White Stag was the Crossroads of America Council's Junior Leader Training Conference (JLTC). At one time, White Stag in the Crossroads of America was arguably the best of the best east of the Mississippi. Beginning in 2006 it began transitioning into an NYLT. White Stag JLTC in Crossroads of America was based on the standard national Boy Scouts of America JLTC staff guide, most recently the 1995 edition. The White Stag JLTC program taught youth leaders eleven tangible, articulable, applicable leadership skills necessary to provide effective, quality leadership, not only to their home units, but on through adult life.
The week-long White Stag course no longer exists as a training program in the Crossroads of America Council, having been fully replaced by a weekends-only NYLT program. At the conclusion of the current program conducted in a, "patrol-like setting," participants, "present their vision of the meaning of leadership."
Brian T. Phelps said it best on his web site, whitestag.org, "The current program differs markedly from today's White Stag program because the leadership competencies have been diluted and replaced with generic concepts of group formation and leadership."
Fortunately, the original White Stag Leadership Development Program is alive and well where it all began in California, and White Stag's lineage can be directly traced back to the original White Stag course in 1958. