When you think of the people most influential to Scouting's
history in the United States, names like W.D. Boyce, James West,
and, of course, Lord Baden-Powell come to mind as three of the
several founding fathers of the Boy Scouts of America. Well
here's another name for your consideration: Stanley Harris.
Harris, who was born in 1882, was highly influential in
extending the Boy Scouts of America program to African American
and Native American boys in the 1910s and 1920s. And this week,
the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources is honoring
Harris with a highway historical marker. The special dedication
ceremony, during which the patch seen at left will be
distributed, is Saturday in Boone, N.C. Boone is where Harris
lived for the last 30 years of his life, and it's where he was
buried when he died in 1976. Harris was an avid outdoorsman in
Kentucky in the 1900s when he began reading about the Boy Scout
movement happening in Great Britain. He then applied for and
received a charter from Baden-Powell