Welcome to the Blue Ridge Scouting History Blog, celebrating stories from the Roanoke Area Council, Piedmont Area Council, and Blue Ridge Mountains Council, BSA. You’ll find here a good assortment of narratives, photos and artifacts from over the years, going back to our first council’s origins in 1915. This project has had many versions over the past 25 years, and has grown into a robust archive of stories, images, newspaper articles and other source documents. If you wish to contribute any of the above, please contact the editor by using our Contact Form. In the name of preservation, we appreciate your help!
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Hankins Tales: Life Moves Pretty Fast
(Originally posted to social media on August 28, 2020) “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around every once in a while you could miss it” Ferris Beuller’s Day Off….. Ferris was right on the money. We are so busy living life that we sometimes fail to notice what is going on…
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Hankins Tales: Coffee’s Always Better Out of a Camp Mug
(Originally posted to social media on September 10, 2020) An old friend of mine from England (Peter Hodson) sent me a message recently. He had found a bunch of old boy scout camp mugs when he was cleaning and he wanted to know what he should do with them. Nobody in his circle of friends…
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Hankins Tales: Remembering Daniel Janosko
(Originally posted to social media on October 6, 2020) I feel compelled to note another passing. Sometimes it seems like that is all I do lately. So many old and dear friends have already gone on down that long and dusty camp road. My good friend Jeff Janosko dropped us a note saying that his…
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Hankins Tales: Remembering Jim Warren
(Originally posted to social media on October 20, 2020) I have just learned of the death of yet another old friend. We went to the same elementary school and we lived in the same neighborhoods. We were members of the same Boy Scout troop and we walked many of the same trails over the years….
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Over 40 Roanoke Scouting News Clips From the ’50s and ’60s Made Available
If you’ve ever searched through the WSLS-TV news archive, available online at University of Virginia’s website (link: https://explore.lib.virginia.edu/exhibits/show/wsls), you’ll know just how rich this vast treasure can be. When you keyword “scouts” you get an even better treasure: over 40 news videos from the 1950s, 1960s, and a few from the 1970s. These clips have…
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Hankins Tales: Remembering Joe Larocco
(Originally posted to social media on January 19, 2021) My old friend Tom Keeley has posted that he just learned of the death of Joe Larocco. I have not had the chance to verify this information but I have a bad feeling that it is true. There are a number of Staff pictures from Camp…
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Hankins Tales: A Grandson in the Wings…
(Originally posted to social media on January 21, 2021) My son just posted a video to our little family forum that shows my grandson Greyson telling stories at Brady Saunders. He is standing right in front of a firepit that I built many years ago. There is nobody in the audience but that is beside…
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Hankins Tales: Zoom Gathering of the ASRPH
(Originally posted to social media on February 8, 2021) A bunch of the boys from Camp Powhatan and Ottari got together this weekend to have a zoom meeting. They were all members of ASRPH (American Society of Ridge Pole Hunters) and I am deeply sorry that I was not there. I do not currently have…