Scoutmaster Minute April 2015 

Continuing through the scout law, the Scoutmaster theme for April is thrifty.  Thrift is one of those words whose meaning had subtly shifted over time.  I can’t remember the first time I heard someone say they were “going thrifting,” but I’m pretty certain that when I was a kid, thrift wasn’t a verb. In fact, “thrifty” was what the adults in my life would say about adults who didn’t like to spend money.  When Baden-Powell was putting the values he deemed important into the scout law.  

My family wasn’t wealthy in the spendthrifty 70’s, when I was scout age, but my childhood was once of abundance compared to that my parents.   

When my mom was a kid growing up on a farm in Kentucky, thrift was a way of life. Food spoiled couldn’t be replaced at the local grocery. The cow could be milked once a day, the garden harvest couldn’t be left on the vine or go unweeded, and a pig butchered had to be smoked or eaten.  If the food wasn’t stored or prepared properly, the family went hungry.