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The account that follows was drawn largely from my interview with him in 1977, with additions as noted from other sources: A chum of mine from New York City organized a Scout troop, and I was interested in the letters that he wrote me, so when it came to Christmas vacation, I spent most of my Christmas vacation working with that troop, passing tests and taking them on hikes and so forth. "I wouldn't remember," he replied. ", Col. Edson's chronology is at odds with the official version of the history of the Order of the Arrow, which has Dr. Goodman receiving his Vigil at the end of the summer of 1915, and Col. Edson receiving his in the fall of 1916. Getting your sash signed by the founders was an OA ritual back then. At a Wiatava Lodge banquet in 1978, he told the best story I've ever heard about Dr. Goodman's playful side: It seems he was at a dinner party at some fine home, and when the meal was over, the men headed to the living room, while the hostess went to the kitchen to start cleaning up. in the language of the Lenape. That was perhaps the richest spiritual experience I ever had. So the camp operated that summer on pretty much the same basis that it does now. So there was a good deal of emphasis on secrecy. Dr. Goodman said as he shook his hand. ", So we went up there; and Urner was there, and I was there, and Arthur Schuck, who subsequently became Chief Scout Executive, was there, and the Scout Executive of Baltimore [W.P. As far as I know, it was created. And there used to be much greater emphasis on secrecy than there is now. Over the years, Col. Edson had developed a very distinct style in how he told about the founding of the Order of the Arrow. I think it was in 1922 there was a national Scout Executives' conference, and prior to that the National Office had appointed a number of commissions - one on camping, one on training and leadership, and so forth - and they were to make intense studies of their particular topics and write up detailed reports and have them printed and distributed before the national conference was held. Both move the candidates around the ritual site during the ceremony, for example. google_ad_height = 15;
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Yes, that's right.
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He signed them, and found four more young men waiting. <>>>
Well, the boy went down and picked out the name that we were going to use for Urner and he took it to the telegraph office and the man thought that it was a German code message and he refused to take it! 0000001718 00000 n
And always there'd be one or two that said, Well that sounds interesting to me.'.
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(Blazes on the Trail, 1928)]. Allowat Sakima is a fictional character in the Boy Scouts of America Order of the Arrow ritual induction ceremony. I borrowed a tape recorder and we sat down for an interview, much of which is quoted below. When the appointed time came, I got an added bonus - Dr. Goodman had invited Col. Edson to come along as well. 0
I'm sure that's when I became aware that Dr. Goodman and Col. Edson were both still alive. //-->. I went back to Urner and I said, "I think that gives us the clue to what we've been looking for." endobj
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Of course there are some changes that I regret. Like Dr. Goodman, he was on the staff of the Philadelphia Area Council in 1915, and assigned to Treasure Island. And just before we got to the amphitheatre where we were going to have our ceremony there was a big tree that had fallen across the trail, and they had to get down very low - practically on their hands and knees - in order to be able to get under that. Almost all used an Indian motif, or some other historic theme. [In my 1979 interview, Col. Edson had more to say about a two-week camp: "I think it is very much better. . And Mr. West said, "Well, I wanted to call this meeting to find out whether the people in this Order knew what Scouting was really all about," he said, "But I can't ask that of this group. I was also able to attend the 1979 National Order of the Arrow Conference inFort Collins, Colorado, when my good friend, Larry Brown, was serving as National Vice Chief. ?" Mike Stevens was a little blonde haired kid, maybe 14 then, but looking younger.
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compiled into a single PDF document, which can be downloaded Then somebody else got up and moved an amendment to soften the tone of his motion, and we debated that for a while. google_ad_width = 728;
Col. Edson began his Scouting career in New York City in 1910, and was active in the program for more than 70 years. I still have his handwritten response, telling a little bit about the start of the Order: "I had done some camping in a boy's brotherhood in my church and I knew it took more than knowledge of how to pitch a tent and cook a meal in the open. They were bright and energetic. Bradley], who was an outstanding man, was there. I've heard of that place.". <>/Font<>/ProcSet[/PDF/Text/ImageB/ImageC/ImageI] >>/MediaBox[ 0 0 612 792] /Contents 4 0 R/Group<>/Tabs/S/StructParents 0>>
He was bright, inquisitive, enthusiastic, sincere - and at times a little mischievous. I don't remember all the details of [the ceremony], but I know that one of the things they did was that they were told to put their arms around a tree. So when each troop came to camp we said, "Now, at the close of your camp period here we'd like to have the boys hold a secret election as to what boy has done the most for the success of the troop's encampment in terms of his leadership, spirit, and service." "I believe it was," Dr. Goodman said, sounding not at all sure. "Delaware Verbal Morphology." I had no better luck in 1979 when I asked them both what Dr. Goodman's Vigil name was.
