Harold Roe Bartle - Scouting Career

Scouting Career

Bartle was admitted to the Kentucky bar in 1920 (before completing his correspondence degree) and worked for a Lebanon firm; he was also the Lebanon prosecuting attorney, 1920-22. Nevertheless, Bartle's gifts were as an organizer and promoter, and he was unwilling to spend his life in the law. Bartle had supervised a Boy Scout troop in Lebanon, and in 1923-24, he accepted a position as the executive of the Cheyenne Council of the Boy Scouts of America in Casper, Wyoming, a responsibility that included oversight of the entire state. From 1925 until 1928 he held a similar position in St. Joseph, Missouri; and from 1928 until 1955, he was the executive at the Kansas City Area Council.

Bartle created the Tribe of Mic-O-Say honor society in Saint Joseph, Missouri in 1925, although the inspiration for the program dated to his Wyoming years. A Boy Scout camp at Osceola, Missouri is named the H. Roe Bartle Scout Reservation in his honor.