Scouting celebrates 100 years in Oak Bay
Stan Petley-Jones was a scout leader for more than half a century in Oak Bay. Here he shows a sketch of Boy Scouts founder Lord Baden- Powell that he used to joke with his troops was a picture of himself.
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Movement was originally just for boys, but girls and women plentiful in today’s troops
When Erin Evans packs up to go camping at Sechelt this month, it won’t be with her husband and family.
Instead, Evans, 24, will head out with seven Rovers and Venturers aged 14 to 26 – the young adult levels of Scouts. And although she could use the skills she’s acquired through years of scouting – tying knots, building a shelter or starting a fire come to mind – what draws her to the weekend away is what has kept her in Scouts for almost a dozen years: camaraderie.
“We work as a big collaborative family,” Evans said about Venturers and Rovers groups that include young members from 13 to 26. “It’s not like ‘oh, you’re 14 and you’re 20 so we can’t talk to each other’ – we do everything together.”
Scouting started in Oak Bay over 100 years ago, part of the Boy Scout Movement founded by Britain’s Lord Robert Baden-Powell. In Oak Bay the first scout groups started up in 1909.
Extremely popular in the 1940s and ’50s, multiple troops then attracted up to 30 boys in Oak Bay alone. Canadian author Pierre Berton was an Oak Bay scout when he lived in Victoria as a youth. Originally boys and girls were segregated: boys into Beavers, Cubs and Scouts, and girls into Brownies, Guides and Pathfinders.
Stan Petley-Jones was a Scout leader for 52 years, most of those years with 12th Garry Oak Scout troop in Oak Bay. Now 98 and living in Oak Bay with his wife Frances, Petley-Jones said he was doubtful when it was suggested that girls be allowed to join Scouts in 1998.
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