Two singular figures in history converged in Ohio on a recent October weekend. One was Daniel Carter Beard, a 19th century outdoorsman and Cincinnati native who helped shape America's national Scouting movement. The other is a prominent Art Deco style building just outside Cincinnati. It opened in 1944 as the Voice of America, a shortwave radio station created by the US government to transmit the message of freedom to countries overseas.
On the weekend of scouting's annual Jamboree on the Air, the organization's largest event, 40 Ohio youngsters in the Scouting Council named for the pioneering advocate Daniel Beard visited that radio building, which is now a museum. There, inside the National Voice of America Museum of Broadcasting, the scouts called CQ, sending a message of friendship around the world using the callsign of the West Chester Amateur Radio Club, WC8VOA.
Radio scouting is a big priority in the Scouting organization, which supplemented the weekend's on-air activities with classroom lessons on propagation, radio safety and related subjects. All of this - plus QSOs with fellow scouts in other countries - will help these youngsters satisfy requirements to earn a merit badge called Citizenship in the World. It's only fitting that the Voice of America building was where their message began.
