Scouting in Hawaii - Early History Prior To Statehood (1908-1960)

Early History Prior To Statehood (1908-1960)

The first troop in the islands, appropriately numbered Troop 1, was founded by a British Scouter just recently relocated, and chartered to Kawaiahaʻo Church. One Saturday, former Queen Liliʻuokalani was driven past Kapiʻolani Park in Honolulu, and noticed this troop going through Scouting drills. She stopped and enquired what manner of military play this was, and the Scouts eagerly explained the concept of Scouting to her. On a following Saturday a month later, the Queen reappeared, and presented to the troop a Hawaiian flag. Emblazoned upon the red-white-and-blue stripes were the Hawaiian royal crest and the lettering in gold The Queen's Own Troop, which she had labored at herself. As the Scoutmaster was an Englishman, in their tradition of naming rather than numbering troops, the appellation stuck. The unit claiming longest continuous charter is Troop 1.

Troop 5 up until the early 1980s held the distinction of the longest continuously chartered Unit in Hawaii. It was Troop 5 that was known as "The Queen's Own Troop" that received the flag which was made by her own hands. The flag was held by the Liliuokalani Trust until it was given to the Aloha Council BSA by a previous Assistant Scoutmaster, David Jeong of Troop 5. The flag was given as part of the Centennial Celebration of Scouting in 2010 . One of Troop 5's Scoutmasters, "Kimo" James Austin Wilder was also a founder of the Sea Scout program.

David McHattie Forbes was the founder of Scouting in Waimea in the early 1900s.

In 1946, Scouts helped re-introduce the endangered Nene into the Haleakala National Park by carrying young birds into the Haleakala Crater in their backpacks.

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