Pam Elrod, Kentucky Girl Scout
“I’ve got something for the girls of Savannah, and all America and all the world,” declared Juliette Gordon Low when she assembled the first Girl Scouts at her Savannah, Georgia home on March 12, 1912. Here in Bowling Green, the first troop was organized in 1920. By 1947, there were 22 troops with some 300 girls. By 1962, the 50th anniversary of the Girl Scouts, there were at least 30 local troops with about 400 members.
As the Girl Scouts celebrate their 100th anniversary, WKU’s Special Collections Library continues to collect material documenting the history of this organization in Warren County and elsewhere in Kentucky. Our holdings include uniforms, photos, video, membership cards, and a Girl Scouts autograph book. Scrapbooks of newspaper clippings detail the activities of local troops from 1947-1962. Included is volume 1, number 1 of Scoutabout, the inaugural 1963 newsletter of Senior Troop 62, offering news of all 23 troops active in the area. In another collection, a cartoon drawn by a soldier serving in the Persian Gulf War commemorates the support of a troop of Elizabethtown Girl Scouts during his deployment.
With a commitment to honor both past and future and to produce “happy, resourceful, creative citizens willing and able to serve others everywhere,” the Girl Scouts are, of course, about much more than their famous cookies. Nevertheless, Scoutabout offered a few tips for cookie merchandising success. Girls were advised to say “thank you” even if they didn’t make a sale, to be knowledgeable about each kind of cookie and its correct price, to wear their pin and uniform if possible, and to be “spic and span from head to toe.”
Search KenCat and TopSCHOLAR to learn more about our Special Collections Library holdings relating to the Girl Scouts.