Y'all might remember that Juliette Gordon Low is my biggest hero. I love so much about her--her passion for travel, her commitment to bettering the lives of girls, the fact that all of her major achievements happened past the age of 50, the way that she normalized living and working and doing so many amazing things with a physical disability. I even kind of love that she was known for being pushy, stubborn, and light on the details of her big plans, because that is just about the opposite of how history normally loves to portray its heroines.
Juliette Gordon Low is a wonderful role model for all kids, but in the Girl Scouting movement it's pretty common to just have the little ones celebrate and learn about her life. The little kids make Flat Juliettes and send them on adventures, learn some facts from her biography, throw her a birthday party around Halloween, and then it's off to learn about insects or social dance or balloon-powered cars.
The occasional lucky troop may make their own pilgrimage to Juliette Gordon Low's home, but most Girl Scouts don't think a lot about Juliette Gordon Low after their first year or two learning about her. And that's such a shame, because as great a role model as she is for any kid, I think she's an especially great role model for the older Girl Scout. The teenaged years are when girls really need all the role models they can get of brave, wild women who travel and do good works and are pushy and stubborn. And Low, herself, had a special affinity for older girls, and would have loved these modern teenagers if she'd ever had the pleasure to meet them.
So here are some of the ways that I like to connect my Girl Scouts with the founder of our movement.
Celebrate Founder's Day and/or National Girl Scout Day
Founder's Day, or Juliette Low's birthday, is on Halloween, and National Girl Scout Day, the officially recognized date of the founding of Girl Scouts, is March 12. I like that they're roughly half a year apart, because if your troop tends to be busy during one holiday, you've got a good shot at them not being super busy on the other!
Juliette Gordon Low was a high society lady, and she loved herself a good tea party. Afternoon tea is actually one of the older Girl Scout experiences that you can book at her birthplace! A DIY version of a tea party is a fun way for Girl Scout to earn the Cadette New Cuisines badge and the Ambassador Dinner Party badge--the Senior Locavore badge doesn't work quite as well for this, but there are some retired Interest Patches that would certainly apply.
Low also loved art, and up to the end of her life was constantly trying to improve her various artistic skills and learning new ones. She particularly loved drawing and sculpture, and learned how to weld as an older adult. Every now and then my Girl Scout troop toys with the idea of attending at Cookies and Canvas-type event, and I've always thought that this would be a fun activity to incorporate into a larger celebration of Low's life.
Both Founder's Day and Juliette Gordon Low's birthday make good occasions for a troop service project. I LOVE service projects that come around yearly, like donating cookies to a local youth shelter right after cookie season and Christmas shopping for economically disenfranchised kids, because it's less for me to have to think about planning for the year and more that the kids can look forward to every year--having activities that kids look forward to is crucial to older Girl Scout retention!
My troop already has yearly service projects planned around cookie season and Christmas, so we've never done anything particular for Founder's Day or Low's birthday, but I've heard of troops that assemble DIY birthday kits containing an aluminum baking pan, boxed cake mix and oil and frosting, a pack of birthday candles, and a Happy Birthday banner to donate to a local food pantry for Founder's Day. I've also heard of troops that create a little green-themed gift set, with onesies, a Juliette Low picture book, a couple of soft toys, and a gift certificate for a year's membership to Girl Scouts when she's old enough, and donate it to local hospitals to pass on to the first girl born on March 12. It's a super cute idea, but you'd definitely have to run it by council first, because I won't be surprised if the cost of membership goes up within the next five years!
Ceremonies
special bags ready to hold the candles for our Eternal Flame ceremony
I'm not personally big on ceremonies, but this was a specific request of one of my older Girl Scouts, so I've been making more of an effort the past couple of years. And since Juliette Low, herself, LOVED a good Girl Scout ceremony, it's definitely something worth incorporating into older Girl Scout meetings.
