Artifact
Girl Guides Troop Crest, circa 1914-1927
Few people had the impact on young women that one Georgian has for over a century. Juliette Gordon Low was partially deaf and suffered from depression, with no children of her own, yet she founded the Girl Scouts of the USA. The Savannah native married William Low, a wealthy British merchant, but their marriage was falling apart when he died suddenly in 1905. Six years later, Juliette met Sir Robert Baden-Powell, the British founder of the Boy Scouts, and the meeting changed her life. In 1912 she returned to Georgia and started the Girl Scouts of the USA (a 1920s-era fuchsia Girl Guides troop crest on a black background is pictured), which grew to become the largest voluntary association for women and girls in the United States. By 1925, there were 90,000 Girl Scouts. Today there are 3.2 million, still influenced by the vision and dream of the Georgian known as Daisy.