The USA sorely misses the character-building impact of the Boy Scouts

The disappearance of the majority of Boy Scouts troops across the USA‘s landscape during the past 30 years, does much to explain the moral depravity that typifies of many of nation’s leaders (and followers) today.

This shrinkage of membership also closely paralleled the steady emasculation of the middle class’s economic well-being and political influence. I had never thought about that aspect until I had a conversation recently with another Eagle Scout, who grew up on Georgia Mountain farm then returned home a few years ago, after retirement from the Federal government. His memories are described in the last section of the article.

The pervasive motto of the Boy Scouts . . . For God and Country . . . was actually a cover-all for a broad educational program for young men to develop their mind, bodies and souls. Often sounding more the Chivalric education of young knights, a Boy Scout was expected to be physically strong and mentally keen, but always compassionate to those in need . . . putting the welfare of the community above that of himself.

IMAGE at top of page – The photo above was made in the gap between Tray Mountain and Chimney Mountain . . . Ironically about seven miles from where I currently live. At the time, very few people lived in this part of Georgia. Few tourists came after the leaf season, because heavy snows were much more common in the winter, making the highways impassible. The Georgia Highway Department then had very few snow plows and salt spreading trucks. We were on the fourth day of a six-week hike on the Appalachian Trail.

Former Boy Scouts are usually quintessential patriots, dedicated to preserving the democratic traditions of the American Way of Life and solving problems with a team approach. They often end up as community or national leaders.

Growing up on a dairy farm outside of Charlotte, North Carolina, during the Great Depression, the Rev. Billy Graham participated in Scouting and advanced close to achieving the rank of Eagle Scout. The beloved journalist, Walter Cronkite, was an Eagle Scout. President Gerald Ford, plus Admiral Elmo Zumwalt, General Collin Powell. Astronauts John Glenn and Neil Armstrong were Eagle Scouts. President Jimmy Carter was not only a member of the Boy Scouts but also a long‑time Scout leader, earning national recognition for his service to youth. Roselyn Carter served as a Cub Scout Den Mother.

by Richard L. Thornton, Architect and City Planner

The stark decline in Scouting membership

The population of the United States increased from 209,837,582 to 342,864,408 at the moment in 2026 (US Census). In contrast, membership in the Boy Scouts of America has dropped catastrophically, despite the broadening of membership to include girls and young women, plus college-age members of both genders.

Membership in the Boy Scouts of America hit its highest point in 1972 with about 4,891,926 youth members, representing 7% of the U.S. population under 18. The 1970s marked the end of the “Scout movement” boom, with Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, Sea Scouts, and Venturing all at high enrollment.

During the Reagan Administration, membership began a decline, influenced by steadily diminishing (real) incomes among most middle class families, the rise in the divorce rate, more extracurricular options, and hostility by right-wing extremists toward the Boy Scouts’ emphasis on helping the unfortunate. Over the past five decades, BSA youth membership has fallen from a peak of nearly 5 million in the early 1970s to just over 1 million today, a decline of roughly 80–85%. Given the rapid growth of the nation’s population, this decline is even more startling.

Life is stranger than fiction

The most life-changing and memorable experience of my childhood and youth were those six weeks that we spent in the Southern Appalachians. I had to carry in my back-pack my tent, sleeping bag, mini-propane stove, lantern, cooking equipment, changes of clothing and rain poncho, plus all the food that I would eat for several days. That was quite a load for an 11-year-old kid. Parents would meet up with us at major highway crossing every few days to resupply us with food. However, I had to cook my breakfasts and suppers – lunches were sandwiches – clean my pots and pains and wash my clothes in streams. Of course, there wee those mundane chores like watching the ground for timber rattlers and not slipping on wet rocks when hiking next to steep cliffs. LOL

I earned enough additional merit badges on the hiking trip to be eligible for the Eagle Scout award other than the mandatory waiting time between the Life Scout and Eagle Scout award. In late fall, I became one of the youngest Eagle Scouts ever.

I never received my God and Country Award because during this period, we moved from Gainesville, GA to Metro Atlanta. Unfortunately, the assistant minister, who was my G & C counselor, for unknown reasons embraced an electric transformer to commit suicide. My G & C records were lost afterward.

There is one bad memory from Scouting. I was supposed to be inducted into the Order of the Arrow at Troop 26 in Gainesville, GA, but we moved to Metro Atlanta before then.

