Best Way to Spend 10 Days

Ahh. Summer Camp. Ask anyone in Troop 318 or the Heart of America Council why they keep going to camp every summer. These scouts and scouters will tell you that the H. Roe Bartle Scout Reservation feels like home and a place that draws them back year after year. And once your child attends summer camp, he'll want to go back!

Each summer, Troop 318, spends 10 days and 9 nights at the H. Roe Bartle Scout Reservation located in Osceola, MO (actually, Iconium, MO but it's an Osceola address). The H. Roe Bartle Scout Reservation (Bartle) is actually three separate camps; Lone Star, Sawmill, and Piercing Arrow, each with its own dining hall, pool, campsites and merit badge classes. 

It all started as one camp, Camp Osceola, in 1929 by then Kansas City Mayor H. Roe Bartle (yes, the same Bartle as Bartle Hall). From then, the camp grew as more and more boys attended each summer. After the addition of a second camp in 1955, Camp Osceola was renamed Camp A while the new camp was Camp B before becoming Camp Wigwam and Camp Sawmill, respectively. The camp kept growing and so a third camp was built in 1962 and called Camp Frontier.

Then came the passing of our beloved Wallace "Pappy" Grube and so Camp Wigwam was renamed in his memory to Camp Lone Star. Many years later, Camp Frontier was renamed to Camp Piercing Arrow in memory of Paul D. Ahrend.

Lone Star's campsites are named after Native American Indian Tribes. Sawmill's campsites are named after trees and was once the location of the Camp's Sawmill (see what they did there). And Piercing Arrow's (originally Camp Frontier) campsites are named after American Forts.

There is so much to do and see at Bartle that the only way you can truly appreciate our beloved camp, is to visit.

Just another fun FYI, the founder of our beloved Scout Reservation is responsible for bringing a professional football team to Kansas City, The Kansas City Chiefs!

Can you hear them? The Hills of Osceola are calling. Will you answer?