| Yorkville - II |
I remember a fall camp out at Yorkville when I passed my tracking requirement for Second Class. Jeff and a couple of other older scouts had all of us younger scouts tail them as they walked along a path at the camp. Jeff would turn around from time to time and name any scout who he happened to see. After fifteen or so minutes of this, Jeff announced that we all failed miserably and we should return to our campsite to practice. Everyone got up and turned back for the campsite, except for me.
I decided to go on. So I stayed down on the ground until everyone left, then I rush down the trail to catch up with Jeff and the others. Then I spent the next hour trailing them as they walked along several trails at the camp.
At one point, they went along the edge of a huge open field. There wasn’t much cover except for the occasional dip in the contour. I was hugging the ground in one of these depressions when a National Guard unit on training maneuvers marched past me in a column. I remember the smiles I got from them as they trod on by. I suspect they thought I was pretending to be them. Still I persisted.
When we got back to camp, I walked up to Jeff with my card and asked him to sign off on the requirement. He said that we all failed. I replied that I didn’t go back but followed them all the way back to camp. He didn’t believe me until I described to him how at one point I watched them light up cigarettes. He quickly signed my scorecard.
Scorecards, by the way, where little thick tri-fold paper sheets that listed all of the
requirements for a particular rank. You would carry the scorecard in your wallet or
pocket. Any adult leader or qualified senior scout would initial passed requirements as
you passed them.