News : It all began with a Daisy: Girl Scouts continue to celebrate 100th year

Area Girl Scouts played old-fashioned games while celebrating the 100th year of the organization.

Daisy-shaped planters honor the founder of Girl Scouts.

A visit from a North Benton Ambulance crew was a highlight of the day.

The area GS leaders.

Even after their big celebration recently, the Vinton area Girl Scouts continue to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the organization.

The celebration will continue May 5, at the Vinton airport.

Originally, we were working to include a flight simulator as part of the day’s activities, but that has grown into a separate collaborative effort with FlyIowa that will take place Saturday, May 5, at the Vinton airport And, we still have Girl Scout cookies available . . . just contact a local Girl Scout in Vinton or Shellsburg for delivery!!!

Girl Scout History

Girl Scouts was founded on March 12, 1912, by Juliette “Daisy” Gordon Low in Savannah, Georgia. The original Girl Scout troop there was composed of 16 girls, aged 15 to 18. Today there are over 3 million Girl Scouts and 60 million Girl Scout alumnae in the United States! Now a century has passed and millions of Americans have taken the Girl Scout promise, sold cookies by the truckload and gone on to careers from CEO to astronaut. Haven’t seen it yet, but hear that the Girl Scout sign was coopted by Katniss Everdeen in the “Hunger Games” movie! The oldest living Girl Scout at this time is Amelia “Milly” Bowden England, age 111, who joined the Girl Scouts in her hometown, New Bedford, Massachusetts, in 1914.

Vinton celebration

On Saturday, March 31, 2012, Girl Scouts and leaders from Vinton gathered at Blessed Hope Church for a Service Unit event, “It All Began With A Daisy . . .” to celebrate the 100th Anniversary founding of the Girl Scouts of the USA. We began our afternoon with a showing of the 1918 film, “The Golden Eaglet,” a black-and-white silent film shot at the actual first troop camp for New York Citygirls with national leader Juliette Low making a special trip to the camp to take part in the film. In the final sequence, founder Juliette Low pins the Golden Eaglet on featured Girl Scout Margaret’s lapel. This is a feature film produced by Girl Scouts in 1918, after the end of World War I, that was shown in movie theaters across the country; it’s believed to be the first motion picture produced by a public service organization.

You can experience some of the early days of Girl Scouting yourself via YouTube from these hyperlinks to girlscoutvideos: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pks_Ah2Q88 and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DT6ZPSUK-ww&feature=relmfu.

Girls and leaders were also able to check out a copy of the 1917 Girl Scout handbook, How Girls Can Help Their Country, written by Juliette Gordon Low, Agnes Baden-Powell and Robert Baden-Powell. The book can be accessed via http://www.gutenberg.org/files/28983/28983-h/28983-h.htm as a download at no cost, which can be read as an ebook, copied, given away or re-used under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License.

During the event, we explored some of the facets of our founder by doing self-portraits, designing pots before planting daisy seeds and decorating Girl Scout Trefoil cookies as daisies for our snack.

After a busy afternoon of being on call, the North Benton Ambulance crew zoomed in, treating the Daisy, Brownie, Junior and Cadette Girl Scouts in attendance to a tour of their ambulance, discussing their job/training, what led them to their career choices of EMT/Firefighter and demonstrating some basic first aid and safety equipment before a quick ride complete with sirens and flashing lights.

And, of course, we played a few Girl Scout games lead by our Cadette Program Aides to celebrate 100 great years, ready for more!!!