H&S scene;

              .IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF LEWIS AND CLARK
In search of spacious skies and the majesty of purple moun­tains,
twenty-eight Boy Scouts commemorated America's
bicentennial year last summer by spending eighty-one days
retracing the Lewis and Clark expedition from St. Louis,
Missouri to Astoria, Oregon. The group, Explorer Scouts
ranging from fourteen to eighteen years of age from Omaha's
Post 476 and four leaders, included Omaha partner
Lawrence F. Chandler and his son, Larry Jr.
In 1804 President Thomas Jefferson gave Meriwether
Lewis and William Clark $2,500 to lead thirty men to the
Pacific Northwest. It took them nearly two years to complete
a 3,600-mile journey that did much to dispel ignorance
about the region and open the way for westward expansion.
What cost only $2,500 in 1804 cost $10,000 in 1976.
Much of the expense of the 1976 expedition was attributed to
a combination of inflation and contemporary means of sup­ply
and transportation. A caravan consisting of a U-Haul
van, trailers portaging fourteen motorized canoes, and an
eighteen-foot, fully equipped kitchen trailer followed the
boys, stopping at towns along the way to pick up prearranged
orders of groceries. There were also four cabin cruisers wait­ing
at St. Louis to transport the boys up the Missouri River
and a bus to get them back home from Astoria.
Larry Chandler, chief fundraiser for the venture, had no
small task. To begin, he asked that each boy raise $1,000 to­ward
the trip. Then he found companies willing to contrib­ute
much of the necessary camping equipment. Even though
businesses, parents and friends were very generous, some
boys were still unable to raise the initial $1,000. "If they
wanted to go, I found a way," Larry said.
Despite the advantages of modern technology, the scouts
were beset by many of the same problems and accidents faced
by the Lewis and Clark expedition. First, a fire destroyed one
of the cabin cruisers. Then a second cruiser was damaged by a
floating log. In Glasgow, Montana, hurricane-force winds
whipped through their campsite, forcing the boys to seek
shelter in the truck. Although uprooted trees and broken
branches caused considerable damage to cars, picnic tables
and tents, no one was injured.
At one point on the journey fourteen scouts were stranded
for a day and a half without supplies. The boys had decided to
separate, half of them traveling to Devil's Creek, Montana
by supply truck and the others by canoes. Heavy rains in the
area didn't slow the canoes too much, but the truck became
bogged down in the eastern Montana gumbo, a type of soil
that when wet becomes very sticky. Meanwhile the boys in
the canoes reached Devil's Creek, a desolate location sixty
miles from the nearest town, only to find no trucks waiting.
They spent the night without food, drinking water or blan­kets.
Two of the leaders used CB relay to ask relatives in the
area to bring food. The boys were finally reunited two and a
half days later.
The most serious accident came not in a canoe or on the
trails, but on the highway near Pierre, South Dakota. The
group's supply truck collided with a semi-trailer truck haul­ing
a crane. The supply-truck driver was pinned inside his
vehicle by the crane and suffered lacerations of the head and
legs requiring some 100 stitches. However, he was able to
rejoin the expedition two weeks later.
Added to these obstacles were washed-out bridges,
rattlesnakes, a dam lock which nearly smashed the canoes
and malfunctioning equipment. Nevertheless, the boys
agreed that theirs was probably the experience of a lifetime.
"This is the greatest high adventure any single scout unit in
America has ever attempted," the senior Chandler said.
Because of a heavy work schedule, Larry spent only the
second half of the trip with the boys. He led the group over
the wilderness trails and down the Pacific slope. "When I
first mentioned this trip to the Mid-America Boy Scout
Council, nobody thought we could do it," Larry said. The
council was wrong. The boys hiked more than 350 miles
through the Rockies at elevations of up to 10,000 feet at a
pace of twenty to thirty miles a day. "I've been hiking a long
time, so at first the boys had a tough time keeping up with
me. After a while it became apparent that old legs in shape
are not as good as young legs in shape. They could hike about
one mile every fifteen minutes," Larry said.
After more than two months on the road, the mishaps and
rising tensions from blisters, sore feet and exhaustion caused
some temporary morale problems. "It's like C rations that we
carried for our lunches," one scout said, "you have to get used
to them, so you make fun of them and it turns out all right."
By the end of the trek, after canoeing the last 700 miles, they
were once again a cohesive group.
It was the last week in August when the expedition finally
reached the blue-green expanse of the Pacific Ocean. "It was
a definite learning experience," Larry said. "I watched the
boys gain confidence in themselves and their outdoor skills.
It gave them a feeling of accomplishment. I found that very
rewarding."
Larry is deeply involved in scouting. At present he is the
Mid-America Council vice-president of finance, a member
of its executive board, and a trustee. In addition he has as­sumed
area, regional and national responsibilities. "Scouting
promotes character development and leadership ability,
mental and physical toughness. Through activities like the
trek, a boy becomes aware of his strengths and limitations.
He gets a real sense of himself." o