Intrepid Girls

The Complicated History of the Girl Scouts of the USA

Amy Erdman Farrell

• Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
• Year: 2025
• Print ISBN: 9781469686837
• eBook ISBN: 9781469686714
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: North American History
• Index: History

When eight-year-old Amy Erdman Farrell moved with her family to Akron, Ohio, in 1972, she found herself adrift in a sea of taunting boys and mean girls. Shy by nature, she dreaded her long, unhappy days at school. But a few years later, Farrell found an escape from bullying, the promise of sisterhood, a rising sense of confidence, adventure, and—best of all—lifelong friendship when she joined a Girl Scout troop. Decades later, award-winning author Farrell returns to those formative experiences to explore the complicated and surprising history of the Girl Scouts of the USA.

Drawing from extensive archival research, visits to iconic Girl Scout sites around the world, and vivid personal reflections, Farrell uncovers the Girl Scouts intricate history, revealing how the organization has shaped the lives of more than 50 million girls and women since its founding in 1912. With Farrell as our own intrepid guide, we travel to American Indian boarding schools, Japanese American incarceration centers, segregated African American communities, middle-class white neighborhoods, and outposts throughout the globe. Intrepid Girls unpacks how the Girl Scouts navigated tensions over feminism, race, class, and political differences, carving out extraordinary opportunities for girls and women—even as it participated in the very discrimination it promised to transcend.

For anyone who has ever worn a uniform or wondered about the hidden history behind this iconic American institution, Intrepid Girls will surprise, inspire, and challenge what we think we know about the Girl Scouts.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Halftitle Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Acknowledgments
• Chapter 1. Girl Scouts of the USA: Race, Feminism, and American Empire
• Chapter 2. Origin Stories: The Myth and Memory of Juliette Gordon Low
• Chapter 3. Girl Scouting and the Intrepid Girl
• Chapter 4. Girl Scouting and American Indian Girls
• Chapter 5. The Arsenal of Democracy: Girl Scouting in an Age of Empire
• Chapter 6. Japanese American Incarceration and the Myth of International Sisterhood
• Chapter 7. Girl Scouting and the Color Line: African American Girl Scouts in the Twentieth Century
• Chapter 8. Even the Girl Scouts: Communism and the Seeds of Subversion in the Girl Scouts
• Chapter 9. From Revolution to Backlash: Girl Scouting in the Late Twentieth Century
• Chapter 10. An Active Education in Forgetting: My 1975 Pilgrimage to the Juliette Gordon Low Birthplace and the Girl Scout Plantation
• Chapter 11. Girl Scouting in the Twenty-First Century
• Chapter 12. A Dangerous Innocence
• Notes
• Index