Campouts, Scouting, and Other Things

Bear Siding on the Verde River

It was a Friday morning when a bunch of Boy Scouts met in the church parking lot for our first ever overnight campout. Scoutmaster Steve was really only a kid himself, who at the age of 18 had been asked to work with a ragtag patrol of 11 year olds. Our previous scouting experience had been performing lame skits and making mostly useless gadgets in cub scouts. But we were older now and ready for real scouting stuff. When a second “adult” leader failed to show that morning, Steve was not about to leave us disappointed. He stuffed the whole patrol, camp gear included, into his old 1950’s vintage Rambler sedan.

At the beginning of the trip, the stuffy confines didn’t bother us, even though nearly every kid was either sitting on someone’s lap or being sat on. But forty hot and windy miles later we were off the highway and traveling on a washboard dirt road.  We were grateful for the extra room when two boys were relegated outside to the hood of the car. Driving between 15 and 20 miles per hour, Steve did his best to view the road between the two human hood ornaments and avoid large pot holes which might send them flying. The two boys dangled their feet in front of the grill and clutched a headlamp ring with one hand and a metal hood ornament with the other.

Bear Siding was a very remote area on the Verde River which offered a nice camping spot and a splendid swimming hole. We swam a good part of the day. A rock ledge offered a terrific spot to do cannon balls. It was high enough to give us a thrill but not enough to scare us to death. While we swam Steve entertained us with stories of the first time his troop visited this place, including the repulsive behavior of one Don Covey who stood at the end of a makeshift diving board, bared his butt, and pooped into the water. As the story went, boys scrambled from the water as if it were alligator infested and refused to return for hours.

After a long day, our evening meal was unremarkable. When the sun went down, we returned to the river for more swimming – this time not bothering with swimming trunks, but skinny dipping in the dark cool waters of the Verde River under the evening stars and a silvery moon. It was done in perfect innocence. The next morning we faced a whole day of more fun, but decided we had had enough. We packed up our gear early, made the short hike to the car, and were home by noon.

Decades have passed. I’ve served as scoutmaster myself four different times. That overnight trip of yesteryear broke a dozen of today’s Boy Scout regulations which fall under the headings of “Youth Protection”, “Safety Afloat”, and “Tour Permits”. And if any scoutmaster today were to swim naked with his boys, I can only imagine he would end up on a sex offender list declaring him to be the pervert that many would assume him to be.

Last week the Boy Scouts of America settled a lawsuit with six men who were molested by a former Portland Scout leader nearly 30 years ago. That lawsuit and dozens that preceded it have made the Boy Scouts of America a safer place for boys. It has also left an organization so encumbered by rules and regulations that far more time and effort is placed on compliance than the fundamentals of scouting.

Next Spring I’ll once again donate to “Friends of Scouting” because I want to make a difference in young men’s lives. But it will pain me knowing that much of my donation will be used to pay for the crimes of a demented individual and not to enhance the lives of America’s youth. And while the plaintiffs are quick to say, “It’s not about the money,” the lawsuits quite obviously would not have been filed without it.

Scoutmaster Steve cared for his boys. His intent was to teach us to abide by the Scout Law, which declares that a scout is “trustworthy, loyal, helpful, courteous…” and eight other attributes of goodness which today’s society places little importance. I give thanks for Steve and the favorable impact he had on my life. He gave freely of his time to help a handful of snot-nosed boys grow up. He taught principles of goodness. It is a shame that every young man involved in scouting can’t have leaders like him.