This year marks the 100th Anniversary of the Boy Scouts of
America (BSA). The BSA theme this year is "Get Into the Game" based
on geocaching. Many states are participating in the Cache to Eagle Series
(CTE). Vermont is participating with three geocaches hidden in
each of our BSA Districts:
- Ethan Allen District - Serving Addison, Bennington and Rutland
Counties.Bennington, Clarendon,
Pittsford
- Calvin Coolidge District - Serving Windsor and Windham
Counties. Guilford, Royalton,
Springfield
- Three Rivers District - Serving Chittenden, Franklin, Grand
Isle and Western Lamoille counties. Williston, Jericho/Underhill, and St. Albans
- Long Trail District - Serving Orleans, Essex, Caledonia,
Washington and Orange Counties. Brookfield,
Stowe, Derby
Each of the 12 geocaches is placed near a local Eagle Project.
There are hundreds of Eagle Projects throughout Vermont and we are
hoping to showcase more than the 12 that are part of this series.
Why only 12? Why these particular towns? The CTE series guidelines
allow only 12 caches. During my research, I found out about many
other caches in the state, but had to chose locations that were
spreadout enough in the state (only a 4.5 difficulty because I
couldn't land the NEK corner 
) and were locations that were geocache
friendly. Please list and describe Eagle projects in your area that
were not a part of this series. Pictures would be excellent. Let's
take this opportunity to show off all of the work our Scouts have
done and share your own Scouting stories!
History of Scouting in Vermont and in the US
William Foster Milne (1885-1920) emigrated to Barre in the year
1907 from Aberdeen Scotland. He had been active in the early
scouting movement there. Milne brought with him the idea and
knowledge of "scouting", which he had learned in his former
homeland as a member of the early British organizations. Upon his
arrival here in Barre Vermont learned that there were no scouting
organizations yet in America. Milne became determined to establish
a similar "Boy Scout Club" at the First Baptist Church here during
the summer of 1909. Later, Milne was officially recognized by Sir
Francis Fletcher Vane of the British Boy Scouts (BBS) as "The
First Scoutmaster in America."
The Homer Fitts Company initiated a contest on October 29, 1909
and issued a coupon for each pair of shoes sold. The winner of the
contest would be the person to collect the most coupons for shoe
sales. The winner of that contest was Harry Kent of Barre, who was
the Assistant Scout Master to Troop 1 of the Boy Scout Club. The
boys grouped together to combine the most coupons to win the prize
of a "fine Traverse Sled" which became the property of the
troop.
A granite memorial to the first Boy Scout troop in America and
its scoutmaster, William Foster Milne, was dedicated on November 3,
1947 by Barre Mayor Chauncey Willy. Since the exact date of the
origination was not known. The date of October 29, 1909 was used as
the earliest known date official of the organization.
About the Cache
Cache requirements - you must
complete all of the other 12 CTE caches - (see bookmark list) to be
eligible for a find at the bonus. Any logs without fullfilling this
requirement, will be deleted.
That being said, the posted coordinates will take you to this
granite memorial. You need to take a bearing of 115 degrees
magnetic for 140 feet to find the final. Yes, you can likely use
your GPSr to do the projection, but in keeping with the Scouting
tradition, try to use a good old fashioned compass. Good luck and
congratulations on completing the series!
The FTF will also receive a special prize in addition to the FTF
"Get Into the Game" geocoin. The first 20 finders will receive a
special "Cache to Eagle" patch via mail. (picture below) Only one
per caching group please. For example, there are 4 Stings so there
would only be one patch for our family. If you would like
additional patches for your group, they can be purchased at
geoscouting.org.
A special note about the "Get Into
the Game" geocoins. There are only 30 in the entire state of
Vermont and we have well over 200 cachers in the state. It would be
really nice if geocaching groups kept only one if you are lucky
enough to FTF on more than one CTE cache. If anyone does FTF more
than one CTE, I am willing to offer a different FTF prize from EMS.
Thank you in advance for sharing!!!
Special thanks to the cachers who agreed to be part of
the CTE team - in alphabetical order - bevanQ, catoz and VT_EMT,
ChittDirt, crowbait, cwgray, DeweyDoubleD, DJ and CAL, hayred,
Qseekers, scubatime, VT-Spike, and yoopers. They hid the caches
throughout the state and many of them outside of their local
caching area. Thank you to NH Zamboni for keeping track of all of
the caches for several months leading up to the kickoff date! We
hope you enjoy the series!
