This comes to you from Boy Scout Troop 61 in Saugus, Massachusetts.

 Our troop has had a long relationship with the First Milton Troop in Milton, Nova Scotia, Canada. (Near Liverpool). Our friendship began in April of 1983, when our then Committee Chairman invited the troop to camp on his land in Liverpool. Midway during the week, the local scout troop heard some American scouts were camping in town, and paid us a visit. Ever since then, we have returned to Canada about every other year, and the Canadian troop has visited the United States four times.

The Canadian Scoutmaster, a Mr. Jordan Womboldt, was instrumental in keeping this friendship alive, along with our own scoutmaster, Mr. Jim Virnelli. Through their personal friendship, they were able to ensure that our two troops maintained a strong bond.

Sadly, 'Jordy' was never in good health from the day we first met him, and he finally succumbed to his illness more than a year ago. We had a memorial dinner for him here in the US, and we contributed the funds we raised to his family.

I wrote the following piece shortly after he died, and I would greatly appreciate your posting it on the Scouter's Memorial Page, for all to see.

On Wednesday, April 9, 1997, our friend and brother in Scouting Jordan Womboldt lost his long battle with liver and kidney disease. Jordy never gave up the fight, and even his doctor was moved to observe that he may have seen stronger men, but none was tougher than Jordy. After two liver and kidney transplants, Jordy had nothing left to give.

Jordy left us a powerful legacy as a Scouter and a person. He brought to his troop a strong hand and an uncanny ability for leadership. More important than that was his ability to understand the Scout age boy. Like many Scoutmasters before him, Jordy knew when to lean heavily on a Scout to push him on to a greater achievement, and when to sit back and watch a Scout learn for himself. Jordy was always there when his scouts needed a stable influence, a father figure, or just someone to talk to who might still remember what it was like to be a boy.

Such is the continuity of Scouting that Jordy's beloved First Milton Troop will go on, with his brother Rick at the helm. But there is a void today that is felt by everyone who ever wore a Scout uniform.

The last time we all saw Jordy in 1995, we brought north with us a handmade cedar strip canoe. Jordy had few things he could enjoy in the last years of his life, but our canoe was one of them. As recounted by his family, Jordy would often have the canoe brought out in front of his house, and he would spend hours cleaning and polishing this gift of friendship. All of us who worked on the canoe can take some solace in the fact that something we put so much into in a small way made Jordy's last years a little more enjoyable.

In closing, I would like to offer a few words of comfort, not from the Bible, but from an old Indian legend. It's a story that has been told many times around a campfire.

"Long ago, the Indians believed the departed left this world and their spirits went to the happy hunting grounds in the sky. At night, the Great Spirit would draw a blanket over the sky to make it dark. The Indians believed the points of light seen in the blanket were holes made by the spirits as they passed through the blanket on their way to the happy hunting grounds. Some of the holes were large, making bright points of light, while others were so small they were hardly visible. The Indians thought that the size of the hole had nothing to do with how powerful a chief the person had been, or how large his land was, or how many enemies he had killed in battle, but instead was larger for the number of good deeds and acts of kindness the departed had done throughout his life."

Tonight, when I go outside and look at the stars and ponder the mysteries of life and death, no star shall shine as bright as Jordy's Spirit.