So they did that, and I was appointed as director of this Sea Scout program. As he'd walked around the living room, Dr. Goodman had hidden all the china, and no one had noticed. They were just grabbing young kids out of the hall, but it happened that one of them was from my home troop back in Orange. "It's much better," Dr. Goodman agreed.]. Most had elected members, rather than membership requirements, and most had secret rituals and initiations. So it spread slowly that way.
. By the 1920s, it would have been hard for any local Scout Executive not to have heard of the Order of the Arrow, perhaps even from Dr. Goodman or Col. Edson themselves. What's new on our site today! Then after a while [in 1934], the National Office took it over as part of the National program, and eventually [in 1948] they took it under their own jurisdiction and appointed an Executive Secretary. I asked. "I'll dry.". American Indian Languages
"], Then Mr. West, the Chief Scout Executive, got up and he said, "I'd like to have all members of the Order meet me at my headquarters immediately after the close of this meeting. 0000001056 00000 n
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Having non-members elect the members, for example, kept it from becoming a clique. [In some recent online searches, I was amazed to discover that the connections between the OA and Masonry are still controversial - at least in the eyes of some people! In fact, at Dr. Goodman's urging, he did most of the talking over the next half hour or so. And how much of the legend has a Masonic background, I don't know. That was August 15, 1979. A year later, I followed up with a letter to Col. Edson, and received a two-page, typewritten reply, outlining the history of the Order. There had been a lot of explosions at munitions factories and ships and so forth, and the country was very anti-German. And Dr. Goodman made sure his friend's contributions were remembered. Then we looked up the words for various officers and so forth. Everybody thought it was a great joke, including the hostess - until the next day, when she couldn't find any of her dishes! And so the Brotherhood was developed for that. But instead of that he told of the fact that he had a summer camp program for some years - I think he called it Woodcraft Indians. Dr. Goodman began his Scouting career in Philadelphia in 1911, when a young Scout from Troop 1 knocked on his door, and told him they were looking for an Assistant Scoutmaster. And at the close of the period we had a little tapping out ceremony. taken were not entirely clean, so errors likely exist.
He agreed, and we talked on the phone a couple times to set up the recording. %
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And the Grand Lodge continued to run the movement for several years. So then we went down to the conference and we presumably had all read these various reports and knew in general what they said. That summer [of 1916]I was not spending the summer at Treasure Island, but I was asked to organize a Sea Scout program.
