[at-l] Boy Scout Hike 1 of 10

[Arthur Gaudet]

This is the first of 10 emails I plan to send to AT-L and Whiteblaze as a
summary of the research I performed on the 1936 Boy Scout Hike. My complete
report runs to 40 pages and contains 201 footnotes. But it doesn't seem fair to
subject friends to that much material, some of which I admit is quite boring to
get through. Much of my work has been with the primary materials I could get my
hands on, but I also relied on Guy & Laura Waterman's work "Forest & Crag" quite
a bit. The work was done over a 15 month period, ending in 2003, and it
consisted of a couple of visits to the Bronx, a week spent in the Main branch of
the New York City Library (a great institution!), another week spent at the AMC
Library in Boston, and additional weeks of work at the main library of Brandeis
University in Waltham, MA. 

I've decided to post the material in a different order than in the report so
there may be occasions when something is unclear because it was already talked
about. I have stripped out the footnotes because it adds to the length of the
emails and in many cases is a long repitition of citations to the Bronx Home
News, or to the Watermans "Forest and Crag".

I'll be happy to elucidate any obscure passages or provide citations to those
who want to know more. As I said in an earlier email it's unlikely that I'll
have time to do more work on this in the near future. I've been tempted to
rewrite sections of this as I go but  I'm going to avoid the temptation. Many of
you know I'm not really a writer but I'm enough of a reader to want to do
better... In fact it's probably taken me 2 hours of writing time for every hour
I spent doing the research. In total the effort is probably in the hundreds of
hours. 
--Arthur aka RockDancer


History of the Boy Scouts in America
The BSA marked the end of their Silver Jubilee year in the spring of 1936 with a
2-night Scout-O-Rama celebration at Madison Square Garden. During the early
years of the Great Depression membership had fallen and 1936 completes the
recovery from that setback of declining membership and income. There are 30,000
troops with over 750,000 scouts in the United States by year's end. By this time
the BSA has had over 6 million scouts as members since its beginning. My
research wasn't able to show if this was the heyday of scouting but 1933 to 1936
was a period of unusual growth at a time when many organizations were in decline
or disappearing. This growth was fostered by the synergy of new public opinion,
renewed public spirit and unusually favorable federal government support.

During these 4 years the BSA organization pulled out all the stops in
publicizing their program at the national level, structuring new (and
aggressive) growth targets for all of the local councils, and marshaling
assistance in governmental offices and from other public resources. American
Legion chapters, along with other service clubs, were asked to sponsor local Boy
Scout troops as part of a patriotic effort to assist the next generation.
Petitions were made for meeting space, financial assistance, and adult mentoring
of the scouts. Institutional opposition from churches dissolved away during this
period, removing an impediment to new membership. And governmental assistance
from many agencies was procured once Franklin D. Roosevelt was sworn into
office. While President, FDR remained involved with the BSA organization as
Honorary President of the National Council, and retained his title as President
of the Boy Scout Foundation for Greater New York. It was in this role, in the
late 1920's, that Roosevelt pulled together the organization that created the 10
Mile River Camp. (Prior to his involvement the scouts used space set aside for
them at Bear Mountain Park.)

Roosevelt opened the Jubilee Scout Year on February 8, 1935 with a radio talk to
NYC scouts and closed the Jubilee Scout Year on February 8, 1936 making a radio
speech on the beneficial activities of 1 million scouts across the US.

Scouts in New York Vicinity
On June 22, 1936 the New York Times ran an article reporting Police Commissioner
Valentine's support for the scouts.  Valentine states that in 1935, 65 boys/day,
under 16 years old, were arrested for petty crimes in NYC, at an estimated cost
of $300 each to handle the juvenile delinquency caseload. He then went on to
indicate that it would cost only $5/year for a boy to be in Scouts, and ended
with an appeal "to Wall Street, to capable men in all occupations, to all good
citizens" to assist in getting these boys out of gangs, and off the streets of
New York, "not alone for the welfare of the community when they are men, but
also and especially for the health and happiness of the individual boys while
they are boys". By years end several appeals raised money for scout memberships,
to reduce debt for the Greater New York councils and to retire the long-term
debt for the purchase of 10 Mile River Camp.

Ten Mile River Camp is located in Narrowsburg, NY (Sullivan County) about 110
miles from the Bronx. In 1936 the facility is in its 8th year of operation and
the camp starts the summer on Monday June 29 (first week after school closing).
The 10,000-acre facility is shared among all the borough scout troops, about
2,000 scouts, and each borough has its own camp. The Bronx council has Camp
Ranachqua, with lots of improvements since the 1935 season. (Evidently the BSA
organization is growing and investing heavily). Each camp is operated
independently by borough leaders, with their own staff of camp directors and
assistants. Among these directors is Harry T. O'Grady.

Scouting during this period in NYC seems essentially a keep busy or make-work
system for boys, a way for boys to have a focus outside their families, outside
school, and an option from the street gangs of the time. Many troops have
activities for the boys each and every week, in addition to the weekly troop
meetings. This explains what I found to be an unusual number of public events
where scouts are participating. Some events are targeted at raising money for
troops: minstrel shows, dance fund-raisers, a 26th annual circus, several
intra-troop contests, boat rides, and Boy Scout Day in the Bronx. And other
events are volunteer work for the local community: honor guard for politicians,
planting trees, bringing donations to retired folks & shut-ins, Orange Day,
feeding birds, 300th anniversary of the Dutch Colony and just standing on stage
for many public occasions.

