Troop 120 at Campsite Walnut at H. Roe Bartle Scout Reservation - July 2006

Note: This story was published in The Odessan - but with a large number of editorial changes and inaccuracies. Here it is as written by Luke and Evan for their Journalism merit badge project.

On the 20th of July, Troop 120 left for Boy Scout camp, a 10 day long camp for earning merit badges. We rented a bus from Randy Small, which we used to get down to Iconium, MO, a small town outside of Osceola. 48 people went down, 31 scouts and 17 leaders. There are six days in those ten when we go to merit badge classes at certain times throughout the day, most often for an hour each, plus one makeup day, when we could go to any of our classes that we didn’t finish on time at any point during the day. We earned more badges than we had ever before earned, totaling 186.

Luke, one of our older scouts, took a total of three badges in camp, but forgot to do a part of one of them, which is why he took part in this article. This is a part of the Journalism merit badge, a class that was just added this year to the available ones in camp. He also worked on Fish and Wildlife Management, and Truck Transportation, the latter taught by Hugh Procter, one of our leaders. I, Evan Johnson, took part in five, which were Journalism, Soil and Water Conservation, Pioneering, Forestry, and Truck Transportation.

Scouts did different things in their spare time. One of the things most scouts did was listen to our bard, Austin Snyder, play his guitar and sing for us, along with his cohort, Andrew Godsey. Some of the younger kids went to the trading post to buy slushies, which is a lot of crushed ice with sugar and flavoring. One of our kids made money off of that because some people were too lazy to actually go and buy, so Ezra Begemann set up a service, where for two dollars, he would fetch your slushies, which only cost one dollar. We also were able to go to the pool for an hour every day.

For the scouts down at camp who are higher in rank, there is an honor group based on Indian lore called Mic-O-Say. The first rank in Mic-O-Say is Brave, and then is followed by Warrior. Once you are a Warrior, you earn duties in a certain order, which are Firebuilder, Tom-Tom Beater, Runner, Keeper of the Sacred Bundle, and then by forms of true leadership. Troop 120 had 3 new Braves: Keith Gass, Daniel Long, and myself, Evan Johnson, and 1 new Warrior; Luke Proctor. Additional Tribal duties assigned were 1 Firebuilder, Andrew Godsey, Tom-Tom Beaters Austin Snyder and Micheal Rambo, and Runner, Eli Gass. Additionally, our troop had 4 new Foxmen, an honor recognizing Scouts who are "in training" to become Mic-O-Say Tribesmen. James Addington, Bryan Long, Ian Porter and Matt Wildschuetz all became Foxmen this year.

Thanks to all the leaders, as we couldn’t have done it without you.

Written by Luke Procter, Evan Johnson.