Hey Scouters!!  Happy Halloween!!   In looking for a topic to write 50,000 words on during the next month, I found this.  True as it is, it’s a reminder on several levels.  One, we USED to do things like this to Scouts and Scouters. At that time, it was deemed harmless and was encouraged.  Today, it […]

 
  (Revised to correct run-on words) In my first book “Patches and Pins”, I talk about the day that my boss realized that there was more to life than just “working in the Army”.  Here’s that story told again with more detail, now that I am retired and the “statute of limitations” has expired on […]

 
  Hi Brendan Fulmer!! You posted and asked yourself (and all of us): “Had somebody tell me that BSA is a rich white kid club. Help me know how to respond, please” Okay. This is a Black man giving you advice on how to respond when people say stuff like that. Ready? (silence) Just walk […]

 
  Hey George!! You wrote some great questions which I’m happy to answer for you and hopefully other Venturing adults… You wrote and asked me:“I’m writing to ask for advice on a uniforming matter.  I’m considering purchasing a red jac-shirt in the near future.  I intend to wear it with my Venturing uniform.  However, I […]

 
  Hi!! Thanks for forwarding me the article.  Just so you are aware, this is a rather old story now, as the local Council involved along with the BSA’s Disability Awareness Task Force has responded to the parents and the Scout involved — and everyone is happy.  I am posting this as a matter of […]

 
                                                    (NBC News image used under Fair Usage guidelines) “Learned Helplessness”   I was taught a new term for what I see around my community here in Dayton and back home in South Lake Minnetonka. Some of you see it in your own town or city. I bet you didn’t have a name for it. It is […]

 
    That is what the guy behind me in the buffet line asked me.  He had just asked me — actually he was asking the air but my ears happen to catch his question — after a local reporter’s comment on the radio beamed into the general buffet area. The comment was made after the reporter […]

 
    The Lantern Song   (taken from a chapter in “Patches and Pins…” by Mike Walton  (c) 1988 Settummanque)   I loved living in Germany for three reasons.  The Sprudle. It was a drink similar to our 7-Up or Sprite, but made with natural water instead of carbonated water.  It was bottled in beer bottles, […]

 
  Over this past weekend, I started to post what a great thing the start of football season is. I remember going to my first high school, college and professional football games as a child — all within Scouting “circles”.  It was a great experience, watching the players run into each other or running the ball from […]

 
  A frequent comment which finds its way into part of the daily email I receive from parents and Scout leaders (“Scouters”) goes something like this: “Isn’t scouting one of the last or THE last traditional boys program left where boys can be taught how to be men.” No.  The BSA was never designed to […]