Webelos was Re: Re: "outside of a dog"

Laurence Horn laurence.horn at YALE.EDU
Tue Jun 15 13:30:26 UTC 2010


At 8:48 AM -0400 6/15/10, Amy West wrote:
>On 6/15/10 12:00 AM, Automatic digest processor wrote:
>>   remember it well, having been
>>a Cub Scout for the whole Webelos trajectory--"Wolf Bear Lion
>>Scout"--but I dropped out before the Tenderfoot stage
>Interesting. I was recently told by scouts in Mass. it stood for "We be
>loyal scouts."
>
>Another folk initialism/acronym?
>
>--
>---Amy West
>
Looks like we're both (essentially) right:

===========
WEBELOS is an acronym, according to the BSA's public relations and
media relations guides, and therefore should appear in ALL CAPS as
written above.

The acronym, thought up in the early 40s, does NOT presently stand
for "Wolf, Bear, Lion, Scout" as before; it now stands for "WE'll BE
LOyal Scouts!". The WEBELOS Cub Scout program replaced the Lion Cub
Scout program in 1966 and became a part of the Cub Scout Program in
1967.

http://www.mninter.net/~blkeagle/webelos.htm
==========

I prefer Amy's version with the invariant "be", but I guess this way
individual dens and troops can decide on the appropriate verb form
for themselves.

LH (a.k.a. Automatic digest processor)

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