Sometime during the school year 1940-41 I joined Troop 1 at the urging of a school friend whose unbounded enthusiasm for scouting in general and Troop 1 in particular was contagious enough to convince me and two other mutual friends and classmates to join. At the time I knew so little of what scouting was about that I needed my friend's assurances that I would not be irrevocably committing myself to anything, but would be free to quit whenever I wanted to do so; and that even if I joined his patrol, which he specifically invited me to, I would not be placing myself under his absolute authority even though he was the Assistant Patrol Leader – i.e. that the Boy Scouts of America was not like an army, despite the uniform!

The following year my recruiter moved away from Bronxville, but he left his mark on Troop 1 and on Bronxville High's class of 1946. In all, five members of that class joined Troop 1 in the school years 1940-41 and 1941-2, and four of the five remained active until our graduation in 1946. Together, we provided virtually all of the junior leadership (Patrol Leaders, Senior Patrol Leaders, Junior Assistant Scoutmasters) to the troop during our high school years.

I subsequently became a college professor, retiring from the Department of Economics at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire in 1998. It is certainly not obvious how a six-year experience in the Boy Scouts relates to a college-level teaching career, so while I welcomed the opportunity to write this little essay on what my experience in scouting has meant to me over my lifetime, I have had to give the matter some thought.

The first - and obvious - thing that came to mind is that there is much more to one's life than to one's job: marriage, children, civic activities, friendships. The second is that I have never regretted the career path I chose. Although my primary appointment since 1956 has been with Dartmouth, thanks to that college's leave and sabbatical policy I have been able to take temporary teaching and research appointments elsewhere – ranging from universities in Thailand, Malaysia, Hungary, England, New Jersey, California and Colorado, to two hitches in Washington, the first at the Brookings Institution, one of the oldest Washington think tanks, and the second with the Federal Trade Commission, an agency that enforces the nation's antitrust laws – as well as consulting from time to time with firms facing specific real problems of competition and the law. All in all, my career has provided me with carried and rewarding experiences. I enjoyed it thoroughly.

In retrospect, I think the most important thing I learned from scouting is the importance of cooperation, both on and off the job. Throughout life, one's interaction with others is largely a mixture of cooperation and competition. There is, of course, some competition in scouting – from jamborees down to competitive games and contests of scouting skills at the patrol level. But more often, scouting activities are purely cooperative, with no losers - just all winners. For example, getting a fire started and cooking for your whole group on an overnight hike while others prepare the campsite and will later clean up after supper and replenish the pile of split firewood; or working with another member of the troop for both of you to qualify for the same merit badge; or teaching a younger and newer member of the troop how to tie nine knots: all are cooperative activities.

Like scouting, both junior and senior high school have competitive and cooperative elements, but I think competitive features such as athletic events won and lost and academic achievement as measured by a grade point average, to say nothing of social standing, tend to predominate in school while cooperative activities have the edge in scouting. And while there are many forms of friendly competition that add zest to life, as well as productive business competition to produce better goods at lower prices, I believe that too often the balance in adult life tips too far in favor of dog-eat-dog, beat-your-rival competition for which high school experiences may have conditioned us too thoroughly if not well enough, and that scouting does redress that balance.