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Bear Cub Scout Book
Cub Scout handbook focusing on God, country, family and self.
264 pages, Unknown Binding
First published January 1, 1954
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87 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
April 4, 2015
This book is a wonderful guide to helping your child learn how to survive in the woods as well as more common life skills as well.
August 19, 2021
Ready for the new season!
April 22, 2009
When I was five, weeks after starting kindergarten in DesPlaines, Illinois, the family moved to rural Kane County, just east of the Fox River. Veterans like Dad had a chance there to own their own houses in what was called the Meadowdale development. The houses were all alike, varying only in color, miles of them on curvy, unpaved streets, new ones going up all the time. There were no lawns. There were no sidewalks. There was lots of dust, except when it rained. Then there was lots of mud. There were no stores, no movie theatres, not even a school until I was ready to enter first grade.
To a grownup it was a wasteland with potential. There were plans for a shopping center, for schools and theatres and even an ice rink and, with time, all these things came to pass. Meanwhile, however, for kids, it was paradise!
Our house was on a ridge overlooking a creek and a road running parallel to it. Across from them were empty fields to the southeast and wooded hills to the southwest. The creek itself went on through an abandoned quarry before emptying into the Fox. It had salamanders, one of which I brought home to bed with me one night, and small fish and muskrats and rocks with fossils in them. To the east, just a block away, the creek turned, passing through an abandoned farm area which still had some derelict buildings standing. Part of it connected to the storm sewers running under the streets of the development. All sorts of scary things were rumored to live in them, but, despite hours of spooky exploration, we never directly encountered them. To the north there was a stream which passed through a dense wood. That was blocks away, a place I'd only start to visit after I'd learned to ride a two-wheeler.
When Oak Ridge Elementary School was built, it turned out to be okay. It was small, one class and one teacher per grade. The principal, Ms. Loose, seemed to know everyone's name and attempted to visit every student's home. Mom, who was still learning English, became head of the PTA. When my brother was born she and Dad gave our piano to the school so he could have his own room.
Since there was nothing else, the school was the cultural center of Meadowdale. On weekends they had movies that anyone could go to, but the fare was family-oriented. Sometimes they'd accompany the films with vacinations or floride treatments in the interest of public health. Weeknights, Catholic kids would go to their mysterious catechism meeting where they'd learn about hell and Satan and other really scary stuff; girls would go to Campfire Girl conventicles. Grownups, god knows, would have AA Meetings or spouse-swaps.
It was a given that when one turned seven or eight one would join something. Girls had the Campfire organization or Girl Scouts. I liked the former because they had better uniforms. Boys had the Cub Scouts, beginning with a probationary period as a Wolverine, which everyone passed, followed by a year as a Fox, then a Wolf, then a Bear, then a Lion, and, finally, transitionally, as a Webelo before becoming a real Boy Scout.
I was a scout for four years, driven into it like a lemming, allured by promises of arcane Indian lore, useful survival skills and exotic wilderness adventures. In addition to large doses of American religion involving flag rituals, a vaguely Christian god and even more vague Indian nature worship, we had the opportunity to learn crafts and earn merit badges in the process with which to adorn our uniforms.
In fact, there was all of one trip to the woods and that amounted to a few dads walking a bunch of us along the creek to the aforementioned "wooded hills" across the street, climbing one such hill, stopping by a large woodpile to eat bagged lunches, then walking back again. The whole thing took an hour or two. Boring!
In fact, what scouting really entailed was a weekly pack meeting at some den mother's basement where we'd be introduced to a craft. Our activities included such useful projects as (1) making replicas of Abraham Lincoln's birthplace out of popsicle sticks; (2) building doll houses out of elbow macaroni, then covering them with golden sparkle glitter paint; (3) constructing huge lumps out of papermache, then painting them; and the like. It was really stupid, but by now we were trapped. Our folks liked us being out of the house once a week and would have no talk of quitting.
Fortunately, just as I was becoming a Webelo, Dad got a chance to buy his Mom's old house in Park Ridge near Chicago and the family moved. There, knowing nothing of the larger community or its cultural opportunities for children, I was able to escape Scouting. Thank heavens too! Those few boys who were in the organization were, by six grade, mocked mercilessly.
To a grownup it was a wasteland with potential. There were plans for a shopping center, for schools and theatres and even an ice rink and, with time, all these things came to pass. Meanwhile, however, for kids, it was paradise!
Our house was on a ridge overlooking a creek and a road running parallel to it. Across from them were empty fields to the southeast and wooded hills to the southwest. The creek itself went on through an abandoned quarry before emptying into the Fox. It had salamanders, one of which I brought home to bed with me one night, and small fish and muskrats and rocks with fossils in them. To the east, just a block away, the creek turned, passing through an abandoned farm area which still had some derelict buildings standing. Part of it connected to the storm sewers running under the streets of the development. All sorts of scary things were rumored to live in them, but, despite hours of spooky exploration, we never directly encountered them. To the north there was a stream which passed through a dense wood. That was blocks away, a place I'd only start to visit after I'd learned to ride a two-wheeler.
When Oak Ridge Elementary School was built, it turned out to be okay. It was small, one class and one teacher per grade. The principal, Ms. Loose, seemed to know everyone's name and attempted to visit every student's home. Mom, who was still learning English, became head of the PTA. When my brother was born she and Dad gave our piano to the school so he could have his own room.
Since there was nothing else, the school was the cultural center of Meadowdale. On weekends they had movies that anyone could go to, but the fare was family-oriented. Sometimes they'd accompany the films with vacinations or floride treatments in the interest of public health. Weeknights, Catholic kids would go to their mysterious catechism meeting where they'd learn about hell and Satan and other really scary stuff; girls would go to Campfire Girl conventicles. Grownups, god knows, would have AA Meetings or spouse-swaps.
It was a given that when one turned seven or eight one would join something. Girls had the Campfire organization or Girl Scouts. I liked the former because they had better uniforms. Boys had the Cub Scouts, beginning with a probationary period as a Wolverine, which everyone passed, followed by a year as a Fox, then a Wolf, then a Bear, then a Lion, and, finally, transitionally, as a Webelo before becoming a real Boy Scout.
I was a scout for four years, driven into it like a lemming, allured by promises of arcane Indian lore, useful survival skills and exotic wilderness adventures. In addition to large doses of American religion involving flag rituals, a vaguely Christian god and even more vague Indian nature worship, we had the opportunity to learn crafts and earn merit badges in the process with which to adorn our uniforms.
In fact, there was all of one trip to the woods and that amounted to a few dads walking a bunch of us along the creek to the aforementioned "wooded hills" across the street, climbing one such hill, stopping by a large woodpile to eat bagged lunches, then walking back again. The whole thing took an hour or two. Boring!
In fact, what scouting really entailed was a weekly pack meeting at some den mother's basement where we'd be introduced to a craft. Our activities included such useful projects as (1) making replicas of Abraham Lincoln's birthplace out of popsicle sticks; (2) building doll houses out of elbow macaroni, then covering them with golden sparkle glitter paint; (3) constructing huge lumps out of papermache, then painting them; and the like. It was really stupid, but by now we were trapped. Our folks liked us being out of the house once a week and would have no talk of quitting.
Fortunately, just as I was becoming a Webelo, Dad got a chance to buy his Mom's old house in Park Ridge near Chicago and the family moved. There, knowing nothing of the larger community or its cultural opportunities for children, I was able to escape Scouting. Thank heavens too! Those few boys who were in the organization were, by six grade, mocked mercilessly.
April 17, 2008
I never made it past Webelos, but I remember Bear Scouts being the best.
October 26, 2009
It's a Cub Scout Handbook, what do you want me to say?
Currently reading
May 23, 2009All about cub scouts....
July 24, 2011
Helped Ryan with his bear scout patch and was Noah's den leader when he was a bear.
Read
October 21, 2014uh read if in boy scouts
Want to read
February 26, 2015I registered a book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/13197935
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/13197935
December 19, 2009
These books are my life once a week for the last 2 years.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews