Scouting, Volume 63, Number 3, May-June 1975 Page: 20
42 p. : ill. ; 28 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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A GATHERING OF EAGLES
Our National Eagle Scout Association is on the move
helping improve Scouting across America, by d pryce
Brian McGahey wears Ben Franklin-
style glasses, a scraggly goatee
and an impish grin that makes him look
just a little like an oversize lepre-
chaun. The total effect of the 18-year-
old Explorer's appearance is — well,
it's ordinary. He is the kind of guy you
could walk by without looking at
twice. One thing is for sure: Eagle
Scout Brian McGahey didn't stand out
among the smooth-muscled athletes
attending the Third National Explorer
Olympics last August on the campus of
Colorado State University at Fort Col-
lins.
I had developed a nodding acquain-
tance with Brian early in the week but
had paid scant attention to him until I
realized that he was the Explorer who
walked off with the Olympic gold med-
al in the General Knowledge competi-
tion. Since Scouting magazine had
asked me to find out what the first Na-
tional Eagle Scout Association Con-
ference (held at CSU the same week
as the Explorer Olympics) was all
about, I decided to start by interview-
ing Brian, because I knew he was at-
tending both the NESA conference and
the Olympics. I asked if there was any
way to prepare for a general knowl-
edge test.
"Read about an hour or two a day for
10 years," Brian said. His eyes
snapped and the impish grin was
there. "Make sure your reading in-
cludes newspapers, all sorts of maga-
zines and an occasional encyclo-
pedia. And, of course, keep up with
your schoolwork, and I would say that
would be good preparation for it."
Touchb\ The guy was smart. And
funny. Brian had given a humorous, in-
telligent answer to a dumb question,
and I liked him for it. He said he had
received his Eagle while a member of
Troop 1083, Rockville, Md., in his jun-
ior year in high school. (Now he's
registered with Post 1334 of Bethes-
da, composed of all Eagle Scouts.) In
his troop he had settled into a com-
fortable rut and had no plan to shoot
for Eagle until an assistant Scoutmas-
ter, Pete Sullivan, jarred him by re-
marking, "You have the ability to make
Eagle. Why in the heck aren't you
working on it?"
Over and over in the ensuing days
as I talked to Eagle Scouts at the
NESA conference, I discovered that
nearly always in the background there
had been a Pete Sullivan — a man
prodding and pushing and encourag-
ing and helping a boy climb the Eagle
trail. But I already knew that, for that's
what Scouting is all about, isn't it? So I
asked Brian what NESA can do for
Scouting.
"NESA obviously can provide a
source of highly knowledgeable peo-
ple in Scouting skills," Brian said, "but
Eagles can do a whole lot more than
that. They can do all sorts of service
projects in the community. Eagles can
do almost anything, for in NESA we
have people of tremendous skills in all
sorts of fields."
Later I talked with Arthur Stalks, co-
chairman for operations of the NESA
conference. Art received his Eagle in
1967 in Troop 24 of Washington, D C.,
was a Report to the Nation Scout in
1970, served as a youth representa-
tive to the BSA National Executive
Board and helped in troop leader de-
velopment experimentation at Phil-
mont. Art has been connected with
Scouting for 14 of his 22 years. This
year he's busy on a master's in busi-
ness administration at the University
of Chicago, working for the Continen-
tal Bank and keeping close contact
with the Chicago Area Council. I asked
him why the National Eagle Scout As-
sociation was formed.
"For a long time" Art said, "Scouting
has developed Eagles and allowed
them to escape not only the move-
ment, but continued service. There
can be no question that this is a great
loss, a loss of proven human potential.
NESA can serve as a way of maintain-
ing this potential."
I talked to several other young Ea-
gle Scouts, all of whom seemed to be
highly enthusiastic about, (a) Scouting
in general, and (b) Eagle Scouting in
particular. Could their enthusiasm for
NESA be a result of their youth? I de-
cided to sit down with some of the
more mature Eagles at the convention,
and the first man I talked with was Jim
Savard, Scoutmaster of Troop 14 of
Medford, Oreg. Jim is student activ-
ities director in a high school of 2,000.
He got his Eagle in 1963 when he was
a Scout in the troop he now leads.
"There is a tremendous gap," he
said, "between the time that a boy be-
comes an Eagle and the time he be-
comes old enough and mature enough
to take an adult role, and I think NESA
Can provide a (continued on page 30)
NESA dignitaries (from left): Art Stalks, events co-
chairman; Dr. Tom Haggai, guest speaker; Don Flanders, NESA chairman.
Conference attendees chow down at chuck wagon feed.
20
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Boy Scouts of America. Scouting, Volume 63, Number 3, May-June 1975, periodical, May 1975; New Brunswick, New Jersey. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth353554/m1/22/: accessed May 5, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Boy Scouts of America National Scouting Museum.