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For a century, the Sea Scout program has been putting teens in boats, teaching them important life skills, and turning out accomplished young people ready for exciting lives of curiosity and achievement.
Sea Scouts learn all about boat safety techniques, navigation, technical skills, and how to keep our waters and coastline clean, and they sure have a blast together in the process.
When BoatUS Magazine ran a cover story in 1999 about a unique youth boating program that not only gets teens on the water, but develops character and leadership qualities through nautical skills and seamanship, it generated lots of mail. Many readers said, in essence, something like: "Gee, I wish Sea Scouting had been around when I was a kid." Fact is, the program was around back then — no matter when you were young — because Sea Scouting celebrates its 100th anniversary in 2012.
Born in England between 1907 and 1911 as a nautical counterpart to Boy Scouting, it arrived on U.S. shores the following year under the auspices of the Boy Scouts of America. Like all scouting programs, Sea Scouting uses an attractive venue — in this case it's the fun and adventure that boating offers — coupled with activities such as mastering seamanship and nautical skills in order to foster confidence, teach management, develop leadership, and instill character in young people. Over the years, Sea Scouting has figured prominently in the lives of many accomplished Americans. They range from Paul A. Siple who accompanied Admiral Richard Byrd to Antarctica and went on to become a distinguished geographer and explorer, to William H. Webster whom President Jimmy Carter appointed FBI director and who later headed the Central Intelligence Agency under President Ronald Reagan. Closer to the boating world, Dawn Riley, the first-ever woman skipper in America's Cup racing, learned to sail as a Sea Scout in Michigan, and songwriting legend Jimmy Buffett, just to name a few, are some of the extremely talented and dedicated people admired for their accomplishments, who started as Sea Scouts.
The History Of Sea Scouts
1907
A five-day experimental Scout camp on Brownsea Island in Dorset, England, becomes the first recorded Sea Scouting activity worldwide.
1912
"Sea or Water Scouts" founded in the U.S. with Arthur A. Carey of Waltham, Massachusetts, using the schooner Pioneer, and Charles Longstreth of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, using the motor yacht Arawan II. (Longstreth's Handbook on Nautical Scouting, the first Sea Scout handbook, was published in 1915.)
1917
Nautical Scouting is renamed Sea Scouting and veteran sailor, global traveler, artist, and Scouting volunteer James Austin Wilder is named Chief Sea Scout. A boy must be 15 years of age and weigh at least 112 pounds to join.
1922-1927
Commander Thomas J. Keane revises the Sea Scout program with new requirements for advancement and a seagoing uniform still worn today.
1925
Membership reaches 1,100 Sea Scouts in 85 Ships.
1932
Membership increases to 14,863 Sea Scouts.
1936
Owen W. Matthews, an Able Sea Scout, Boatswain, Eagle Scout, and member of National Flagship S.S.S. Columbia, won the Eddie Canton $5,000 scholarship for his essay, "How Can America Stay Out Of War" — chosen as the best from 212,000 submitted essays.
1938
The Sea Promise, which an Apprentice still must memorize today, is instituted. It reads: As a Sea Scout I promise to do my best — To guard against water accidents, To know the location and proper use of the life-saving devices on every boat I board, To be prepared to render aid to those in need, To seek to preserve the Motto of the Sea, "Women and Children First."
1941
Sea Scout membership peaks at 27,715.
1942
With the outbreak of war, Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox offers current and former Sea Scouts and leaders with at least two years of college immediate commissions in the U.S. Navy. (It's believed that more than 75,000 Sea Scouts and Sea Scout leaders served in the Navy, U.S. Coast Guard, and Merchant Marine.)
1969
The program becomes co-educational.
1987
As part of the 75th anniversary celebration, National Boatswain Melissa A. "Missy" Marenka presents the Boy Scouts of America "Report to the Nation" to President Ronald Reagan.
1998
Volunteer Sea Scout adult leader Jimmie S. Homberg named first female National Commodore.
2002
BoatUS reinstitutes the Sea Scout National Flagship Award, not presented since World War II, to mark the 90th anniversary of Sea Scouting in the U.S. It recognizes unit excellence, and Ship 502 of Houston, Texas, takes the honor.
2009
Ohio-based Sea Scout Ship 41 wins the first Interlux Yacht Finishes Waterfront Challenge, earning a $30,000 grand prize for designing the "flotsam scoop" to aid in the cleanup of beaches and marinas.
2012
Sea Scouting turns 100. Sea Scouting is found today in approximately 50 countries worldwide.
In Sea Scouting, local units are called "ships" and it's the crew, under supervision of qualified adults, that manages the ship and its activities. The crews, comprised of young people aged 14 to 21, hold positions in a chain of command as they work their way individually toward mastering various boating-focused and life skills in order to progress through the ranks of Apprentice, Ordinary, Able, and Quartermaster. While they're at it, Sea Scouts can earn distinctions, similar to Merit Badges in Boy and Girl Scouts, such as Small Boat Handler, Scuba Diver, First Aid, and Long Cruise (earned for a two-week voyage), as well as many community-service recognitions.
A strong part of the appeal is that with the Sea Scouts themselves at the helm, a ship can focus its activities and related training to the crews' interests, rather than that of the adults. While a ship may concentrate on sailing competition, for example, another may focus on powerboat cruising. Sea Scouts can adapt all manner of water recreation-based activity to their programs, from dinghy racing, to waterskiing, to sportfishing, to scuba diving. It's not uncommon for a Sea Scout ship that you might think of as landlocked — one based in the Midwest or the Rocky Mountains, for example — to conduct a "long cruise" activity with a bareboat charter in Puget Sound, the Great Lakes, or even the Caribbean. Many Sea Scout ships log more "boat time" on the water than the average adult boater.
Nothing "Ordinary" About Earning This Rank
Every Sea Scout starts by earning the rank of Apprentice, which requires learning basic boating and safety skills as well as demonstrating the ability to swim 75 yards. Here's a small sampling of the nautical skills a Sea Scout must master to advance to the next rank, Ordinary. See if you can pass muster:
- Practice drills for man overboard, fire, and abandon ship.
- Tie and explain the use of seven specific knots including a French bowline, stevedore's knot, and midshipman's hitch.
- Calculate length of anchor rode needed in 10, 20, and 30 feet of water in normal and storm conditions.
- Define stand-on and give-way vessels for meeting, crossing, and overtaking — both power and sail.
- On a paper chart, locate your position from given coordinates and determine coordinates of five aids-to-navigation.
- Make a three-stranded Turk's head and a monkey's fist, and use either to make up a heaving line.
Sea Scout membership peaked at the beginning of World War II, and today the program involves more than 7,200 youth. Just over a third are young women. The 520 ships nationwide are supported by some 4,600 adult volunteers.
Today's Sea Scouts are tomorrow's future leaders, and skilled, responsible adult boaters. Marinas and yacht clubs are always needed to form new ships, and even well-established ships offer opportunities to help the next generation. From adult volunteer leaders to meeting speakers, from behind-the-scenes supporters to hosts for outings on the water, there are many ways you can make a meaningful contribution to Sea Scouting and help keep it on course for the next century.
For more information about how you can help, or how to enroll a young boater you know, or to find a ship near you, visit Seascout.org.