Scouting's disappointing slide belies youthful memories

Fifty-three years ago, I attended my final Boy Scout meeting. My life had moved in a different direction and though I had not attained the rank of Eagle, my scouting experience had a profoundly positive effect on me. Even these many years later, I can still recall the Boy Scout oath: "On my honor, I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country; to obey the Scout law; to help other people at all times; to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight."

Thinking back on those words, I can see that the oath had implications that might foretell the issues faced by scouting organizations down the road, but at the time, they were just words we recited at the beginning of each gathering.

I was 11 when I joined the Boy Scouts of America. I was a socially awkward kid who did not make friends easily and felt at the margins of most of my grade-school classmates. My family moved around a great deal, and I rarely attended the same school for more than one year, but when I joined Troop 7, I finally felt as though I had comrades who, for the most part, felt just as disenfranchised by the world around us as I did. Ours was a ragtag group of boys: Christians, Jews and atheists (see my hand in the air on this), nerds, jocks, gay and straight, large and small. We were just kids, but we wore the same uniform, which placed us all in the same tribe, so it didn't matter where we came from or what might be our personal beliefs or proclivities. We were first and foremost Boy Scouts.

Since that time, I have watched from the sidelines as my beloved BSA transitioned into a less tolerant, more religious and increasingly homophobic organization. Many of the boys, including me, who were a part of my troop, would not have been welcome in scouting in 2010. The past few years have seen the BSA become a bit more open in a few of their policies, but I doubt if it will ever be as I remember it, and perhaps Troop 7, being that it was based in Berkeley, California, was out of the mainstream of scouting evening back in the early 1960s.

The recent declaration of a reorganizational bankruptcy was seemingly inevitable considering the number of lawsuits claiming inattention by the national leaders of the BSA with regard to abusive scout masters. Yet, the lessons I learned as a scout have stayed with me all my life and I am deeply saddened by the dysfunctional nature of an organization that made such a difference in so many lives.

One example in particular is a message I use in explaining why I am driven to write, to be involved in my community and to help my friends and neighbors in any way I can. The message that rings so clear over all the years is to always leave a campsite in better shape than when you arrived. To me, the earth is my campsite and I arrived here in August of 1951. My sincerest hope is to leave this world a better place than when I arrived. It is a monumental task and one that has been a self-made burden since my scouting days, but it is one that I cannot let go of, nor do I want to let go of it.

So I thank the Boy Scouts of America for giving me this gift of a lifelong goal. The experience I had, and the experiences of so many other people I know, is indelible and I wish the organization all the best in their quest to reinvent themselves. I will keep watching from the sidelines with my fingers crossed.

• Tobin Fraley, of Mundelein, is a photographer, co-founder of the Long Grove Arts & Music Council and a former Long Grove Plan Commission member.