The Eternal Flame ceremony is a particularly good one for older Girl Scouts, because it's meant to be conducted when there are Girl Scouts who are transitioning away from the troop. My Girl Scout troop conducts this ceremony during our yearly Bridging/Graduation celebration now that we've got a high school graduate or two every year.
We put our own spin on the ceremony in that, after a leader tells the story of Juliette Low and her first troop of Girl Scouts who'd grown up and were ready to fly away and share their spark with the rest of the world, we light our candles in honor of our own Girl Scouts who are about to fly away. As each person's candle is lit, that person shares something about the Girl Scouts we're honoring--a favorite memory, their hopes for her, or just their best wishes. It's a lovely ceremony, and a great end-of-Girl Scouts memory for our graduates.
Other especially good ceremonies for older Girl Scouts include any Scouts' Own, flag ceremonies (you can be proactive and volunteer your troop's services to any civic organizations for their upcoming events), kid-organized Journey ceremonies, and Court of Awards whenever a kid earns the Silver or Gold award.
Badges and Fun Patch Programs
There's never been an official badge related to Juliette Gordon Low, which is a bummer, but the Girl Scout Way badge at any level can easily be themed to her. What there are, though, are thoughtfully created council-based fun patch programs, with plenty of activity suggestions (that you can take or leave, of course--my Girl Scout troop tends to rewrite EVERYTHING!) and beautifully designed patches. Here are three current ones:
Juliette Lowfrom Girl Scouts of North-Central Alabama
Kids don't get enough experience working with primary sources in school, which is a shame, because historical primary sources can be so entertaining! Historical Girl Scout manuals and badge books and leader guides are easy to interest today's Girl Scouts in, and they're wonderful for building historical context and helping a kid feel connected to her Girl Scout history.
My favorite historical primary source to show Girl Scouts is the 1918 silent film, "The Golden Eaglet":
Not only is it absolutely adorable, but it centers the experience of the older Girl Scout!
AND it features a cameo by Juliette Low, herself!
I particularly love how this look at 1918 Girl Scouting shows so much in common with today's Girl Scouts. We still learn first aid, camp and learn how to cook outdoors,. The Child Nurse badge became the Babysitter badge, but what kids lost in not learning how to bathe a baby they've gained in learning Child/Infant First Aid and CPR. And we don't commonly teach the Scout Pace anymore, but after laughing their butts off at it my kids tried it... and it's a BRILLIANT way to cover ground quickly!
At the same time, the kids are always thrilled to bits at the parts that are VERY different from today. Girl Scouts does ZERO marching in formation these days, lol, and there's no semaphore or Morse code (if you want to sneak in some extra history education, you can talk about why Girl Scouts was more militarized in 1918). The kids also marvel at how they'd never walk into the home of someone who was sick and completely take over all the housework, yardwork, and childcare... and then, of course, you can talk about what your troop could do in service instead. Meal Trains and yardwork are services that are still VERY welcome!
It's a little harder to find a connection to Juliette Gordon Low by earning retired Girl Scout badges, even though my troop LOVES to earn retired badges, simply because the physical badges that were available during Low's lifetime are, of course, precious antiques now, and you'd never sew them onto a kid's current Girl Scout vest. But the retired badges that ARE available for love or money on ebay and Facebook groups are still terrifically fun to earn, and get kids involved in activities that are less common today.
Kids generally enjoy just looking through and discussing whatever you can find for them to peruse, whether it's the old Girl Guides or catalogues or issues of American Girl magazine (which used to be run by Girl Scouts before it was run by Pleasant Company) or the 1920s girls' novels written about the adventures of a Girl Scout troop at a female boarding school--think Tom Brown's School Days but even more wholesome! Honestly, the kids love it as a stand-alone activity, but if you wanted to bake in more leadership skills and problem-solving practice and service hours, kids could prepare a presentation for a younger troop or Service Unit meeting.
