The 10th point of the Scout Law – a Scout is Brave – conjures up visions of a Scout running into a burning building to save someone, or being calm in the face of a trying situation, or perhaps being willing to try rappelling for the first time. While in the Seattle, WA area with my family over Spring Break, I stumbled upon a different type of courage that still has me thinking.
You can read the whole story of the Snoqualmie Falls Hydroelectric Plant here, but the gist is that as a 23-year old engineer in 1899, Charles Baker decided he would drill several hundred feet underneath the Snoqualmie River and then go under the falls itself and burrow into the rockface until he met the vertical tunnel he just drilled. He then installed the first completely underground hydroelectric dam. Now…I don’t know what you were doing in 1899, or when you were 23, but I’m guessing a project of this magnitude was not top of mind.
Why do I bring this up? I shared the story of Mr. Baker with our Scouts because I think it shows a different form of bravery – to try something not just new, but dangerous, innovative, helpful, and that would stand the test of time (the plant is still operating today!). Mr. Baker grew up before Lord Baden Powell kicked off the Scouting movement in the US, but I’d bet he would have been a Scout if he’d been born 50 years later. Let’s encourage our Scouts – and each other – to not just be brave in the face of danger, but also to be courageous in “normal” situations like the one Charles Baker found himself in.
Often trying new things requires its own kind of bravery.