The Boy Scouts of America is one of the largest scouting organizations and one of the largest youth organizations in the United States, with over 1 million youth, including 176,000 female participants. The BSA was founded in 1910; about 130 million Americans have participated in its programs, which are served by 477,000 adult volunteers. BSA became a founding member organization of the World Organization of the Scout Movement in 1922.
William Dickson Boyce was an American newspaper man, entrepreneur, magazine publisher, and explorer. He was the founder of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) and the short-lived Lone Scouts of America (LSA). Born in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, he acquired a love for the outdoors early in his life. After working as a schoolteacher and a coal miner, Boyce attended Wooster Academy in Ohio before moving to the Midwest and Canada. An astute businessman, Boyce successfully established several newspapers, such as The Commercial in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and the Lisbon Clipper in Lisbon, North Dakota. With his first wife, Mary Jane Beacom, he moved to Chicago to pursue his entrepreneurial ambitions. There he established the Mutual Newspaper Publishing Company and the weekly Saturday Blade, which catered to a rural audience and was distributed by thousands of newspaper boys. With his novel employment of newsboys to boost newspaper sales, Boyce's namesake publishing company maintained a circulation of 500,000 copies per week by 1894. Boyce strongly supported worker rights, as demonstrated by his businesses' support of labor unions and his concern for his newsboys' well-being.
The Boy Scouts of America (BSA), one of the largest private youth organizations in the United States, has policies which prohibit those who are not willing to subscribe to the BSA's Declaration of Religious Principle, which has been interpreted by some as banning atheists, and, until January 2014, prohibited all "known or avowed homosexuals", from membership in its Scouting program. The ban on adults who are "open or avowed homosexuals" from leadership positions was lifted in July 2015.
James Edward West was a lawyer and an advocate of children's rights, who became the first professional Executive Secretary, soon renamed Chief Scout Executive, of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA), serving from 1911 to 1943. Upon his retirement from the BSA, West was given the title of Chief Scout.
Lone Scouts of America (LSA) was a Scouting organization for American boys that operated from 1915 until it merged with the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) in 1924. The LSA was founded by W. D. Boyce, publisher of the Chicago Ledger and the Saturday Blade and one of the founders of the BSA. Boyce felt that the program of the BSA did not help the rural boy who could not find enough other boys to form a troop or a patrol. James E. West, the first Chief Scout Executive of the BSA, disagreed with Boyce's concept, believing that the 4-H program was fulfilling the role. After Boyce left the BSA, he started the Lone Scouts of America and incorporated it on January 9, 1915. Boyce became the executive officer or Chief Totem and Frank Allan Morgan became the editor of The Lone Scout. In October 1915, Boyce appointed all of his paperboys as members of the LSA and published the first issue of The Lone Scout magazine.
John Watson Creighton Jr. was an American executive who served for nine years, from 1988 to 1997, as president and chief executive officer of Weyerhaeuser, a $7 billion, publicly traded timber company. In addition to Weyerhaeuser, he also served in senior management and executive positions with United Airlines, the University of Puget Sound, the U.S. Department of the Army, and the Boy Scouts of America.
Scouting in the United States is dominated by the 1.2 million-member Boy Scouts of America and the Girl Scouts of the USA and other associations that are recognized by one of the international Scouting organizations. There are also a few smaller, independent groups that are considered to be "Scout-like" or otherwise Scouting related.
The Boy Scouts of America (BSA) was inspired by and modeled on The Boy Scouts Association, established by Robert Baden-Powell in Britain in 1908. In the early 1900s, several youth organizations were active, and many became part of the BSA.
Jere Brian Ratcliffe was a professional Scouter in the Boy Scouts of America who was the ninth Chief Scout Executive.
Robert J. "Bob" Mazzuca is a retired professional Scouter and was the 11th Chief Scout Executive of the Boy Scouts of America. His term started in 2007, and he retired on August 31, 2012.
Alden G. Barber was a long-serving professional Scouter for the Boy Scouts of America, and served as the fifth Chief Scout Executive of the BSA from 1967 to 1976. He served during the peak membership years of the BSA, and was instrumental in modernizing the BSA program, particularly the Boy Scout program for boys ages 11 to 17.
Edgar Munroe Robinson (1867–1951) was Boys' Work Secretary of the International Committee of the YMCA and a long-time director and executive with the YMCA in New York. He is notable for his significant efforts in helping to establish the Boy Scouts of America (BSA).
The 'Unknown Scout' was an anonymous member of The Boy Scout Association in the United Kingdom whose good turn inspired William D. Boyce to form the Boy Scouts of America (BSA).
The Great Smoky Mountain Council is a local council of the Boy Scouts of America in Tennessee, with headquarters in Knoxville. It serves 21 East Tennessee counties that span two time zones. Camp Buck Toms is a summer camp owned and operated by the Great Smoky Mountain Council. The camp is located outside Rockwood, Tennessee, on the shores of Watts Bar Lake.
The Boy Scouts of America is an organization run by volunteers, however the day-to-day administration is performed by a staff of professional Scouters. The organization has professional staffing at every level—district, council, regional and national. The Chief Scout Executive is the top professional Scouter.
The National Executive Board of the Boy Scouts of America governs the Boy Scouts of America organization. One source reports that there were 72 members of the board in 2001.
Roger A. Krone is the president and chief executive officer of the Boy Scouts of America. He was previously CEO of Leidos. A pilot and aerospace engineer, Krone worked for 45 years in the aerospace industry, holding senior program management and finance positions at Boeing, McDonnell Douglas, and General Dynamics.
Michael B. Surbaugh was the 13th Chief Scout Executive of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA), having succeeded the retiring Wayne Brock on October 1, 2015. He was previously Group Director of HR, Innovation, Exploring and Learning for Life for the BSA. Surbaugh first joined the organization as a professional scouter in 1983.
Roger C. Mosby is the former President, CEO, and 14th Chief Scout Executive of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA). He was previously Vice President of Human Resources for Kinder Morgan. Born in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, his parents and family moved to Union County, Illinois where he attended elementary and high school. He graduated from Shawnee High School in Wolf Lake, Illinois, going on to Southeast Missouri State University earning a Bachelor of Science in 1973. He was succeeded by Roger Krone, the former CEO of Leidos, on November 8, 2023, months after announcing his intent to retire.
In the Boy Scouts of America, a Scout leader refers to the trained leaders of a Scout unit. Adult leaders are generally referred to as "Scouters," and the youth leaders are referred to by their position within a unit. In all Scouting units above the Cub Scout pack and units serving adolescent Scouts, leadership of the unit comprises both adult leaders (Scouters) and youth leaders (Scouts). This is a key part of the Aims and Methods of Scouting. In order to learn leadership, the youth must actually serve in leadership roles.