There was a snobby clique of Woodward Academy (private school) students at my new Troop 249 in College Park, GA, who always bloocked me from being in the Order of the Arrow, even though I was the only Native American in the troop. The joke is on them. I went on to be the architect of the Trail of Tears Memorial in Tulsa, OK. LOL As soon as possible, my parents moved to a friendler church in Red Oak, GA and I helped them start a new troop, of which I was Senior Patrol Leader.

There is no doubt that my wonderful experiences in Scouting made possible the success of my fellowship in Mexico. I never would have had the confidence to go long distances on foot in the mountains and jungles of Mexico and Guatemala without the long-distance hiking-camping adventures in Boy Scouting.

I think back about some of the extremely dangerous solo explorations down there and realize that I was a young fool. However, at the time, it did not dawn on me that it was risking all manner of bad things happening to me in foreign countries, when several guerilla insurrections were underway.

In addition to the hard work (and play) the Boy Scouts have always stressed career development of young men through requiring a series of “cultural” merit badges that introduced them to potential careers and avoacations. My Boy Scout interests literally became my life-time interests. My Architecture, History and Art merit badge counselor was a neighbor, Ed Dodd. He was a Georgia Tech Architect, who fell in love with the mountains then created the tamous “Mark Trail” cartoon series . . . which produced a whole lot more income that architecure. Sylvan Myer, the Pulitzer-Prize winning editor of Gainesville Daily Times, was my Journalism and Writing merit badge Counselor. Dr. Arthur Kelly was my Archeology Merit Badge Counselor – but I only had direct contact with one of his students. Mr. Gartner?, a neighbor, supervisor of the Chattahoochee National Forest, was my Forestry, Canoeing and Camping merit badge couselor.

The ultimate BE PREPARED challenge

My campsite near Brasstown Bald – exactly 50 years later. During the winter, there were fabric walls on the cooking shed, which blocked the wind..

In November 2009, a company, which didn’t own my house mortgage and was barred from doing business in Georgia because of ties to the Dixie Mafia, foreclosed on my house illegally. Then on December 21, 2009 I was illegally give a an eviction notice to be out by Christmas Eve. This was all made possible by the organized crime that ran Pickens County, GA.

That I was able to thrive while living off the grid in the national forests was absolutely the skills taught me by the Boy Scouts. I was able to pack most of my belongins into two storage bins before Christmas. . . the rest I burned . . . then become a homeless forest dweller by Christmas Eve. Let’s make it clear, though. I have absolutely no desire to wake up in a tent again in a tent, when there are icicles hanging from the roof of the tent and my mustache!

The evil ones in Pickens County assumed that I would be unable to move out my belongins in three days and thus all things that represented my life would be dumped on the street. They assumed that I had the same depraved values that they had would soon commit suicide.

When that didn’ t work, they started sending groups of Neo-Nazi’s to attack my camp at night. This occurred wherever I camped, whether it was Tennessee, North Carolina or Georgia. That didn’t turn out well either. Never dreamed that the education that the US Navy gave me at Georgia Tech would safv my life at the end of the first decade of the 21st century.

The regular NROTC program, however, was in the classroom. However, on the weekends, prior to heading to Mesoamerica, a Marine Colonel and a Navy Lt. Comander, who both wore the Congressional Medal of Honor, did take me out to the Navy Recreation Area on Lake Allatoona. They taught me how to survive close encounters with any of the guerilla groups fighing in the jungles and mountains during that era. Those skills were not needed, since the Maya insurgents liked me and even furnished me young English-speaking school teachers to be my temporary companions. The Mayas are smart, telephathic people, who quickly discerned that I was sympathetic to their oppression. It was a Eagle Scout thing.

The Nazi hooligans, who dominate northern Union County, GA, the county where Track Rock Gap is located, were impressed by my ability to survive in the wilderness. The created a highly publicized competion in which members would see who could live alone in a tent in the national forest the longest. None of them came close to my record. When folks start admiring their mortal enemies, maybe they should change sides before it is too late.

I woke up this morning with a startling revelation. The camp site near Brasstown Bald Mountain, pictured above, was where I was based, when I stumbled upon the Track Rock Terrace Complex. Exactly, fifty years earlier, this is where our group from BSA Troop 26 was camped. God works in mysterious ways.

1930s Photo – Boy Scouts from Habersham County, GA maintained the Alec Mountain Stone Oval archaeological site throughout the mid-20th century. It was one of the most popular tourist attractions in Northeast Georgia, until the county government closed access to its parking lot in the early 1970s, to keep Afro-American tourists from visiting the site. The Boy Scouts official map does not show any Boy Scout troops in Habersham County today. There are three Cub Scout Packs. Note that these Boy Scouts in the photo hand-made their beds and tent frame from saplings.A

The sorely missed impact of Scout troops in local communities

Recenty I had a conversation with a retired federal employee. He is also an Eagle Scout. I told him that when I grew up, northeast Georgia was the most progressive area of Georgia. It was known for its friendliness and honesty of its residents, plus many cultural activities. The valleys were filled with vegetables, beautiful craft objects and the soutn of blue grass music. “What happened? “

He laughed, “Actually, you are right. The traditional mountain survival skills, music and arts are gone with the wind. Most of the young men here, who didn’t go to college, go straight from their mother’s cooking to that of whatever girl is willing to move in with them. Except what most of these young women call cooking is putting a frozen meal in the microwave. They never learn how to take care of themselves without a woman. They don’t know how to cook, buy food for themselves or wash their own clothes.. When they see you go into a supermarket alone, they immediately think that you must be a pervert, Meanwhile, they spend their spare time shooting assault rifles and semi-automatic pistols . . . thinking that it makes them real men.”

He grew up on a small farm on Stone Pile Gap Road, northwest of Clarkesville, GA. That is fairly close to the Alec Mountain Stone Oval. His father was a foreman at Habersham Mills. His mother stayed on the farm, cultivated fruits and vegetables, raised pigs, cattle, chickens and sheep., plus four children. In 1972, his parents contracted with the new Fieldale Farms company to build and operate a chicken house. The income was use to put all four kids through college. They were not rich, but thought of themselve as being blessed with plenty of food and his father’s paycheck to cover the costs of what they couldn’t grow. He considered it an idealic childhood.

Jim was a member of the Boy Scout troop and Little League baseball team, sponsored by Habersham Mills, where his father worked. His mother was a member of the Garden Club, sponsored by the mill. For awhile, when he and his brother were Cub Scouts, his mother was a Den Mother.

That was pretty much the pattern for all of Northeast Georgia. The region had prospered after Georgia Power Company built six hydroelectric dams in the region between 1911 and 1927. Numerous textile mills and other types of factories clustered in the mountain towns near Georgia Power or TVA dams. These industries pumped up the county tax bases and gave back to the communities donations, which enhanced the quality of life for their employees.

Then after World War II Jesse Jewell created the vertically-integrated poultry industry. Suddenly, farmers could make far more money raising chickens than any other agriculural activitiy. That began the Golden Era of Northeast Georgia, which lasted until the 1990s. Prosperous communities elected progressive political leaders, who contrasted sharply with the segreagationists in some other parts of Georgia.

Jim said that the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was devastating to NE Georgia. It was first conceived by Ronald Reagan, but finally passed in 1992 when George H. Bush was president. Textile plants were the first to leave, but now most of the non-poultry related industries in the region have left. Leaders of both political parties eventually supported the bill and promised Northeast Georgians that textile plants would be replace by tourism. That was impossible and it didn’t happen.

Even though Reagan conceived the program, President Clinton got the blame for the sudden disappaearce of jobs, tax revenue, Boy Scout troops and Little League teams. the thousands of people, who lost their jobs through no fault of their own, were told that the Educated Libruls in Washington, plus the Gays and Blacks in Atlanta were responsible for their sudden poverty. The region flipped seemingly overnight from being Progressive Democrats to extreme right Republicans. The influx of retirees, such as Jim and I, have stabilized the economy, but retirees rarely start Boy Scout troops and Little League teams.

Jim said that there have been no institutions to replace the Boy Scouts and other non-governmental organizations that focused on the young people. Public schools, to a certain extent, provide activities, after school hours, but are not focused on creating well-rounded young men. Jim added that very few of the young people, who go off to college, return home.

Meanwhile, the marginally educated young people who remain in the region and take marginal blue collar jobs, deeply resent the more affluent, better educated retirees, who live in the more affluent neighborhoods. Jim speculated that much of the harassment that I have received from several law enforcement agencies is rooted in class warfare type emotions.

Jim ended his explanation with a wishful look in his eyes. “You know Richard, we had boys for all sorts of backgrounds in my Scout troop, but we learned to get along, learn from each other and respect each other. It’s just not that way anymore.”

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