Roger Saunders, 90 years old, remembersTroop 12 as a scout and leader.

00:01 Hi.

00:01 We're here with Roger at the 100 year anniversary of 212 Boy Scouts of America, Hollis, New Hampshire. Nice to meet you, Roger. Can you tell us a little about yourself? Introduce yourself and tell us about your involvement with the troop.

00:14 And I'm Roger Saunders. I'm a long time resident of Hollis. I'm 90 years old. I was first involved with group twelve back when I joined in 1945 and was a member through my graduation from high school in 1950. And later when my son became a scout in 1975, I became an assistant scoutmaster, most particularly in Walton trips, and stayed in that role until 1980.

00:59 What were some of your favorite memories from your time with troop twelve, Roger?

01:05 Well, I must say I don't have a lot of memories from back in the forties. There wasn't a great deal going on in scouting at that time. We had our meetings worked and merit badges and things like that. Occasionally go out to Rocky Pond or something like that. One of the big tweets in my personal case at that point was when I got old enough to have a license. My parents let me drive to the scout meeting so he wouldn't have to take me and take me up.

01:51 A lot of history later.

01:56 When I was an assistant scoutmaster, the troop was a lot more active. And I particularly remember a trip that we took up to to hike the knife hedge trail, which was exciting in itself, came back down, set up our camp in the campground. Everyone had tents. And the unusual thing was that at 02:00 a.m. the park ranger came running up and said, there's a fire up here. Everybody's going to get out right now. So at 02:00 a.m. we folded up our camping gear, tents, sleeping bags and everything. And I remember the scouts recognized quietly they should all bring a fly flight because we had to lead ourselves down that trail to the cars, which was quite a long distance. In a pitch black night through the woods on the trail, got down to the cars and drove off to a golf course. The first thing we found, and everybody just kind of spread themselves out on the ground, golf course and slept the rest of the night. And then we had to go home because.

03:38 That'S an interesting story. Do you still keep track of your friends story, scouting what friendships have endured?

03:48 Some. Some of the kids that were in scouts with my son still live here in Hollis the great Bergeron But aside from that, I don't have a lot of associations. Well, I know some of the leaders that have been very active now, but more from watching their leadership than being.

04:19 Involved what do you think are some of the most valuable things that the Boy Scouts learn being part of troop twelve?

04:29 Well, I think one of the most important things is to learn more self reliance, the ability to plan, prepare, participate in activities that are nothing, just normal everyday doing the school as a real thing and get some self confidence in being able to deal with those situations.

04:59 A lot of the boys that come through the program are very self reliant. They go up to the White Mountains. They know how to handle themselves. They don't know what to bring. Equipment. I noticed that as well from my son. Those skills, very valuable. You don't get those anywhere else. But Between Cub twelve and Boy scouts, it's very, very valuable part of their upbringing. So we're celebrating our 100 year anniversary today, Roger, a lot of history. What would you tell people? We're making this time capsule so that folks could listen in the future. What would you tell to people who might be listening to this 50 or 100 years from now? What would you like them to know about troop twelve?

05:45 Well, it's obviously been very resilient. Yes. To keep on going for 100 years is quite old in the country.

05:53 Yeah. Almost as old as Boy Scouts itself, the organization in America.

05:58 Yeah. And the USA has had ups and downs, and it's wonderful that the Hollis group has been able to keep prospering right through those ups and downs in the national situation. Yes.

06:15 It's great that they endured for so much time. Well, great, Roger. So thank you. It's not a pleasure to meet you and thank you for your insights and I hope you enjoy the day. Thank you.

06:31 Thank you. All right.