‘Coherent,’ ‘entertaining’ history of Scouting

“The Scouting Party: Pioneering and Preservation, Progressivism and Preparedness in the Making of the Boy Scouts of America,” by David C. Scott and Brendan Murphy, Red Honor Press, 312 pages, $24.95.

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Few today question the presence of Boy Scouts of America. It always has been there.

Millions of boys have gone through the program on their passage to manhood.

Yet “always” is just 100 years. The organization celebrates its centennial in 2010.

What motivated the creation of an organization devoted to camping, woodcraft and service?

Why was it focused on youth, rather than adults?

“The Scouting Party,” by David C. Scott and Brendan Murphy, reveal the answers.

A history of the origins of the Boy Scouts of America, it examines the currents that flowed together that gave birth to a movement in both the United States and worldwide.

The book’s subtitle — “Pioneering and Preservation, Progressivism and Preparedness in the Making of the Boy Scouts of America” — highlights the major elements that converged in Scouting’s creation, and the reason it started during the opening of the 20th century.

Urbanization created fear that America’s frontier heritage would be forgotten and its outdoors traditions discarded.

Simultaneously, progressivism — a political movement positing that humans were perfectible through technology and the application of the vigorous life — emerged. It sought to propagate its tenets through mass education.

Finally, preparedness — the belief that nations had to be ready to instantly take up arms to protect the state — led individuals to seek ways to quickly expand the military.

A youth program focused on self-reliance and outdoor physical activity satisfied one goal of each constituency. As might be expected, different organizations emerged, led by different adult leaders with individual aims.

Scott and Murphy present the three most influential. The Sons of Daniel Boone, organized by Daniel Beard, focused on the pioneer past.

The Woodcraft Indians, created by Ernest Thomas Seton stressed nature and living in harmony with it.

The Boy Scouts — an English enterprise formed by Robert Baden-Powell — emphasized service and preparedness.

“The Scouting Party” shows how these organizations grew, how they borrowed from each other, the rivalries that emerged between them — and other competing boy’s organizations — and how they finally merged together.

The tale is neither as straightforward nor as placid as is commonly imagined today.

Seton, Beard and Baden-Powell all were strong-willed and idiosyncratic individuals with different goals. Other strong personalities — including Teddy Roosevelt and William Boyce — added complexity.

“The Scouting Party” admirably succeeds in untangling myth and history to produce a coherent and entertaining history of scouting’s origins.

History buffs and Boy Scout fans will find this book attractive.

Mark Lardas, an engineer, freelance writer, amateur historian and model-maker, lives in League City — and is the father of an Eagle Scout.