The Maui news. [volume] (Wailuku, Maui, H.I.) 1900-current, 1921-01-07
With the Alert Boy Scouts of Maui

before him stretches the %alluring line
Of Merit Badges" Electricity, bee
farming, automobling, swimming,
handicraft, art. cooking-there are
and every talent or hobby
has a place. A scout with two or
three of the little emblems on his
is fired with ambition to add
them, slowly but steady, until with
the tw%enty-frst he earns a silver
badge, and is an Eagle Scout" Think
of the lines of practical endeavor with
whose fundamentals he has become
familiar! The w~ork-a-day world, so
vague and mysterious to the ordinary
boy when he reaches its threshold, is
definite and clear to the scout.
Nor does the boy who risks his life
for recognition. TO his surprise, he
receives a bronze or silver medal
from National Headquarters and a
letter which means even more. Perhaps
if his bravery had been particularly re
markable. as was that of a scout in
Houston, Texas, the whole city turns
out to see the Mayor pin it on his
jacket.
Newsboy Wins Honors
He is a thirteen year old n%ewsboy,
this Texas honor scout, but all year
had studied scout work without
missing a meeting. He was hurrying
through his evening route when he
heard a scream. A little boy, play
ing in the street, had experimental
with a clothes wire as a lasso. Flung
over the trolley wire, it carried the
current, and the child struggling in
pain could not remove his hands from
the burning wire. over dashed the
plucky newsboy, at first hardly, rea-
soning out what to do. He grasped the
little boys legs to pull him away, but
instead received the full shock him
self and was thrown violently to the
side of the road. Undaunted, he jump.
ed up, and as he did so he emem-
bered his stock of papers. Paper
is a non-conductor of electricity" ran
the first aid maxim. Folding several
sheets around his hands, he held
ready and though conscious of
the danger ran back to the child.
the extra papers around him
the plucky scout pulled him safely off.
Passers-by had watched in awe. A
came out and carried the scream
ing child into the house. His hands
severely burned, the boy begged for
ice to hold, and sympathetic elders
to get it. mo ice" spoke up
tie pale little rescuer. THAT will only
hurt him worse. You must put on
something soothing" And he told
them what to do, without self-scon-
seriousness or Dragging. The child's
hands were saved and off went the
newsboy to finish delivering his depict
ed stock of papers. But the child's
parents heard of it and the motor.
man and ~passers-by spread the story
and soon he had a letter from rhe
president of the street car company
and then the Mayor, and best of all
own Scoutmaster. When the media,
was sent from headquarters it was
the occasion for a dignified p%resenta-
ton, with all the scouts as a body
guard, and newspapermen and cameras
everywhere, but when it was all over
the scout went back to his ruote and
the praise that might so easily
worried his head.
Road Not Smooth
OF course, all scouts haven't a
to be such spectacular heroes,
but they go right ahead with their
everyday life in the same spirit of
bravery. 1t means as great a sacrifice
to some to give up a hike to help
mother with the dishes or to close his
ears to the whistle of his patrol when
a garden is to be weeded. Some city
boys must watch themselves constant
ly to guard against the profanity they
almost unconsciously and hear
all about them, or must grit their
teeth, when they hear the jeers oc-
casiOned by refusing the cigarette
offered by a n time idol. Some
adults forget how sensitive a boy is
TO ridicule, how he hates to be thought
different from other fellows; others
are so partial that they encourage
their sons to selfishness and lack of
consideration for others. Both boyish
faults are met by the scout training.
which teaches the boys not to be
afraid to do what seems right to them
and always to remember taht a scout
is a brother to every other scout anG
a friend to all the world.
All too often parents who have
brought up a boy with careful watch
fulness and have known his comrades
and have thought they could account
for every moment of his day, have
suddenly been shocked when he ran
away, or lourishing a covertly obtain
ed gun, wounded a comrade or him
self. An inquiry revealed a mass of
buried untruths and perverted ideals,
drawn from some undreamt of
ource that no careful oversight has
traced. How, perhaps under the boys
bed, an investigating mother discovers
TO her horror Nick Carter, Dick Dead
eye or their fellows. Reading! What
a scope for suggestion and inspiration
or the REVERSED!
Good Reading Encouraged
Here again the Scout movement has
seen its chance. A special commission
on which library experts, busy pub
fishers and boy psychologists serve
gratuitously, attacked the almost in
superable difficulty of assisting
parents to regulate the boys reading
matter. A list of good books was
drawn up-stories of adventure with
out ~falsehoods and equally damaging
half-truths, yet full of fun and whole