These events created a positive public profile for the organization and no doubt
generated community support for the 1,000+ troops in the New York area. In
addition a vast publicity campaign in New York City raised funds, raised
awareness and systematically reduced opposition to the idea of BSA membership in
the citywide area.
Scouts & the Bronx Council
1936 was a busy year in the Bronx, with troops first participating in the
celebrations for the close of the Scout Jubilee and then conducting fund-raisers
and activities to celebrate the 20th Anniversary of the Bronx Council. The
celebrations begin with Boy Scout Day in the Bronx in June, and finishes with a
large November celebration. Fund-raisers are held throughout the summer and fall
for this event.

I was delighted to discover that the scouts have their own 15-minute weekly
radio slot to advertise their organization and activities to New York City. The
Bronx Council begins broadcasts in April 1936 on WBNX. The Council headquarters
were at 260 E. 161st Street and Grand Concourse, earlier they were located at
159th Street and Grand Concourse in the Bronx.

It seems that 1936 was a period of outreach to the Jewish community in the Bronx
and that Harry O'Grady, a Roman Catholic, was spear-heading the effort to have
more Jewish troops. Of 9 new troops inducted into the Bronx Council that year, 5
are Jewish troops meeting in synagogues with Harry O'Grady presiding at the
induction ceremonies. My research may be misleading me here since reading the
daily Home News for nearly all of 1936 gave me information about only 24 scout
troops of the 143 in the Bronx! I lucked out in finding 2 announcements
concerning Troop 257, Max Gordon's troop. I haven't found any additional info
regarding the establishment of this troop but I did find that the earliest known
Jewish troops in the US were in South Orange, NJ and Baltimore, MD.

The Bronx Council, if organized along the lines of other Boy Scout councils, had
a central office with paid & volunteer staff that administered policy downwards
to the districts, and through the districts to the troops. At this time the
Bronx Council contained 143 troops divided into 15 districts. It's likely that
an intra-district newsletter was issued regularly in order to efficiently
communicate policy and to announce news to all the troops in the council. These
communications are held within the council and are not circulated to the
national council level. I haven't found the name of this internal newsletter for
the Bronx council. Other monthly publications relating to scouting at the
national level are Boys Life and Scouting. I've examined these magazines for the
period 1936 to 1939 and found no references to the BSH or to the people in our
story: Harry (Pop) O'Grady, Mr. Grabow, Max Gordon, Seymour Dorfman and Louis
Zisk.

The BSA Annual Reports contain hundreds of pages and include summaries of
membership, finances, noteworthy achievements by scouts & scouters and also
lists of Local Council Representatives and Members-at-Large for each District in
the nation. There were no references to the BSH and no listings for Harry
O'Grady in the years 1936 to 1940 indicating he did not achieve those titles.
This lack of evidence is consistent with Max's statement that O'Grady left the
scouts, moved to California to work with a Catholic youth organization.

Should an O'Grady trip proposal exist in BSA archives in the Bronx? O'Grady
wasn't a scoutmaster at this time, but instead a paid BSA official, his title
was Field Executive. He was expected to stay around and earn his keep, and he
did - as indicated by the New York Times article stating he's at 10 Mile River
Camp during the Summer of 1936. The scoutmaster on the hike would be the point
person to generate a detailed plan, but Max Gordon doesn't mention one in his
story. It's possible the anonymous WWI vets, without Mr. Grabow, did this trip
all on their own and were the ones responsible for the boys. In this case it's
still possible that the Bronx council required a trip proposal in order to
satisfy the parents of the scouts involved. It's also possible a trip proposal
was generated for consideration of the Veteran's Post in their discussions about
how to support the trip.
Jewish Scouting & Max Gordon's Awards
The Ner Tamid News Bulletin has been in publication since the late 1920's by the
National Jewish Committee on Scouting. I've found only a few examples of this
quarterly publication but examining an archive of this material might be very
pertinent to this research. It regularly details, for the Jewish scouting
community, the achievements of Jewish scouts and troops. Recipients of the Aleph
Award (cub scouts), Ner Tamid Award (boy scouts) and Shofar Award (adult
scouter) are named. Mr. Gordon was the first recipient of the Shofar Award
according to the ATN article, in May 1960. The Ner Tamid could confirm this.

Other awards mentioned by Mr. Gordon include the Silver Beaver and Wood Badge,
both significant scouter awards. He was an early recipient of each of these:
	
The Silver Beaver Award is presented for outstanding longtime service to youth
by a registered Scouter residing within a Council. The average tenure for Silver
Beaver candidates is ten years or longer. Career members of the BSA receive this
award by agreement of the Council Scout Executive and the Director of Operations
at the National office. Mr. Gordon received his award on June 5, 1961.

Wood Badge is considered by scouters as a peak experience in their Scouting
careers. It's an award for woodsmanship & advanced leadership for scouters who
support troop operations. The Bronx council first offered this award to council
scouters starting in 1958. Mr. Gordon received his on January 18, 1958 
according to the ATN article, so he's possibly the very first of the Bronx
scouters to receive Wood Badge.
(end of part 1)

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