At 79, She Might Be the Best Scout of All : A Member Since Age 14, Woman Leads Troop of Senior Citizens

On my honor, I will try: To serve God and my country, to help people at all times, and to live by the Girl Scout law.

--Girl Scout Promise Beatrice Price Russell has been a Girl Scout for 65 years, from the day in 1919 when that oath sounded so beautiful that she wanted to keep it forever.

That’s a long time to be honest, fair, helpful, cheerful, friendly, considerate and a sister to every Girl Scout, to respect authority, use resources wisely, protect and improve the world and show self-respect through actions.

Today, at 79, she may be the oldest living Scout with the longest unbroken membership--no one knows because there are no records to prove or disprove it.

Beatrice (“Buddy” to everybody) became a Scout at age 14 and a year later was commanding troops in New York’s settlement houses.

She’s still a leader, the head of a group she calls Troop 676, made up of a dozen residents of Claremont’s Pilgrim Place for senior citizens. The men and women make up one of a handful of senior citizen Scout groups across the country.

They help Girl Scouts in the area with their work in earning God and Community awards, make and sell handcrafts to raise money, entertain visiting troops and act as an audience for youngsters’ programs.

Russell was in the first Scout camp in New York, and after marrying the Rev. Galen E. Russell, she founded Girl Scout troops in every city as they moved about the country and even in Tokyo, where they lived for many years.

“At first, this was my family,” said Russell, who was a child of divorce in an age when divorces were few, and without sisters and brothers when large families were the norm. Then, when she had her own family (two sons, both ministers), she kept “adopting” scouting sisters and daughters she still claims as her own. The walls of her Pilgrim Place apartment are covered with pictures of an extended family of many races, colors and cultures.

The lasting fascination of scouting, Russell said, has been in seeing girls grow in leadership and in understanding themselves.

The differences between then and now, she said, is that the scope is international, the girls start younger and they become leaders earlier.

Girl Scouting now begins with 5-year-old Daisies and continues chronologically with Brownies, Juniors, Cadets and Seniors. Anyone over age 18 who keeps up her (or his) registration as a sign of commitment, such as those in Troop 676, are among the country’s 624,000 Adult Girl Scouts.

Russell, a small woman who doesn’t let arthritis slow her, said she maintains lifetime commitments to church-oriented work, Church Women United and the YWCA.

“Anything for the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man,” she declared. “Scouting holds the promise to honor and follow God and help other people at all times.

“It’s in my bones and in my soul.”