The National Council of the Boy Scouts of America has confirmed Hannah Bailey has earned the rank of Eagle Scout and has become the first female in Warren County to obtain that title.
For her Eagle Scout service project, Bailey partnered with McMinnville Breakfast Rotary for a system of codes and informational kiosks along local waterways which let boaters know their location in the event of emergency.
“My project benefits anyone on the river,” said Bailey at Riverfront Park. “The signs along the river tell people where they are so they can notify emergency response of their location if they’re in distress.”
Bailey explained her project to a local Eagle Scout Board of Review last week.
“As I come before you to be considered for the rank of Eagle, my time in scouting is soon coming to an end,” Bailey told the board. “I am currently a full-time student at ETSU majoring in biology with a pre-medicine focus. I have always dreamed of being a doctor.”
Bailey’s project put informational kiosks at main entry and exit points along rivers in Warren County and coded markers at each mile along the rivers. The markers have a combination of letters and numbers to let boaters know their location.
For example, a marker reading CO38 would let the boater know they are on the 38th mile of the Collins River. A marker reading BF10 would let someone know they’re on the 10th mile of the Barren Fork.
The Collins River itself required about 50 miles of signs.
“It’s kind of tricky to pick the locations for the mile signs along the river because they have to be placed in an area where they’re visible for boaters coming from either direction,” said Breakfast Rotary member Rachel Killebrew.
The kiosks themselves are near ramps and show boaters where signs are located and information about points of interest along the river. The posts for the signs are about 6.5 feet tall and the actual signs are 2 feet by 3 feet.
“We had gotten an estimate from someone we were considering using to build the kiosks and they told us it would be $4,000 a sign,” said Killebrew. “Hannah came up with a way to do it for $2,800 total.”
Bailey logged nearly 47 hours of her own time completing the project. Volunteers made up the rest of the 232 hours the project took to complete.
“The things I have learned in scouting have helped shape me into the person I am today,” Bailey said. “I hope to always live by the values I learned in scouting.”
Bailey was a member of the first Troop for Girls in Warren County through the Boy Scouts of America, which changed its name to Scouts BSA when the organization began allowing female troops to join.
