CATHOLIC BOY SCOUTS

In the process of research.

Scout Executive Walter Gunn, along with strong support from several Catholic leaders in the ARCHDIOCESE OF DUBUQUE, keyed the rapid growth of the Boy Scout movement in Dubuque. By the end of 1917, the Dubuque Council consisted of 118 registered Boy Scouts from seven troops. The number of Scouts registered would increase to 301 from sixteen troops by the end of 1918. By the end of 1919, there would be 356 Scouts registered with the Council and two troops that chartered directly with the national office.

The history entitled Boy Scouts of America A Centennial Edition stated that the Catholic Church allowed Catholic boys to join the Scouts if there were Catholic troops under a Catholic Scoutmaster and that there would be a chaplain appointed by the proper ecclesiastical authority for each Catholic troop. Many of the early troops were chartered to Catholic parishes. Local Catholic leadership became influential on the national level. Of the three original recipients of the Silver Beaver award from the Dubuque Council, one chaired the Catholic Committee on Scouting and another was an influential Catholic priest. A letter of endorsement for Scouting was obtained from the Vatican in 1919 and the KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS made Scouting its official program for boys aged 12-15.

Once accepted by the Vatican, Catholic support for scouting was pronounced. In the August 28, 1919 issue of Scouting magazine, the author stated the aim of the National Catholic War Work Council (later the U. S. Council of Catholic Bishops) cooperating with the Boy Scouts of America had the goal of increasing the number of Scot troops chartered by the Roman Catholic churches to at least 1,000 within a year. The National Catholic Council approved of the idea of hiring fifteen men for the nest year to help in the organizing effort. Nationally there were then 587 troops under the leadership of a Roman Catholic Scoutmaster with 300 of them chartered to a Catholic church. By 1937 Every Diocesan Lay Chairman was entitled to be commissioned annually by the BSA as a Special National Field Scout Commissioner, a national commission. (1)

Two of the original troops chartered when the Dubuque Scout Council was chartered in 1917 belonged to Catholic parishes. Rev. John Adams THEOBALD served as the Scoutmaster of Troop Two, chartered to ST. RAPHAEL'S CATHEDRAL. ST. PATRICK'S CATHOLIC CHURCH charter the second. Local leadership accelerated with the announcement in 1929 that Archbishop James J. KEANE had been chosen to serve on the Bureau of Catholic Extension of the Scout Movement, part of the National Council of Catholic Men. (2) Archbishop Francis J.L. BECKMAN appointed H. J. Lott as the Lay Chairman for the Archdiocese of Dubuque in 1938. For Catholic adult Scout leaders, the first year of "Scouter retreats" was held in 1938. Archbishop Beckman also delivered the sermon at the July 4 Pontifical Mass at the base of the Washington Monument in 1937 at the National Scout Jamboree. At the time the honorary vice-chairman of the Bishop's Committee on Scouting, Archbishop Beckman also gave the benediction at the Grand National Convocation.

Archbishop Beckman remained a towering supporter of Scouting in the archdiocese. In September, 1942 addressed a meeting for Catholic leaders and civic leaders meeting to discuss the wartime situation. Archbishop Beckman stressed the need for a workable program between parents and children to maximize backing for the Scout program. Kenneth Cook, assistant to the director of the division of operations for the BSA, addressed methods of making a Catholic layman's committee more effective in wartime.

From October 13-15, 1936 the 3rd Annual Conference of the Catholic Committee on Scouting was held at the HOTEL JULIEN. The conference, part of the 5th Annual Catholic Action Week, was attended by over forty Catholic Diocesan Scout Chaplains.

Cooperation among the Scout Councils in the Dubuque diocese led to the first formal meeting on October 16, 1933 at LaSalle Hall in Cedar Falls. One of the goals from this meeting was to have, by February 1, 1934 a total of fifty Catholic troops and 1,000 Scouts in these Catholic troops. Dubuque had the target of 450 Scouts. The state-wide conference for the Catholic Boy Scout leaders were held in the Julien Hotel in Dubuque on April 11, 1948.

