Visiting Scouts build dining hall for Glacier Institute

Boy Scout Troop 99 from Lancaster, Pa., traveled across the continent to put their boys to work volunteering in Glacier National Park last week.

Troop leader Scott Snyder said they do a trip like this one every other year. Two years ago, the troop traveled to Lake Powell in Utah to clean campgrounds and pull weeds.

This year's service project includes rebuilding a Glacier Institute classroom at their Field Camp in Glacier Park that collapsed in 1996 due to heavy snow pack and building picnic tables for the Park.

Snyder said the program is a dual effort between the National Park Service and Boy Scouts of America, where service projects help scouts gain points towards earning a scout-ranger patch.

"Which is not something many people get to earn," Snyder said.

The visiting scouts teamed up with local Troop 1941 member Qynn Ingraham, 12, to install window panes, paint siding, pull weeds and use a staple gun to put up plastic sheeting for the walls.

"This experience has been quite exhilarating," Lancaster troop member Christian Hackman, 14, said, adding that they had hiked to Avalanche Lake the day before and saw a moose while visiting Lake McDonald.

Snyder said the troop was broken up into three groups, each one trading off work for the Institute or the Park and visiting Logan Pass.

This isn't the first year the Glacier Institute received help from the Boy Scouts, executive director Joyce Baltz said. Last year, troops from Libby and Kalispell laid a gravel path around the Field Camp cabins. As a partner with the Park, the Glacier Institute acts as a classroom "dedicated to all things Glacier." Baltz said donations and volunteer work help enhance the teaching site.

"We could never afford to do that on our own," she said.

This year's project wouldn't have been possible without help from two big donors in Pennsylvania, Rich and Kathryn Szarko. The Szarkos previously coordinated successful service projects in Yellowstone National Park.

Fortunately for the Troop 99 scouts, their trip was not all about work and no play. Starting Monday, they will backpack a four-day, three-night loop in the Park, as well as visit several parks and monuments on the long drive back to Lancaster.