Increase Tourism by Marketing Area Scouting Hertitage

[RememberSchiff]

Burnside, KY Mayor Robert Lawson and other city leaders were on hand at the Thursday board meeting for the Somerset-Pulaski Economic Development Authority (SPEDA) to present their plans for creating a Boy Scout heritage museum and Merit Badge Training Academy on what used to be Burnside's old high school property.  No mention of the Blue Grass Council involvement?

“This is going to happen. I don’t know how long it’s going to take,” Lawson told SPEDA members as he and Deco Architects President Derek Phillips showed off plans to create a multi-building complex that would, hopefully, become a regional Boy Scout training hub.

...

The plan is to offer an area with a circular outdoor design, offering a possible amphitheater, a building to house a Boy Scouts museum and a Burnside historical museum, two buildings that would serve as classrooms offering educational instruction for scouts to earn merit badges, and a parking area that would be shared with the Masonic Lodge.

Phillips said he felt that with the resources offered by Burnside, the lake and area attractions, along with short field trips to places like McCreary County and Cumberland Falls, a Boy Scout training center could offer classes on almost all of the approximate 135 badges that scouts have the potential to earn.

...

Phillips said that the city’s connection of having the first Boy Scout troop in America made it instantly marketable today.

“There’s one disclaimer, and that is that we failed to claim this history,” Phillips said. “So now, 100-some-odd years have passed. The Boy Scouts have written their history in a different way, although we have proof. So we have to be a little careful with our wording, but regardless, it’s indisputable that Burnside is the Birthplace of Scouting.” 

Burnside,KY is about 300 miles west of Summit Bechtel National Scout Reservation. ~RS

https://www.somerset-kentucky.com/news/local_news/burnside-plans-boy-scout-training-academy-to-jump-start-tourism/article_007f90a5-31bd-5336-8ee2-ca44e369c2d0.html

Burnside is one of several places that lay claim to be home to the first Boy Scout troop in the United States. In 1908, two years before the Boy Scouts of America was officially organized, Mrs. Myra Greeno Bass organized a local troop of 15 boys, using official Boy Scout materials she had acquired from England. A sign at the edge of town declares Burnside "Birthplace of Boy Scouts in America", and an official state historical society marker commemorates the troop.^[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burnside,_Kentucky

 

I can understand with some oversight, a museum offering scouting programs to increase revenue, but a town? And shouldn't the local council be the driving force or at least involved? I must be missing some information?

As far as I know, I have only visited one disputed birthplace and that was Riverside, Iowa which was tourism marketed as the future birthplace of Captain James T. Kirk. The museum was in a local's garage.  Not a money-maker. 

[Owls_are_cool]

Wouldn't the attraction be merit badges? Scouts, families, and troops would come to town to get merit badges done and that is what would bring revenue to the town?

[David CO]

30 minutes ago, Owls_are_cool said:

Wouldn't the attraction be merit badges? Scouts, families, and troops would come to town to get merit badges done and that is what would bring revenue to the town?

Just what we need.  Another merit badge factory.  

[Sentinel947]

I actually drove through Burnside on my way to Cumberland Gap National Park a few week ago. Myself and a few buddies, all former Scouts, had never heard of Burnside's Scouting's connection and..... we didn't even consider stopping. Only thing we saw was a sign. That being said, that area is a hotbed of Southern KY tourism.. The Red River Gorge/Daniel Boone National Forest is nearby, as is the Big South Fork, and Lake Cumberland. 


 

[awanatech]

With all of the advertising right now by lawyers seeking plaintiffs against BSA, this might not be the best time to use Scouting Heritage in marketing for the area's tourism industry.  It may bring unwanted attention in today's society. I truly hope it does not, but you never know with the way things go these days. 

[Sentinel947]

On 9/5/2020 at 5:36 PM, Sentinel947 said:

I actually drove through Burnside on my way to Cumberland Gap National Park a few week ago. Myself and a few buddies, all former Scouts, had never heard of Burnside's Scouting's connection and..... we didn't even consider stopping. Only thing we saw was a sign. That being said, that area is a hotbed of Southern KY tourism.. The Red River Gorge/Daniel Boone National Forest is nearby, as is the Big South Fork, and Lake Cumberland. 


 

Can't make an edit, this isn't close to Cumberland Gap, was actually going to Big South Fork National Park..