From October 13-15, 1936 the 3rd Annual Conference of the Catholic Committee on Scouting was held at the HOTEL JULIEN. The conference, part of the 5th Annual Catholic Action Week, was attended by over forty Catholic Diocesan Scout Chaplains.

Concern that Scouting be allowed to soften religious teaching was cleared stated in the 1952 Scouting for Catholics, a 56-page booklet printed by the Catholic Committee on Scouting. The following was stated:

                         Church units are definitely labeled as Catholic, Protestant, or Jewish. A
                         Catholic parent who permits his boy to join a unit affiliated with a non-
                         Catholic church has this matter definitely on his own conscience. This
                         creates an obligation for the Scout chaplain or the pastor to endeavor to
                         help that parent form the right conscience. Scouting for Catholic boys can
                         best be carried out in a closed church unit. (4)

Catholic Scout retreats were championed by Rev. Theobald who scheduled the first at Camp Burton on June 21-24, 1934. This was an outgrowth of a proposal he had submitted and discussed at the 1937 Chaplains Conference and had later distributed nationally. The paper provided advice on how to plan for, staff, and conduct the retreat. He used this format within the Dubuque diocese for many years. The popularity of retreats grew so that by 1952 courses were being taught nationwide at seminaries by the Catholic Youth Organization Director of Diocese Scout Chaplains. (5)

A "religious award/emblem" is not a Scouting award. It is a "church award" conferred upon a Scout by his pastor or religious leader. The first church award for any denomination was the Ad Altare Dei Cross pioneered by the Archdiocese of Los Angeles in the 1920s. Objections to the award disappeared quickly. To earn the emblem, a Scout had to have reached the First Class status and have served as an "altar boy" for 250 consecutive hours. A gold bar could be earned and placed across the ribbon for an additional 250 hours. In 1939 six Scouts from Troop 25 were the first in the City of Dubuque to receive the award. These Scouts included James Burd, Adrian Gerken, Donald Gerken, Leo Hartman, Richard Noel, and Charles Uthe. (6)

In 1940 the Dubuque Archdiocese set the following requirements for the award;

• 250 hours of service as an alter boy with up to 200 hours being earned prior to becoming a First Class Scout
• certification from the pastor or the sisters to attest to the boy's decorum and fitness
• at a minimum, the boy had to have earned the rank of First Class Scout
• knowledge requirements for the sacred vessels, knowledge of the Mass, and identification of its various parts

By the spring of 1942, there had been 2,584 crosses awarded nationally. Gradually the requirements changed. Being an altar boy was dropped with such replacements as singing in the choir, attendance at such groups as the Junior Holy Name Society, and participating in parochial religious study clubs.

Awards for Scouts led to increasing interest in awards being available for adult leaders. The idea of using Ad Altare Dei Cross to honor adults who had made outstanding service to youth was considered. The result was the creation of the Saint George Award which was first presented nationally in 1954. In 1955 Archbishop Leo BINZ made the first presentation of the award in Dubuque to Leo Dunbar of Cedar Falls, Don Maresh of Cedar Rapids, and Arnold Stierman of Dubuque. The third annual presentation of the award included Leo Mohr of Dubuque, Frank Drahozal of Cedar Rapids, John Koch of Waterloo, and Arnold Staudt of Marble Rock. (7) It was a tradition in the Dubuque diocese for many years to hold a mass and present emblems to all Catholic Scouts who had earned a religious emblem the previous year and St. George emblems to adults at the same Mass. (8)

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Sources:

1. Lewis, Paul W. Scouting in Northeast Iowa 1910-1959, Dubuque, IA, S4 Carlisle Publishing Services, 2017, p. 21

2. Ibid., p. 225

3. Ibid., p. 233

4. Ibid.

5. Ibid., p. 239

6. Ibid., p. 244

7. Ibid., p. 246

8. Ibid., p. 248