Dr. Goodman was first on his feet, asking that the people who actually have such groups in their camps should have the opportunity to say something about it, to "make plain to all who have not tried out the plan the value of such an undertaking." And it was Scout Executives who ran summer camps in those days. There were two or three things of that sort that we did in order to develop certain characteristics. Treasure Island was one of the very few camps at that time which was operated on a troop-unit basis. Scout Executive J.D. So the Grand Lodge was abolished. And when that report came up the chairman got up there and he said, "Now you've all read this report; there's just one thing that I want to emphasize," he said, "and that is about this secret organization which is totally contrary to the spirit of Scouting, and I move that we go on record as abolishing this movement! And those committees worked through the winter and came up with their reports. I would like to hear from Carroll Edson. When it finally came time to turn around and head to dinner, he still had a line of Arrowmen waiting for an autograph, and he never did get down to the watch the competition! G.B. 259 0 obj
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So we were able to get a hold of a copy of an English - Lenni Lenape dictionary, and then we looked up in that to get the Delaware equivalent of the Brotherhood of Cheerful Service' and we came up with Wimachtendienk Wingolauchsik Witahemui. It varies a little bit from Col. Edson's recollections, but the tone is the same. "Oh, how do you do? Dr. Goodman laughed. <>
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Well, of course, eventually that was overcome, but that was a problem there for a while. Of course, he obliged. But that did, of course, give a great deal of publicity to the movement, and it began to spread quite rapidly after that. It was with that in mind that we started the Order. We mulled over that problem for several weeks, and then I had an invitation to hear a talk by Ernest Thompson Seton, who was then the Chief Scout. He chose an Indian motif, he wrote, because "History, logic, and my instincts all pointed one way - the ideal Indian was the cleanest, strongest, manliest, most unsordid type I could find." If they get a total of so many points, why, then they're given this award of Treasure Island Scout and a little badge that they get to wear on their uniforms." Well, it wasn't in anybody's mind for an instant a question of if, but only how. They each had a scholarly bent and enjoyed putting ideas into writing. When a boy goes to camp for one week it takes a couple of days to shake down, and then he gets to go camping for a couple of days, and then a couple of days getting ready to leave. It didn't mention the Order at all. When the meeting was over I took a deep breath and said: "Dr. Goodman, I know you're very busy this week, but if you have any time at all, I'd love to sit down with you and talk a little bit about the history of the OA.". I was inducted into the Order of the Arrow in 1974, just before our 60th anniversary. The tree was about five feet across, and they couldn't possibly do that [alone]. trailer
Their devotion to the Order and their endless promotion of it, combined with their prominent positions in Scouting, made it possible for the Order to grow and thrive. Unamis, (esp. How do you do?" And when he looked up, two more Arrowmen were waiting, sashes in hand. And he told of the values that he had in his campfire programs utilizing the symbolism of Indian rituals as a character building device. Well, then that was gradually modified and anybody who had a legitimate reason for wanting to know could be told what various things stood for. They had to have two or three others to join with them. Well, at that time there was no registration system, but in 1921, when they organized a registration system, they gave me retroactive credit as an Assistant Scoutmaster from 1910. to assist members of the Order of the Arrow with their interest Well, we inquired and we found that the Indians that were indigenous to Treasure Island were the Lenni Lenape tribe of the Delaware Indians. (That Scout was Gil Talmadge, later known as the "founder's finder." 4 0 obj
Stephenson, the Scout Executive from Chicago, rose to say, "I have a man on my staff who has tried it and he sold it to the rest of us and we are for it.
xb```f``g`2x9N0` kRnw'ui\s8{m-W~fssK:N0tzE@3|.~w5*l6>*?X]OiY|KKZ xfjEa0gxf6mmr)9{|h]HkxQ;vvwv 85"pOjkjhYo/w?\HZR,-,!Y= -/2k) . And we said, "Now, we asked you boys down here to find out whether you felt that the experience that you had was something that was worth continuing, or whether it was just a flash in the pan that didn't amount to anything.". And as a historian - even then - I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to interview and correspond with both men. Go back to our Indian Tribe Facts for kids
We could take 24 boys on the boat, and from the time they woke up in the morning until they went to bed at night they were doing nothing but seamanship."]. 0000001185 00000 n
", Col. Edson rose and said, "For eight seasons now I have been connected with a camp honor society which has proved of such wonderful help in the Council where it was first started that it has since been organized in a number of other cities as well, where it is proving equally valuable. [W]e can effectively use ceremony and symbolism in furthering Scout ideals of personal service.", The "W.W.W." [In 1979 Col. Edson explained: "I knew nothing about sailing, but I got a hold of a Naval Petty Officer who knew nothing about Scouting. So he had to argue with him about an hour before he finally got him - against his better judgment - to accept it, and so that's how Urner got his name. The original motion was finally softened a little, in the sense that "fraternities" were still "discouraged" - unless they were found to be a "good scheme" that would not harm the larger program or exclude certain boys from membership. Note that the Full startxref
/ English Dictionary. Learn more about the Lenape Indian tribe
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The rule holds good! And that passed by a bare majority. He later retired to Orange County, where I would see him from time to time.