Back in the OA

Last Thursday I attended my first Order of the Arrow chapter meeting in the newly organized Scouting District 14. All the districts in the Great Salt lake Council were realigned at the end of 2012. About 80 Scouting units, Cubs, Scouts, Varsity, and Ventures, were taken away from Golden Eagle District and added to the White Buffalo District. Many other units were moved around and in and out of other districts as well. I went to the Ta Tanka Ska Chapter meeting with a little bit of sadness since I had been in the Wamblee Chapter (Golden Eagle) since 1981. I named it. It was my chapter for over thirty years.

In 1981, the Golden Eagle District needed an OA advisor. The chapter was dead-no active members and no one to get it going again. (It has had to be resurrected a few more times over the last thirty years.) So the district chairman submitted my name to the lodge advisor, Dave Halliday. I was a Blazer Leader (eleven year old Scout leader) at the time, but I was not a member of the Order of the Arrow. When Dave Halliday called and asked me to take over and rebuild the chapter, I told him I wasn't a member. "That's alright," he said. "There is an Ordeal next week. Be on it. Oh, and there is the LECM (Lodge Executive Committee Meeting) this Thursday. Please be there." So I went to the meeting on Thursday and to the Ordeal the next weekend. Wayne Jacobsen and Dave Jager helped me out as assistant advisers, and we went to the Scouting units and held elections until we had a few young men who could take the leadership positions.

It took us a year to organize a group of dedicated young men, like Brent Shaw, Scott Hogge and many others to serve as Chiefs and Vice-Chiefs in the chapter. We organized a dance team and a ceremony team and assisted the lodge with Ordeals and other programs. We created an Eagle Court of Honor program and an Arrow of Light program for the Cub Scouts. We were doing dance programs and ceremonies in our district and all over the south end of the Salt Lake Valley. The second year, Wamblee Chapter was fourth in the lodge for service hours. The third and fourth years, our chapter was Chapter of the Year.

During the second year of my tenure as advisor, I was called as Scoutmaster to Troop 420. Between the OA chapter and the troop, there were months when I was gone from home three and sometimes four nights a week and two weekends a month. I was so busy with the OA and being Scoutmaster that my wife said one or the other had to go or she would. Since Scoutmaster was my church assignment, and I kind of liked her, I let go of my responsibilities in the OA, and Wayne Jacobsen and Dave Jager took over. I served for a few years as a part time assistant advisor, but slowly gave it up. Later the Golden Eagle District was divided, and Wayne and Dave were in the new White Buffalo District.

During my advisor years, I became a Brotherhood member and a Vigil Honor member of the OA. My last big hurrah with the OA was in the summer of 1990 when I was on staff for the OA Junior Leader Training, called Coup Trail.

Because I have been active in many church and Scouting assignments and work over the last twenty-five years, I haven't been able to do much with the Order of the Arrow. I have paid my dues and slipped into a meeting or two when attending District Round Tables as an Assistant District Commissioner, but that is not much. However, serving in the local Scouting units does fulfil the Obligation of the Brotherhood of Cheerful Service. My wife is happy to have me do some OA stuff again, so I will give it a whirl. Wayne Jacobsen is the advisor of Ta Tanka Ska Chapter, and I will serve as one of the associate advisers, along with several old friends from the past-from the Wamblee Chapter past.