Travel was one of Juliette Low's enduring passions, so every time we give the gift of travel to our Girl Scouts, we're connecting them to the history of our founder. Low was known to be an exceptionally adventurous traveler for her time, and thought nothing of traveling for months with only very basic necessities at hand, in accommodations and using transportation that was atypical for most tourists coming from Western Europe or North America.
Older Girl Scouts connect with Juliette Low's legacy by learning the skills to become confident trip planners and travelers, from budgeting to figuring out transportation and accommodations to practicing resilience to venturing out of their comfort zones and having big adventures. It's nice that this is still such a key part of the Girl Scout movement, and it's something that my troop absolutely adores.
But of course, Girl Scouts can also pilgrimage to some of the actual places important to Juliette Low! Savannah, Georgia, is a terrific destination for national travel, and taking my own two kids to Juliette Low's home, the home of Girl Scouting, is one of my favorite Girl Scout memories. But anything historically associated with Girl Scouts can forge those same connections, like the national headquarters in New York City, Low's plaque in Washington, DC, or any of the WAGGGS centers--I'm planning for my family to pop by Pax Lodge when we're visiting London this summer so we can participate in the flag ceremony, collect our pins, and hopefully earn one of their fun patches. My excitement is palpable!
Further Reading
These older kids are capable of reading adult biographies of Juliette Gordon Low, but I can't imagine even the most enthusiastic Cadette being interested in the 300-page biography that I recently plowed through, complete with an extensive index and list of primary sources for my further reference pleasure. I like to read non-fiction books about Low and early Girl Scouting/Girl Guiding, however, and I enjoy sharing the best of what I've learned both with my Girl Scout troop and in adult training workshops at the council level.
Children's and picture books, although they're below the reading level of older Girl Scouts, are still enjoyable for them to skim through and talk about during a meeting. You can turn it into a project by handing them a pile of these books and suggesting that they rank them or write book reviews. You can turn it into a service project by suggesting that the troop could buy copies of their favorites to donate to a local public or school library that doesn't already own them.
Here Come the Girl Scouts, by Shana Corey. This is my favorite of the children's books about Low. I think it really captures how exciting it must have been to be an early Girl Scout, and how involved and caring Juliette Low was in working with the children. I always tell fellow Girl Scout volunteers that our professional staff are hired for their passion for providing service to children, NOT for their administrative skills (and it shows, ahem!), and to be honest, that's simply a tradition passed down from our founder, herself.
Helping Hands: A Paper Doll History of the Girl Scout Uniform, by Kathryn McMurtry Hunt. Hint: You can scan these and print them on transparencies or shrink plastic, or change the sizing and make them into charms. You can also color copy them onto super thick cardstock so that each kid can have her own set.
Juliette Gordon Low: The Remarkable Founder of the Girl Scouts, by Stacy A. Cordery. I'd been meaning to read this particular biography for years, so I took COVID as my excuse to finally work through it. The most notable takeaway, to me, is that Low was firmly in favor of making it possible for cognitively-impaired Girl Scouts to earn the Golden Eaglet, and after she retired she even published an opinion piece in their leader magazine encouraging it and opposing an opinion piece written by the current president of Girl Scouts who was against it. My hero!
How the Girl Guides Won the War, by Janie Hampton. This isn't about Low or Girl Scouts, but specifically about the UK Girl Guides during World War 2. Kids were doing the same types of activities on both sides of the ocean, but the Girl Guides had the added terror of the London Blitz to contend with, and it's fascinating to read about ALL of the considerate, caring, brave, helpful, thrifty activities that these children, especially the older ones, participated in.
I've been going hard in cookie mode for the past couple of months, so this is my own personal reminder to incorporate some early Girl Scout history into my next troop meeting. We'll be celebrating finishing up cookie sales, taste-testing ABC Baker cookies and the new Raspberry Rally, writing thank-you notes to businesses that hosted our cookie booths, and updating some of our marketing materials while it's all fresh in our minds--perhaps we can bake the original Girl Scout cookie recipe, too!
P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, dog-walking mishaps, encounters with Chainsaw Helicopters, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!
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