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Sunday - June 25, 1950 Well here we go !!! I got up bright and early Sunday June 25th and got ready to leave home to go to Abilene to catch train. I got into Abilene at 7:45 AM. Train left at 1:00 PM. We ate our first meal on the train at 2:30. We arrived in Fort Worth at 5:30. We went in station and looked around. Left Fort Worth at 6:00 PM. Crossed Texas border 1:21 that night. Monday - June 26, 1950 Got into Little Rock at 7:00 Monday morning. Took pictures of capitol. Got into St. Louis at 2:00 in the afternoon. Ate dinner in the park across from the station. Took picture of train station and statue fountain in park. Got into Indianapolis at 9:30 Monday night. Went into station and saw cut away of a jet engine in operation. Also saw cut away view of truck engine. Tuesday - June 27, 1950 Went through Pittsburgh the city of smoke Tuesday morning and about 11:00 we saw Horseshoe Bend. Took picture of Horseshoe and some pictures of a lake. Got into Harrisburg at 12:20. Got into Baltimore at 3:00. We got us an electric engine which carried us into Washington D.C. The reason for the electric engine was because engines with smoke are not allowed in Washington. We arrived in Washington at 4:00 in the afternoon. As soon as we got there we took a bus tour. Saw all the government buildings. Saw the National Cemetery were soldiers are buried. Saw the tomb of the unknown soldier and saw them change guards and took picture. Went to Lincoln Monument and saw the famous Lincoln statue of him sitting down in a big chair. Took some pictures of it. Right in front of it across the street at the end of a huge pond was the Washington Monument. I took some pictures of it. Next stop was the U. S. Capitol. We toured it and saw Senate and House Chambers. We saw the room were the Guide stood on one side of the room and put us around a small bronze plate. He got on the other side of the room and talked to us. Took some pictures of the capitol. We ate supper with our congressman at a fancy restaurant. (Omar Burleson) Then we went through the Congressional Library and saw the original copy of Constitution and Declaration of Independence. Then as we walked back to the station, I took a picture of the capitol all lite up. We left Washington at 1:00 that night. Wednesday - June 28, 1950 We got into New York at 6:30 Wed morning. We took a bus tour through Lower Manhattan. Drove down the famous street Broadway. Saw the grand daddy of all bridges, the Brooklyn Bridge. Saw St. Johns Cathedral and went through it. We stopped at the Rockefeller Center and ate dinner. Went through the RCA Building and Radio City. After dinner we took the subway to the New York Yankees Stadium and saw the Yankees play the Washington Senators. The score was 3 to 1 in favor of the Yankees. After the ball game we took the subway back to the station. As soon as we got there we walked about 8 blocks to the Empire State Building. Took a ride to the top of the first sightseeing floor which is the 86th. We could see for 20 miles. Then we went to the 102nd floor to look around. After we left the Empire State Building we went to the station and messed around for about 3 hours. Then our train left out at 1:00 that night and we were on our way to Valley Forge and the National Jamboree. Thursday - June 29, 1950 We got into Valley Forge at 6:00 in the morning. We got off the train and walked 1-1/2 miles to our camp site. But, I got to ride on a truck with our pack. As soon as we got there we ate breakfast and then started checking out equipment. By night we had our camp set up. That first night we just went to bed. Friday - June 30, 1950 We got up about 7:00 and ate breakfast. The rest of the day we fixed up our camp and cut the weeds. After supper we went to the big arena for the opening ceremonies. We heard the president talk to us. After the president spoke to us there was a pageantry of the winter Washington was there. Afterwards we went back to camp and went to bed. Saturday - July 1, 1950 We ate breakfast as usual. Nothing happened that day. L. J. Cook and I run around to the Trading Post and other camps. We didn't do anything that night. We just went to bed. Sunday - July 2, 1950 We went to the big arena and had church services. After church services we went back to camp. The rest of the day we sat around camp. That night they had another meeting at the arena but, it was not a church service. L. J. Cook and I stayed and guarded camp. Monday - July 3, 1950 Monday morning we took a tour through all one side of Valley Forge. Then that night we had a council meeting and sang songs. Tuesday - July 4, 1950 We just fooled around that morning and about 12:30 I went to the big arena to practice for that night. I couldn't find L.J. so I went back to camp. When I got back to camp our troop had gone on a tour so Gene Hargrove and I went to the museum which is 2-1/2 miles from camp. When we got back L.J. and I ate supper and went to the big arena to get ready for the pageantry. Me and some other guys were Prospectors and had to take some donkeys across the arena. There was a cast of 8000. After our pageant, General Eisenhower talked to us. After his speech we had $5,000.00 worth of fireworks. After that we went to camp and went to bed. Wednesday - July 5, 1950 We didn't do much. but, that night we had a Regional Camp Fire. We sang songs and our troop gave Mr. Reed a gift which was a small statue of a boy scout. Afterwards we went to camp and went to bed. About 12:30 I woke every boy in our troop up. BOY! they sure liked me after that. Thursday - July 6, 1950 We didn't do much that day except we had the closing ceremony of the 2nd National Boy Scout Jamboree. L.J. Cook and I stayed to guard camp. Bobby Armstrong and Carol Lane stayed with us. We let them guard camp and we went to the Trading Post. After we went to the Trading Post we set out by the road and told everybody that came along goodbye for we were leaving the next day. After we had told everybody goodbye we went to camp and went to bed. About 1:00 that night I got up and poured water on L.J. as he was asleep. It made him mad. Friday - July 7, 1950 We broke camp today. Tore down our tents and packed up. We slept under our kitchen tarp. Saturday - July 8, 1950 We got up at 4:00 and finished rolling up our kitchen tarp. We checked in all our army supplies that we had. We left Valley Forge at 12:30 Sunday - July 9, 1950 We got into Buffalo, NY at 5:30 this morning. We ate breakfast in the station. We got 3 new cars because the cooling system didn't work. We got to Nigeria Falls at 10:30. We saw the falls and then walked across the Rainbow Bridge into Canada. I got some ice cream and a malt. L.J. and I played some machines. After we got back into the good old USA we got on the train and left at 1:00. Now we are on our way back home. O-Yes we saw Lake Ontario at 9:12 this morning. At about 1:45 this afternoon we started following Lake Erie and followed it for about 50 miles. We ate dinner at 2:00 At 7:23 we got back into good old Texas. Note: At the end, it looks like Ray missed a day or something. He doesn't know what day or if the ending time of 7:23 is AM or PM. - For the record Ray's Journal was kept on a 4" wide by 6-1/2" long spiral tablet and except for correcting the misspelled words it was transposed word for word 52 years later after he had wrote it at age fifteen.
At the time of the Jamboree, Ray was a member of the Chisholm Trail Council - Troop 46 - Lueders, Texas. He currently lives in Titusville, Florida.
We want to thank E. Ray Smyth of Titusville, Florida for allowing us to use his 1950 National Jamboree Journal on our web site. We have also linked to the memorabilia of the Jamboree that his mother saved. Last Updated: January
31, 2015
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