[David CO]

On 9/5/2020 at 10:43 AM, RememberSchiff said:

“There’s one disclaimer, and that is that we failed to claim this history,” Phillips said. “So now, 100-some-odd years have passed. The Boy Scouts have written their history in a different way, although we have proof. So we have to be a little careful with our wording, but regardless, it’s indisputable that Burnside is the Birthplace of Scouting.” 

Even if the original town of Burnside, KY was the birthplace of scouting, it is now somewhere beneath Lake Cumberland.  The town was relocated when a dam was built in the 1950's to create the reservoir.  

[RememberSchiff]

On 9/5/2020 at 11:43 AM, RememberSchiff said:

Burnside, KY Mayor Robert Lawson and other city leaders were on hand at the Thursday board meeting for the Somerset-Pulaski Economic Development Authority (SPEDA) to present their plans for creating a Boy Scout heritage museum and Merit Badge Training Academy on what used to be Burnside's old high school property.  No mention of the Blue Grass Council involvement?

“This is going to happen. I don’t know how long it’s going to take,” Lawson told SPEDA members as he and Deco Architects President Derek Phillips showed off plans to create a multi-building complex that would, hopefully, become a regional Boy Scout training hub.

...

The plan is to offer an area with a circular outdoor design, offering a possible amphitheater, a building to house a Boy Scouts museum and a Burnside historical museum, two buildings that would serve as classrooms offering educational instruction for scouts to earn merit badges, and a parking area that would be shared with the Masonic Lodge.

Phillips said he felt that with the resources offered by Burnside, the lake and area attractions, along with short field trips to places like McCreary County and Cumberland Falls, a Boy Scout training center could offer classes on almost all of the approximate 135 badges that scouts have the potential to earn.

...

Phillips said that the city’s connection of having the first Boy Scout troop in America made it instantly marketable today.

“There’s one disclaimer, and that is that we failed to claim this history,” Phillips said. “So now, 100-some-odd years have passed. The Boy Scouts have written their history in a different way, although we have proof. So we have to be a little careful with our wording, but regardless, it’s indisputable that Burnside is the Birthplace of Scouting.” 

Burnside,KY is about 300 miles west of Summit Bechtel National Scout Reservation. ~RS

https://www.somerset-kentucky.com/news/local_news/burnside-plans-boy-scout-training-academy-to-jump-start-tourism/article_007f90a5-31bd-5336-8ee2-ca44e369c2d0.html

Burnside is one of several places that lay claim to be home to the first Boy Scout troop in the United States. In 1908, two years before the Boy Scouts of America was officially organized, Mrs. Myra Greeno Bass organized a local troop of 15 boys, using official Boy Scout materials she had acquired from England. A sign at the edge of town declares Burnside "Birthplace of Boy Scouts in America", and an official state historical society marker commemorates the troop.^[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burnside,_Kentucky

 

I can understand with some oversight, a museum offering scouting programs to increase revenue, but a town? And shouldn't the local council be the driving force or at least involved? I must be missing some information?

As far as I know, I have only visited one disputed birthplace and that was Riverside, Iowa which was tourism marketed as the future birthplace of Captain James T. Kirk. The museum was in a local's garage.  Not a money-maker. 

Update 11/28/2024:

"As the story goes, a local woman, Myra Greeno Bass, learned of scouting during a trip to England, where cavalry officer Robert (later Lord) Baden-Powell had founded the organization, and was so taken with the concept that she started a troop when she got home.

That was in the spring of 1908, almost two years before the Boy Scouts of America was incorporated in February 1910.

The rules at the time barred Bass from being scout master, so her husband, Billy, took the title, but “left most of the actual planning to his capable wife,” according to an account in a book on the 100th anniversary of the city being incorporated in 1890.  (Note: this is also the first known instance of a BSA scoutmaster delegating  to another volunteer! )

...There hasn’t been a troop based in Burnside for years.

Now local leaders are working to change that.

“If you’re going to claim to be the first Boy Scout troop in America, you better have a Scout troop,” said Mayor Robert Lawson, who was himself a Scout.

City leaders have discussed starting a troop with representatives of the Blue Grass Council of the Boy Scouts, which is headquartered in Lexington and covers 55 counties in Central, Southern and Eastern Kentucky..."

More at source (including video):

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/kentucky-town-seen-as-the-birthplace-of-boy-scouts-in-the-us-tries-to-bring-back-troop/ar-AA1uUwpG