--- description: A gallery of photos chronicling the ways that the Boy Scouts of America sought to respond to the cultural tumult of the early 1970s. title: Boy Scouts: Photos of BSA Troops From the Bronx to Los Angeles, 1971 image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3a602c25b7e17eb0/69884949e20a87ff22a8a9e8/32_00825679.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Culture](/tag/culture/) ## Culture Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # LIFE With the Boy Scouts in an Era of Tumult and Change by [Ben Cosgrove](/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Apr 19, 2014 5:48 PM CUT  Caption from LIFE. "Cub Scout Tony Talbot (10) ... from Canoga Park joins a potted-plant brigade to help restore Los Angeles's Lime Kiln Canyon Park, ravaged last year by fire." Caption from LIFE. "Cub Scout Tony Talbot (10) ... from Canoga Park joins a potted-plant brigade to help restore Los Angeles's Lime Kiln Canyon Park, ravaged last year by fire."John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images by [Ben Cosgrove](/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Apr 19, 2014 5:48 PM CUT The Boy Scouts of America is one of those enduring institutions woven so deeply into the fabric of so many lives that it sometimes feels like it’s been around as long as the country itself—as if it might have been incorporated along with, say, Benjamin Franklin’s visionary national postal service. In fact, the BSA has been in existence for about a century, or roughly as long as the international Scout Movement—begun in England—from which it grew. But four decades ago, the BSA faced a dire crisis, as the Scouts struggled to respond to the cultural and racial upheavals of the 1960s and ’70s. Here, LIFE.com presents a series of photographs—most of which never ran in LIFE—by John Shearer, who traveled across the country in 1971, chronicling the ways in which boys and young men of color were invigorating the hidebound association. “I was in the Scouts briefly, in the late Fifties,” Shearer (at right, on the Boy Scouts assignment in 1971) told LIFE.com, “and I remember going to these huge jamborees with other troops, and we’d be the only black guys there. And I mean the _only_ black guys. “So when I set out on this cross-country assignment for LIFE in the early 1970s, I was surprised—and heartened—to find all of these troops filled with black kids doing work in the inner cities. I suppose part of the reason I felt encouraged was that I encountered so many more black scout troops, and other troops filled with kids of color, than I’d expected to. “My own experience in the Fifties, overall, had been pretty negative,” Shearer said, “so to revisit the Boy Scouts and find these committed, engaged youngsters—it just made me feel like maybe there really had been some progress, after all.” One positive aspect of his time as a scout that Shearer recalls quite clearly today, six decades later, was the way that the scoutmaster of his troop geared a lot of the teaching and guidance directly toward the life experiences of the boys in his charge. “He definitely introduced us to writers and thinkers—black writers and thinkers—we otherwise might not have learned about for years,” Shearer said. “He had us read \[W.E.B.\] Du Bois, and Baldwin’s _Go Tell It on the Mountain_, and other books that spoke to us, as black kids. I wasn’t a big reader at that point, but those books made a difference. Being in that troop, even for a little while, made a difference.” [\[See more of John Shearer’s photography at johnshearerpicturebook.com\]](http://www.johnshearerpicturebook.com "undefined") In its June 1971 issue, in which a handful of Shearer’s photographs first ran, LIFE made it plain that the Boy Scouts were at something of a crossroads at the dawn of the Seventies. In an article titled, “Scouting Blazes a Trail Into the Ghetto,” the magazine told its millions of readers: --- > “” --- More than 40 years later, the Boy Scouts of America are still face to face with that simple admonition_—_and with pressing, complex challenges. _Liz Ronk, who edited this gallery, is the Photo Editor for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter_ [_@lizabethronk_](https://twitter.com/LizabethRonk "undefined")_._  Caption from LIFE. "Troop 35's shaggy Hector Melendez is part of a proud new breed of Scouts who, like fellow troop members (see slide #4), find traditional camaraderie in a south Bronx church." John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not originally published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not originally published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, New York, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. "Dexter White (not pictured), leader of Milwaukee's 'Super Troop,' feels that camping in a vacant lot is better than waiting months for a trip to the country. 'Besides,' says White, 'these kids can relate to urban camping. It's home turf.'" John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not originally published in LIFE. Boy Scout, Milwaukee, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Milwaukee, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Milwaukee, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Milwaukee, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Milwaukee, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Milwaukee, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scout, Milwaukee, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Chicago, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Chicago, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Chicago, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Chicago, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. "A rat patrol in garbage-strewn backyards in Chicago's South Side is a routine good deed from Troop 341." John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Chicago, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Chicago, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, Chicago, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. "Cub Scout Tony Talbot (10) ... from Canoga Park joins a potted-plant brigade to help restore Los Angeles's Lime Kiln Canyon Park, ravaged last year by fire." John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, southern California, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, southern California, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, southern California, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. "'Project SOAR' ("Save Our American Resources"), scouting's new effort to preserve the environment, gets middle-class kids like 11-year-old Mike Gardner of Canoga Park, Calif. involved in ecological problems." John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, southern California, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, southern California, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Boy Scouts, southern California, 1971. John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3879615/boy-scouts-photos-of-troops-from-the-bronx-to-los-angeles/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3879615/boy-scouts-photos-of-troops-from-the-bronx-to-los-angeles/"},"headline":"LIFE With the Boy Scouts in an Era of Tumult and Change","datePublished":"2014-04-19T17:48:52.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T05:03:44.099Z","description":"LIFE presents a gallery of photos chronicling the ways in which the Boy Scouts of America tried to respond to the cultural tumult of the early 1970s.","url":"https://time.com/3879615/boy-scouts-photos-of-troops-from-the-bronx-to-los-angeles/","keywords":["Culture","New York City","los angeles","chicago","Boy Scouts","photography","LIFE Magazine","black and white photography","1971"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3a602c25b7e17eb0/69884949e20a87ff22a8a9e8/32_00825679.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Ben Cosgrove","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/ben-cosgrove/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3a602c25b7e17eb0/69884949e20a87ff22a8a9e8/32_00825679.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"California Boy Scouts, 1971","caption":"California Boy Scouts, 1971","creditText":"John Shearer—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/culture/","name":"Culture"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3879615/boy-scouts-photos-of-troops-from-the-bronx-to-los-angeles/","name":"LIFE With the Boy Scouts in an Era of Tumult and Change"}}]}] ```