Orienteering 2009

Greetings from Troop 66,
Sorry these are late getting updated, but here are some photos courtesy of Eric Taubman of the Orienteering trip to Waterfall Glen.

Happy Holidays!
Mr. C

Eagle Project at Work

Greetings from Troop 66. We had yet another Eagle Project completed yesterday. This project was that of Life Scout Charlie T. Charlie raised funds and installed a swing set at the Hines V.A. Hospital in Maywood for the benefit of the children who are visiting the patients at the hospital. It was a cool and rainy day, but that didn't dampen the high-spirited Scouts who are pictured here.

Well done to Charlie and all of our other Life Scouts who are completing their projects!

Mr. C

Troop 66 Court of Honor

Greetings from Troop 66,

We had a great Court of Honor this evening with 29 scouts getting 11 rank advancements, 64 merit badges, and 2 Interpreter’s Strips. We installed our new Senior Patrol Leader (SPL), Charlie T tonight. (Thanks so much to AJB for his tenure as SPL!). Charle and Mark C will be sharing the SPL duties to balance their busy high school schedules. Matt H will be serving as our Assistant Senior Patrol Leader (ASPL).

Fantastic job by Henry and Carter in planning and executing the Court of Honor. Well done, boys!

Congratulations to all of the boys who advanced in rank and/or earned merit badges! We are proud of you.

Mr. C

New Troop Patrol Structure

Greetings,

After much consideration and consultation we have determined to establish a new patrol structure. Scouts will join the troop and establish a "New Scout" Patrol with a unique identity. They will stay in this new scout patrol until they reach the rank of First Class. When they reach First Class, they will graduate to the older scout patrol. We will have two older scout patrols, red and blue. When the boys forms these patrols, they will have the option of changing the name of the patrol.

We will form these new patrols after we have an election of patrol leaders at the Court of Honor this Thursday, October 1st.

Boys under the rank of First Class will remain in their "new scout" patrol until they achieve the rank of First Class. They will be attending skills training with other scouts under the rank of First Class to work on advancement.

Here is the mapping of the "New Scout" Patrols to the "Older Scout" Patrols

Patrol - Older Scout Patrol
Cobras - Blue
Dragons - Blue
Eagles - Red
Falcons - Blue
Jaguars - Red
Platinum Panthers - Blue
Red Coyotes - Red
Redmoon Raccoons - Red
Roadrunners - Blue
Silver Wolves - Red

Remember, this change will NOT affect Scouts under the rank of First Class.

Let me know if you have any questions regarding this.

Thanks,
Mr. C

Shin-go-beek Summer Camp Photos

Folks, here are summer camp photos from Mr. Knupp!
Enjoy!
Mr. C

Article in Forest Leaves - Troop 66 75th anniversary

Folks, there is a good article here about the 75th anniversary of our Troop.
Please join us in the festivities! Details can be found here.

Also, special thanks to Steve Evanson, former ASM of Troop 66 for this fantastic patch design!

Thanks,
Mr. C

New High Adventure Proposal

Thanks for Mary Morgan Ryan for suggesting this new tradition for Troop 66.
Please see her email below:

Troop,

At tonight's troop meeting, the scouts expressed interest in starting a new troop tradition: going on a troop high adventure trip every other year! What a great way to have fun and grow as an individual and a troop.

We talked about the three BSA high adventure options, which are Florida Sea Base, Philmont Scout Ranch (New Mexico), and the Northern Tier (Minnesota). Please check out this web page for links to all three adventure bases and the activities offered here.

High adventure activities are open to Boy Scouts ages 14-18, so there is a window of time for each scout to participate. If we go every other year, each scout would likely have two chances to go on a troop high adventure trip.

On the off years, we would plan a shorter, less expensive trip, such as our recent trip to Canada, that all scouts in the troop could attend. And not to worry, our very successful and enormously fun annual week of summer camp for all scouts in the troop would continue!

These trips require extensive planning, training, and fundraising, so we are aiming to begin our new tradition in the summer of 2011 and continue in 2013, 2015 and so forth.

We are in the discussion phase of all of this, so I am asking all scouts and their parents to submit ideas for high adventure trips! Please contribute your thoughts, questions and opinions by emailing me at marymorganryan@comcast.net.

Thanks,

Mary Morgan Ryan

The Amazing Race - Boy Scout Camp-o-ree

The following is the text of an article about the Spring Camporee that was run by Troop 66. It was published in Triblocal.

The Amazing Race is more than a reality TV show, it was the theme for the Des Plaines Valley Council Twin Lakes District Spring Camp-o-ree. A Camp-o-ree is a gathering of Scouts from different Troops for a weekend of skills instruction and fun!

On the weekend of April 17-19 approximately 40 Scouts and 20 adult leaders from 5 Troops made a trip to Camp Crown in Trevor, Wisconsin for The Amazing Race Camp-o-ree. The Scouts visited five “countries” as part of the Saturday morning activities. In each “country” they received skills instruction and were tested on their competency in each skill.

In China, they participated in the Chinese “fire works” where they had to show their fire-building skills and see how quickly the could build a fire to burn through a string suspended above it. In Scotland, they learned team building as they performed a “blind rescue” where two blind-folded Scouts were directed by the sighted Scout they were carrying. In Italy, they lashed 2x4s to chairs and had a Roman Chariot Race. In Brazil, they measured heights and distances and constructed a shelter in the Amazon river crossing. Finally, in Canada, they participated in a Compass game where they had to provide the bearings for five markers.

Also in keeping with the Amazing Race theme, they had to use a map and compass to travel from one “country” to another. At the end of the morning, they had to submit compass bearings and distances between each country.

