Scout Stories: Don Holbert

My name is Don Holbert, I was born and raised in Kansas City, but currently reside in Sedalia. I grew up in a Scouting family. My father was a Cubmaster and an assistant Scoutmaster for almost 20 years. My mother was a den mother for almost 14 years. Scouting was fun. You went to family functions and all the families there were scouting families.

As I grew from Cub Scouts to Boy Scouts I belonged to one troop but our church had another troop and I did several functions with the church troop. I can remember in particular the church troop decided to do a campout on the church on Saturday before Scout Sunday.  This campout was the first time I had stayed in a tent with a group of guys camping. Saturday was nice and we did a lot of outside functions and, of course, made the fires to cook on.

Saturday evening started getting cool and by the time we went to bed, it was cold. We woke up Sunday morning to temperatures of single digits and 8 inches of snow on the ground. I was never so cold and didn’t know if I ever wanted to go on another overnight.

As I grew in Scouting and came up the ranks, with my family support and sometimes pushing, I decided I wanted to get my Eagle Scout. I had learned early in life that life is exactly what you make out of it and nothing else. In the spring of 1961, I decided that it was up to me.

The personal fitness merit badge was a requirement for an Eagle Scout, and part of that merit badge required me to run a mile in seven and a half minutes. I went to the local high school that spring and I started walking around the track, I went every single day seven days a week. Rain, snow, sleet, hail and sunshine, I was there. At first, I didn’t think that this would be possible. I would come home and my hands would have blisters that were raw, and I would pour alcohol on them to harden them up.

The reason I had to use alcohol on my hands was because I had polio at age 5 and the only way I could get around was to use crutches.

In late January 1962, I decided that I was ready to try for my merit badge. We called the counselor and made arrangements to meet at the local high school on a Saturday morning.

It was a beautiful Saturday for January with temperatures in the low 60s. The counselor arrived and my heart started pumping fast. It felt like it was going to jump out of my chest.

The counselor said, “Runner to his mark, ready, set, go,” and off I went on my crutches. I kept going and pushing. I didn’t think that those four laps would ever end. I finished and I had put so much into it that I didn’t even feel like I had the strength to walk back to the car.

My father, who had gone with me that day, stayed and got the results from the counselor.
When he arrived at the car, he asked, “How are you doing?” My common response is I am breathing. He asked then how do you think you did? I said I didn’t know. I felt like I started good, but at the end I was too tired. I probably need to practice more. Dad said I don’t believe that would be necessary because you just ran a mile in seven minutes flat — on your crutches.

Remember in those days there were no substitutions for required merit badges, because you were disabled. Come to find out I was the first Eagle Scout from my troop at school and they believed that I was the first disabled Eagle Scout in Kansas City.