Abstract
John Sanders of the Nathan L. Dauby Boy Scout Museum describes the history, operations, and collections at the museum, as well as scouting-related activities, and the Boy Scouts' philosophy of leadership training.
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Interviewee
Sanders, John (interviewee)
Interviewer
Hons, Justin (interviewer)
Project
Cuyahoga County Fair
Date
8-11-2006
Document Type
Oral History
Duration
10 minutes
Recommended Citation
"John Sanders interview, 11 August 2006" (2006). Cleveland Regional Oral History Collection. Interview 907010.
https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/crohc000/892
Transcript
Justin Hons [00:00:00] My name is Justin Hons, and I’m here on August 11th. We’re here at the Cuyahoga County Fair. If you could state your name and what you’re doing here at the fair.
John Sanders [00:00:08] I’m John Sanders. I’m with the Nathan Dobby Boy Scout Museum in the Junior Fair building. I’m one of the Boy Scout leaders that run the booth.
Justin Hons [00:00:18] What is the museum?
John Sanders [00:00:20] The Nathan Dobby Museum is our Scout museum that is in the Greater Cleveland Council School Service Center. What used to be called the headquarters building is now called the Service center. I’m one of the senior assistant curators of it. We have 23 display cases in the lobby. That gives us an opportunity to display part of our collection. The members of the museum committee are always changing something in there. So we have, every month there’s something different in the museum. And we’re trying to keep it fresh that way. We’ve been going now, from what I can pick up since the late 1960s, early 1970s, they just did a major renovation at the service center, which moved our museum down in the lobby so people can visit at any time.
Justin Hons [00:01:06] What are some of the pieces?
John Sanders [00:01:09] Oh, boy. Right now we’ve got a 1910 Boy Scout uniform on display. We have a 1930 Cub Scout uniform, which was the first year of Cub Scouting. We have a 1950 Sea Scout uniform. We have a 1940s leader’s uniform, actually a Scout executive’s uniform. We have a ’60s den mother’s uniform. We have several merit badges on display. We’ve got fishing merit badge with the old merit badge books and a lot of the old memorabilia from that. We have a carving display where we have some of the older carvings. And we also have some new ones, which I just did. My job in the booth here is I’m a carver and I demonstrate a lot of the arts and crafts, including– we’ve got two custom guitars we made over here that’ll actually be on display in the museum here within the next couple of months, we hope. Westgate Music was nice enough to donate the kit for the museum. And I purchased the other one for me. And I made two guitars out of them. Did about 20 hours of wood burning on each of the guitars.
Justin Hons [00:02:12] Could you tell us a little bit about the history of Boy Scouts, Cub Scouts in Cleveland?
John Sanders [00:02:17] Well, actually, I’m the youngest guy. I’m learning it slowly but surely. Scouting in the Greater Cleveland Council, from what I can pick up, we got our charter in 1911. And considering Scouting was founded in 1910, that’s pretty good. We’ve gone. We have gone through several different service centers. The current service center was dedicated in the 1960s at its current location at East 22nd and Woodland. It’s actually a three-quarter scale of I think it’s Constitution Hall in Philadelphia. It’s the buildings right next to Tri-C off the freeway. Then two years ago in 2004 they did a million-dollar renovation. Upgraded all the office buildings and upgraded a lot of our computer systems. And that’s when they moved the museum. One of the things about Scouting is our Venturing, Our Sea Scouting, and our Exploring program are not just for boys. They are co-ed. The 14- to 21-year-old programs. The Venturing is more high adventure but aimed more at a land-based program where you’re camping, you’re canoeing and kayaking but, and you can go sailing in that too. But Sea Scouting is actually the second oldest form of Scouting. Baden-Powell, the founder of the original Scouting movement in the world, his younger brother was a commander in the Royal Navy. Baden-Powell was a Brigadier General in the British Army. And when his brother saw what Scouting was doing for the boys that wanted to get in the military in the army, he came up asked if they could do something similar along a nautical line. And so our Sea Scouting program has actually been, is actually the second oldest form of Scouting. We have a strong Sea Scout contingent here in Cleveland Council. We have four or five ships, actually. Our regional Commodore is based out of Cleveland Council, which is kind of a neat thing.
Justin Hons [00:04:17] How do you feel about the future of Scouting in Cleveland?
John Sanders [00:04:21] I think it’s good. I’d like to see- Personally I think Scouting is an excellent opportunity for boys and young ladies too. With the Venturing and the Sea Scout program, one of the things that Scouting does is it provides an opportunity for our young people to have to try different things and learn leadership skills. When a Scout earns or a Venturer or a Sea Scout earns the top ranks in their respective programs, the military recognizes that leadership by if that individual were to enlist, say in the United States military, instead of going in as an E1, they go in E3. That’s how much the military puts emphasis on it. When I went in the service, I wasn’t an Eagle Scout but I had two years of college and I went in E3. So that’s the kind of emphasis that Boy Scouting put or the world puts on Scouts. Eagle Scouts. There’s less than 1% of all scouts make Eagle. But yet if you look at it, the original seven, all the original seven astronauts were all Eagle Scouts. More than 60% of people in Congress have served in Scouting in some capacity. More than 50% of the military academies were Scouts. So the leaders of our country come from this program. I get real enthused every time I work with my troops. I’m an assistant Scout master of two Boy Scout troops. And I see those kids and I see the leadership abilities and it’s absolutely phenomenal. I have no qualms about where this country is going to go because the leadership is there. And Scouting is a great way for people, young people to learn how to do the leadership properly.
Justin Hons [00:06:04] What do you think it is about Scouting that prepares young boys and young women to be leaders in the way you’re speaking?
John Sanders [00:06:12] The biggest thing is if we truly follow the way Baden-Powell, our world founder, set up the program. It is supposed to be a youth-run program. Boy Scouting, the youth are supposed to give us what they want to do and the leaders are supposed to help plan and organize that so we achieve their goals. In Venturing and Sea Scouting, actually, the leaders are called advisors. So the youth truly run those programs. At least they’re supposed to. We give youth an opportunity to do leadership under the supervision of adult mentors that encourage leadership, but also know when to step back, which is a tough thing to do. You know, boys making a mistake and you want to get in there and do it. But as my father told me, the toughest thing about being a parent is learning when to let your children fail. Same thing with the Scout leader. We’ve got to let them fail so that they can learn to succeed. It took Edison, what, over 100 times to finally achieve the light bulb. And each one of those failures gave him a clue as to what wouldn’t work and gave him a guide toward where he could go before he finally invented the light bulb. We want to do the same thing in Scouting. It also gives the youth an opportunity to learn about the outdoors with the development of the planet. We’re tearing down forests in that all the time. And these young people have an opportunity to go out and learn what is out there and available and learn to appreciate the beauty of nature. One of the skills that I teach is plant and animal id. I love taking new Scouts out in the springtime and showing them the wildflowers that are available. They don’t realize it because they’re not taught to slow down and look. I get the opportunity to do that.
Justin Hons [00:08:01] So are you concerned at all the direction of the environment- [inaudible] -Scouting addresses that?
John Sanders [00:08:10] What we’re doing, what we’re doing as Scouting with the environment is we’re making people aware. I grew up out in California, and the biggest thing you- [audio damaged]
Justin Hons [00:08:22] Thanks a lot.
John Sanders [00:08:23] Anytime. Nice meeting you. Go take a look at the guitars.
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