Local Cards

Council and/or Locally Printed Cards: Since 1911, over 3500 council or locally owned summer camps have served over five million Boy Scouts.  All encouraged boys to write home, and the vast majority provided (sold!) postcards for the boys to do just that.  So did local businesses near the camps.  Every few years the camps had new cards.  Over the years, the camps serving Scouts from the larger metropolitan areas published several hundred cards each.  The best estimate is that at least 40,000 different camp cards were produced in all.  [One postcard dealer purchased from one former postcard printer, an archive of over 3.5 million negatives from which postcards (not just Boy Scout) were printed.] Some collectors try to gather up as many different cards as they can from the camps they attended.  Some try to find at least one card for each camp in their state - some, one for each Boy Scout Council.  In addition, many councils published cards showing local Scout offices, buildings, and events.  How about finding a postcard showing each school, church, YMCA or other organization in YOUR town that sponsored a Boy Scout troop?  That would require a great deal of research, but would almost certainly provide you with a unique collection.