Sunday, May 16, 2010

Official Patrol Car

-click to enlarge-

Photo of Billy Greene and his Ford F-1 pickup truck. Notice the logo on the door is his initials in Old English (top) and "Bat Patrol BSA" (lower).

The old truck is probably 6-7 years old - the F-1 was introduced in 1948 - so this photo is probably from 1955 or later.

The Boy Scout troop in Baldwyn (Troop 33 at the time I was a member) was made up of groups of boys called patrols. I was in the Wolf Patrol and remember that there was a Badger Patrol, a Hawk Patrol, and others that escape me. Each Patrol had its' own unique flag, badge, call, and cry in order to gather and stay together by sound other than voice commands.

Evidently there was a Bat Patrol that Billy belonged to, and he was probably a leader and had transportation for his group to go on outings. There were many fun outings, marches, overnight camping and cookout trips. We would walk to an encampment at Blue Mars in Prather Bottoms, swim, cook, camp overnight and return the next day (sometime raw with poison ivy and chiggers) but had a dickens of a good time. The cold artesian water was better that we had to drink in town!
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Photo courtesy of Jim Greene.

9 comments:

  1. WE HADD SOME REALLY GREAT TIMES ON B. S. TRIPS. WISH I COULD DO IT AGAIN, EVEN AS OLD AS I AM.

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  2. We took the old pick up and went out to Mr Greene's farm and was going to build us a log cabin..We worked all one Saturday and got 4 logs cut and laid out on the ground,,,,never went back...

    Wallis

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  3. We took the old pick up and went out to Mr Greene's farm to build us a log cabin..We worked all day Saturday and got 4 logs cut and laid out on the ground..Never went back..

    Wallis

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  4. Wallis Nobody told us that it was going to be WORK !!!!!!!!! I was back in Baldwyn around 1985 and decided to take a trip down memory lane and went out to the farm and walked over most of the old roads there. The four logs that we laid were rotted but still right where we had put them... amazing.

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  5. Sounds like another project we were involved in, Wallis. Remember the wooden bridge we worked on over the deepest gorge in the "gullies"? We cut saplings and got pieces of rope whenever and wherever we could. When we couldn't get any more rope, we abandoned that project also, with many man-hours lost!

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  6. Is Billy Joe flipping the bird there?

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  7. Billy ended up wrecking that ole truck...totaled the other car but he drove the truck home with only a hole in the radiator. Only used burnt motor oil in it. It was a great truck and you couldn't tear it up. The truck hauled a million kids to Blue Mars. Anyone remember the camping trip we all went on to Barnett's hill. The Red truck hauled the gear. The night raiders pulled all the wires off the plugs and coil.

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  8. Jim, I remember some camping trips to Barnett's Hill. On one occasion when we were there a man filpped a John Deere tractor on its' side at the artesian well by the road. On another trip we built a campfire so massive it almost got out away from us, but Indian Chief Henry Outlaw chanted to the Great Spirit and we succeeded in getting the fire under control. Great Fun... I did not have a sleeping bag so I used 3 quilts from home, and had to wash them with a water hose when I brought them back home.

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  9. Carl, I very well remember the camp fire that Bo Henry made for the Indian thing. While we were attending someone raided our campsite and hung our sleeping bags in the trees. Someone removed all the labels from Robert Hugh's can goods. So every can was a surprise...

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