SEA SCOUTS Sailing Back

Boat/US Magazine, July, 1999 by Ryck Lydecker

Chuck Modlin made it in the business world the old-fashioned way, by hard work and half-hitches. And bowlines and sun sights and varnishing brightwork. Sure, a formal education helped but so did the marlinespike seamanship, celestial navigation and heavy weather sailing skills he gained as a teenage Sea Scout in Southern California.

For Modlin and all the other young people who have gone to sea -- or on a river or a local lake -- with Sea Scouting since 1912, small boats are the confidence-building platform for learning about responsibility and teamwork as well as mastering the maritime arts.

Modlin is one of millions of Sea Scout "veterans" worldwide who have come up through the ranks since its founding by Royal Navy Admiral Warrington Baden-Powell, brother of Boy Scouts founder, Thomas Baden-Powell.

In the U.S., Sea Scouting is sailing back slowly after a prolonged decline. Today the program involves over 6,500 young men and women, age 14 to 21, in 529 local units or "ships" in 49 states, Washington, DC, and Puerto Rico, supported by 2,200 adult volunteers.

Sea Scouting here peaked at about 27,000 members prior to World War II and went through a slump in the 1960s and 1970s. Today it is one of the fastest growing segments of scouting, according to Charles Holmes who is responsible for Sea Scouting as the newly appointed head of the Venturing Division of Boy Scouts of America (BSA). The reason, Holmes says, is that parents, adult volunteers and community sponsors realize the value of structured extracurricular programs for teens. And of course, boats and the water are natural magnets for kids.

Like all scout programs, Holmes says, Sea Scouting uses an attractive venue, which boating provides, coupled with compelling activities -- in this case, nautical skills -- to foster confidence, teach management, develop leadership and instill character. In Sea Scouting, young people hold ranks in a chain of command that manages the ship and its activities, and they work their way individually through various advancement awards, similar to Merit Badges in Boy and Girl Scouts.

A boater himself who sails a Cal 31 sloop, Holmes' priority in the new position is to re-energize Sea Scouting in America. Strong marketing, revised training materials and new partner organizations are all important, Holmes says, hut committed adult leaders like Chuck Modlin are the real key.

The Sea Scouting Life

Like most adults with Sea Scouting in their blood, Modlin credits the program he joined in 1936 as a 15-year-old to have fun on the water with giving him valuable self-confidence and lifetime skills. And like many, he has stayed involved as an adult volunteer. He's been "skipper" of a Sea Scout ship for over 45 years.

As a stockbroker in Los Angeles today, Modlin will tell you the value of Sea Scouting hasn't changed much in all that time. Its contribution to the individual and to society, he believes, lies not so much in the mastery of maritime skills as in the management abilities and leadership qualities Sea Scouts take with them into adulthood. The boats, he says, are a bonus.

"Sure, I love being out on the water and that's what draws the kids, but that's not the main reason I've stayed involved," says Modlin, who served in the Navy following his Sea Scout days and came back as an adult leader in 1953. "There are few programs that teach responsibility the way Sea Scouting does."

At 78, Modlin's kids have to work hard just to keep up with him. He takes his teenage crew to sea as many as 60 days a year in a retired, World War II-vintage, 40-foot U.S. Coast Guard fireboat. The SSS Volunteer with her Sea Scout crew sails frequently to Catalina Island and the Channel Islands off Santa Barbara, and has ranged as far as San Francisco, Puget Sound and even to southeastern Alaska.

BOAT/U.S. member Jim Elroy also grew into adulthood in Sea Scouting and earned its highest award, Quartermaster, under Modlin's tutelage as a member of SSS Volunteer in Newport Beach during the 1950s.

As he went on to a career as a special agent with the FBI, Elroy stayed close to Sea Scouting, even when stationed far from the sea. Assigned to Oklahoma City in the 1980s, Elroy founded Sea Scout Ship Conquest in Shawnee, OK.

Now retired, Elroy is skipper of Ship 410 in Miami, FL, and has served on the Sea Scout National Committee for the past 10 years. He is currently vice commodore of the volunteer board which helps set direction for the program. (BOAT/U.S. members Bruce Johnson, Bill James and Walt Whitacre also serve on the committee along with America's Cup contender, Bill Koch, and sailboat designer Buddy Melges.)

Ship 410 owns a Catalina 25 and has access to another boat, but Elroy frequently uses his own CSY 44 sloop for Sea Scout activities. In fact, Elroy developed a Sea Scout Advanced Leadership Training program (SEAL) over the past several years and uses his boat for the course.

"This is a week-long leadership training program, conducted entirely under way, that allows advanced scouts to use their knowledge of seamanship in combination with management skills," Elroy says. "Each kid takes command for 24 hours, supervising the rest of the crew -- helmsman, navigator, lookout -- and they learn that their decisions and actions have consequences, good or bad, right or wrong."