In the afternoon, 26 Scouts and 6 leaders went on a Nature hike. During the hike we identified ten types of native plants, signs of ten animals, and discussed poisonous plants.

The weather was beautiful in the morning, but turned cloudy and rainy by late afternoon. This did not stop the Scouts from a traditional campfire program with skits and songs. After the campfire, we had a pot-luck Cracker Barrel meal with many Troop contributing. Two dutch oven cobblers were featured with other assorted goodies.

The weekend closed with a rainy Sunday. This didn't dampen the Scouts spirits as they had a lively Scout Service on Sunday morning before we broke camp and returned home.

Photos of the event can be found here

All-in-all, the Amazing Race was run and a GREAT time was had by all.

Scouts Activities for 3/13 to 3/15

Greetings from Troop 66!

We split the Troop between the cross-over of Pack 66 and the regular Troop meeting. We crossed-over 7 Webelos Scouts and they should be attending our next Troop meeting on 3/20.

At the Troop meeting we worked on Second Class Requirement 1a, Understanding Map Symbols. We tested the Scouts knowledge with a lively map relay game.

On Saturday we had several Scouts and Adults do an equipment inventory of the Scout closet and we also developed a plan for moving further towards Patrol Camping. Dan, James, and Mark joined Mr. C and Mr. Taubman for the morning's activities and we then enjoyed lunch at Mickey's!

On Sunday the Camporee Committee met to begin planning of the Spring Camporee. Mark your Calendar for the weekend of 4/17 to 4/19. The theme of the Camporee is "The Amazing Race"!

Thanks to all of the Scouts and Leaders who made these events possible!

Mr. C

Troop Meeting 3-3-09

Greetings from Troop 66!

We had a great meeting on Friday night! We had Webelos guests from Pack 67. We learned requirement F1 - finding directions during the day or night without a compass. We played a very interesting Jeopardy game to reinforce the skills we learned.

We heard the baby shark song and all-in-all had a GREAT meeting!

My thanks to all the Scouts and Scouters will made this possible.

Mr. C

Still more Canada Photos

Folks, here are some additional photos courtesy of Mr. Knupp. If you haven't seen them it's worth taking a look as there as some great pictures in here.

Pictures can be found here

Thanks,
Mr. C

Canada Trip

Greetings from Troop 66,

This long weekend the Troop took 18 Boy Scouts and 7 Scout Leaders and went to Camp Attawandaron in Canada.

We left on Friday, took the train to Detroit, rented vans and drove to camp.
We worked on the Citizenship in the World Merit Badge on the train going up. On Saturday, we spent the day sledding and working on various Scout requirements. On Sunday we participated in a Scout Sunday Service at St. Bart's in Sarnia, Ontario.

On Monday morning we drove back to Detroit and caught the Amtrack train back to Chicago. After we rushed to catch the 5:19 Metra train, we promptly broke down just past the Kedzie stop. After un-boarding and re-boarding trains we arrived safely in River Forest just about 7:15 p.m.

Pictures can be found here and Dave Zyer's photos can be found here.

All in all it was a WONDERFUL event. Special thanks to ALL who helped make this event a success. THANK YOU to Mary Morgan Ryan who organized the event. Thanks also to all of our gracious Canadian hosts, especially Chuck Grimme our camp ranger. THANK YOU also to all of the adult leaders without whom this event could not have happened.

Mr. C

Busy Scouting Weekend

Greetings from Troop 66:
This was a VERY busy Scouting weekend! We had a meeting on Friday. We had Senior Patrol Leader (SPL), Assistant SPL (ASPL), and Patrol Leader (PL) elections on Friday!

I'm happy to announce AJ B. is now our Senior Patrol Leader! He will be assisted by Lue and Adam W. Congratulations to these new leaders! Special Thanks to James F. and Mark C. as our out-going SPL and ASPL. You guys did an outstanding job! PL results will be posted shortly!

On Saturday we had our Winter Blast! Let's just say it was "Wet and Wild"!!!
On Saturday night we had a Chicago Wolves Hockey outing!
Sunday is Scout Sunday and the Troop helped out at the Pancake Breakfast!

Whew!

Thanks to all Scouts and Scouters for demonstrating Scout Spirit and having FUN in the process!

Mr. C

Updated Scout Calendar Available

Greetings from Troop 66,

We now have the updated Troop calendar on our web page. It can be found at this link.

Please check it periodically because the dates do change from time to time.

Looking forward to yet another GREAT year in Scouting!
Mr. C

Troop 66 Recognized by River Forest for volunteer work

From Mr. Thompson:

"The Oak Park Wednesday Journal newspaper recognized our scouts for the help they provided during the flooding last year. The scouts are part of the newspaper's "River Forest Villager of the Year" runner up award

Here is the link to the article

Good job Troop 66!"


Mr. Thompson

January Campout - Hoover

Greetings from Troop 66,

I wanted to say a few words about the campout at Hoover and include the pictures. We had a great time in spite of some equipment issues. We stayed in a new cabin at Hoover then we have stayed in before. It didn't have the individual rooms, but was still quite nice.

Saturday climbing was fun! 12 out of 14 Scouts earned the Climbing Merit Badge and the 2 who didn't are very close with partials. The younger Scouts had a good time climbing as you can see from the pictures.

Saturday evening was a fun-filled game night with a VERY interesting game of APPLES TO APPLES.

My thanks to all the adults who helped on the campout: Mr. Taubman, Mr. Knupp, Mr. Bergholz, and Mr. McQuade.

Mr. C