I was the Good Turn for America person on the district committee. GTFA is not an advancement but a way to recorded all the service hours that BSA members give. So if it conservation service require in an CS requirement, achievement, for world conservation award, requirement for Star, Life, Eagle, cleaning up the park at Day Camp, singing carols, or anything done by a members or leader whether for advancement, patch or just for the heck of it counts and should be recorded for Good Turn for America.

So these scouts are wearing Cub numbering on their Boy Scout Shirts? My Cub shirt in 1960 had the red and white numbers, and we have the red & white strips. Seattle and Wash. Then when I moved just north of the city when I was a Boy Scout, the top strip became Innis Arden.

The yellow den leader shirt, depending on which batch of fabric used, was almost to by gosh entirely see through. My ex-wife always wore a white turtle neck shirt with it. The slide show was nice that Time has but its caption writers have the National and World Jamborees mixed up. Those shots are from a National Jamboree. All are wearing a national Jambo patches and all are BSA. When did we have blue troop numbers? In the 50's era scouts they have blue unit numbers?(This message has been edited by Nwscouter)

I took a course at a place I was working on customer relations skills. It was call FISH and put on by the people from the Fish Market at Pike Place Market in Seattle who throw the fish around. Their take on questions was while you have answered the question a thousand times before it is the questioners first time. And they deserved a good answer. Check some threads topics on this site, OA sash wear, Too young to be an Eagle, uniform -- all have been asked but someone needed an answer now.

Ed, your right those words do not appear in the constitution. The words in the first clause of the first amendment are "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;" The rules of the Supreme Courts, federal and state, have said the clause creates separation of church and state. The courts have said to enforce that clause that the state (both federal, and individual since the 14th amendment)cannot give support to any religious group or give them any preference over other groups. Courts have over the last 220 years have ruled and are ruling on the exact boundaries of that separation but have not disagreed that the clause does mean separation of church and state. Also, Ed this is the question that I ask people who are so sure that Government should support religion. "Is your Faith, your Religion so weak that it needs government support to compete in marketplace of ideas?" I believe mine does not.(This message has been edited by Nwscouter)

FD other than city departments out in Washington State are refered as junior taxing districts along with water districts, school districts, diking districts, library districts and park districts. That means they do tax for operating expenses and repayment of bond for capital projects. They can be volunteer, volunteer and paid or fully paid firefighters depending on the population and/or the tax base. If your FD is staffed by volunteers and gets it funding through taxes under state law and the voters vote for the bonds to build stuff and elect fire commissioners I think you are a government entity.(This message has been edited by Nwscouter)

If as has been stated before by BSA officials and their agents state that the BSA is a religious organization (establishment) then in Washington State no state support can be had. The prohibition has been in our constitution since the state was admitted in 1889. Here is the wording: "No public money or property shall be appropriated for or applied to any religious worship, exercise or instruction, or the support of any religious establishment:..." Even the chartering of unit with out any contribution of final support would be against the constitution, because the goodwill of the agency is considered property (am I right NJCubScouter?). Our state constitution even has a clause that forbids Lawmakers to accept passes from the evil railroads (remember it was 1889).

In the western states, which do have a strong LDS membership. You will find a great deal of pressure to not hold events that included Sunday. Be it WB, camporee, or summer camp. They as practice charter 4 units in a ward. With packs, troops, teams and crews of only five boys and sometimes get waivers to have smaller units than the minimum size. Again they do not have girls in the crews and they have no crew members older than 18. The men are assign by the ward's bishop to scouting positions and many times you are lucky that they are last 2 or 3 years before they are resigned to another position in the church.

Urban Scouting was an attempt to make Scouting relevant as all Scouting numbers were dropping. First the baby boom generation was aging out of Scouting and the number of available youth were in a free fall. Not to pick up until the Baby Boom bounce generation in the '80 scouts. Scouts came out of the '60s as very unhip and thought of as very 'establishment' not appealing to the many of the parents of the early '70s. The relevant to the kids theme, resulted in a urban look to include potential members where scouting numbers were dropping faster, the cities. The middle class scouting type families were moving to suburbs. The school district where i grew up just outside Seattle closed many of its elementary and jr. high schools plus one of its three high school. Our parents were still living there but not the 3- 5 kids. The kids wee priced out of the neighborhoods and if new families were moving in they had 1-3 kids. So they looked to the urban environment to rebuild numbers. So they took on Urban Scouting, which seemed to not have the outing as important. Units and leaders who remembered the earlier days of scouting kept the outing and maintained or grew. The bounce back in numbers came as people like me become parents and their kids came of scouting age in conjugation with an increased emphasis of outing. Another interesting addition to scouting numbers was the boom in membership of the Mormons. In the eighties into the nineties they had great growth in members. As scouting was their official program for their young men. Membership numbers grew as every boy had to be in scouting. The increase in units boomed as new wards were being created. Each new ward (many wards can be in one building) had to have Cub Pack, Scout Troop, Varsity Team and Explorer Post (now a Venture Crew). New ward = 4 new units. many of them just had the minimum number and got waivers if they didn't.(This message has been edited by Nwscouter)

Not a comment about the case but the comment about Coho tasting fatty. it must because they're in fresh water. Out here they're in salt water and they're fine eating fish. Even the landlocked lake coho in Flathead Lake, Mt. and up in BC's lakes are prized and fine eating. I come from commercial salmon salmon fishing family both in Alaska and the Salish Sea (Puget Sound and BC waters, Salish Sea the new designation approved by US and BC naming authorities.)

Few years ago I heard of merit badge wekend at the Naval Academy. Do they still do it? We're a long ways away from there.

The flag store in Seattle I went to closed they carried a small display of historical American flags, but I found another on the web in Ohio that does: http://www.flagladyohio.com/store/historical-flags-miniature-historical-flags-c-16_25.html?zenid=5920539a3f77b7d8eeada8780d976210. I thought the Scout Shops carried it but it is not in the online catalogue. I sure there are other web resources. A great flag history site is: http://www.usflag.org/index.html. The only thing it hasnt been updated in the last two years at least in the great section about the evolution of the US flag from 13 to 50 stars. It tells how each flag got its new stars, long it flew and what presidents served under it. It mentions the 48 star flag was longest flying one with 47 years, but the 50 star flag passed it up July 4, 2007.(This message has been edited by nwscouter)