Once a Girl Scout, always a Girl Scout

The Girl Scouts might be celebrating a historic milestone across the nation on Monday, but some pretty impressive Girl Scout history began right here in Lane County more than 30 years ago: The Order of the Silver Trefoil.

Think of it as a group for Girl Scouts who are still Girl Scouts 20 years, 30 years, 40 years or, in some cases, 70 years after leaving their original Girl Scout troops.

These girls are no longer girls, but they are still Girl Scouts. They will always be Girl Scouts. They will go to their graves as Girl Scouts.

“You don’t have to be popular, you don’t have to be beautiful to be a Girl Scout,” said Katie Lytle, who put on her first Girl Scout uniform as 10-year-old student at the former St. Mary’s Elementary School in Eugene in 1941. “It doesn’t matter what you look like or what part of the community you come from. We find a home in Girl Scouts from the time we’re Brownies … right up to 91,” she said, glancing over at the woman seated next to her, Eleanor Mason, referring to Mason’s upcoming 91st birthday this July.

Lytle, 80, and Mason were having lunch at Izzy’s Pizza on Seneca Road in west Eugene on the last day of February. They were joined by four other women, Clara Emlen of Springfield, Nancy Burnett of Springfield, Inez McEldowney of Junction City and Sheila Logan of Eugene, and one man, Gary Burnett of Springfield, at the monthly lunch of the local Order of the Silver Trefoil, which started in Eugene in the late 1970s.

In fact, it was the first group, Chapter 1, of what are now some 40 chapters across the nation. Members must have 25 years of experience with Girl Scouts, including their days as a Scout and their adult years as volunteers.

McEldowney, 86, of Junction City, is credited with starting the group, which now has about 30 members across Oregon and southwest Washington, She had read an article in a Girl Scouts magazine about how Girl Scout councils around the nation were losing money because older members were dying. She wanted to figure out a way to provide more support for the Eugene-based Western Rivers Girl Scouts Council that covered six counties. McEldowney was president of the local council, which merged with the Portland-based Girl Scouts of Oregon and Southwest Washington council in 2008, at the time.

“You have to believe in youth,” McEldowney said.

Like all the members, McEldowney was wearing her small, Silver Trefoil pin. The group sells the pins for $15 to members nationwide. That income, plus $15-a-year dues, supports local Girl Scout troops and provides funds for adult volunteers to accompany Scouts on excursions.

The group also raises funds for scholarships and operating expenses, as well as organizing and providing receptions for the council, doing Girl Scout history displays for the Lane County Historical Museum and providing and serving meals for Girl Scout patrols on special occasions.

Socializing and staying connected to an organization that has meant so much to their lives is a big part of the draw, too.

Thus, the luncheons on the last Wednesday of each month.

“I believe in it,” said Lytle, who is the organization’s treasurer and point person. “I believe in the principles and values. I’ve been associated with so many wonderful people. And when things weren’t going so well personally, I had my friends,” she said, as tears begin to well in her eyes.

“I think probably the reason I joined was because everybody was doing it,” Lytle said of her decision to join Girl Scouts as a grade-school student in 1941. Her mother, Vera Heidenreich, who died at age 95 in 2004, was also a key Girl Scout leader in Lane County for many years.

Lytle has kept many souvenirs over the years, including a trefoil-shaped invitation to her parents to attend the annual meeting and birthday dinner of the Eugene Girl Scout Council on March 12, 1943, at the Eugene Hotel. The invitation says the dinner was 85 cents per plate.

She also has a spring 1942 issue of Girl Scout Equipment, in which a standard Girl Scout uniform cost $4.25, a Brownie uniform cost $2.50, a neckerchief was 50 cents and a whittling knife $1.

After leaving Girl Scouts as a 14-year-old in 1945, Lytle got involved again as an adult in San Diego in the late 1960s when her daughter, Karen, joined.

McEldowney was never a Girl Scout growing up in Salem, but she was a Camp Fire Girl in high school.

“We love her anyway,” Lytle joked as everyone broke into laughter.

McEldowney moved to Junction City in 1946 to teach seventh grade and became involved with Girl Scouts when asked to lead a troop. Then her three daughters joined and she’s been involved for the past half century.

“I like the friends I’ve made,” McEldowney said. “And you run into (other) Girl Scouts wherever you go. Girl Scouts are a certain breed of people. They’re honest and trustworthy.”

“This lady here not only started this group, she was also the one who came up with the idea of putting Girl Scout Cookies on airlines,” OST member Nancy Burnett of Springfield said, throwing her arm around McEldowney.

McEldowney was on a United Airlines flight back to Eugene in August 1979, after attending a wedding in Carmel, Calif., according to March 1981 Register-Guard story. A flight attendant offered her a chocolate cookie and she had a brainstorm.

That led to the involvement of attorneys and negotiations with the national Girl Scouts organization, and in March 1981 United Airlines bought $50,000 worth of Girl Scout Cookies and gave away about 2 million of them to passengers that month. The Western Rivers Council split the profits with the national organization, putting thousands of dollars in local council’s coffers. McEldowney then wrote to airlines all over the nation, to no avail, to try and get them to do the same thing.

“The only reason I joined (the group) was because of my wife,” Gary Burnett said, as everyone laughed.

Yes, men can join the Order of the Silver Trefoil, too.

Nancy Burnett, former Western Rivers Council president, of Springfield, became a Brownie at age 7 in Sweet Home in 1948, and then a Girl Scout through junior high school.

When her daughter, Andie Olson, became a Brownie in 1966, Burnett felt liked she joined all over again and has been involved ever since.

“And this one became involved when he had to start hauling stuff down the trails at Camp Cleawox,” she said of her husband.

Their daughter, Amy LeRoy, now 31, was the top Girl Scout Cookie seller ever in this area, as far as anyone knows, selling more than 17,000 boxes between becoming a Daisy (entry level Scout for kindergartners and first-graders) and being in Girl Scouts all the way through North Eugene High School.

“I got a lot of self-worth out of it,” Nancy Burnett said of her years in Scouting.

“The council’s been blessed to have had these people as Girl Scouts,” McEldowney said.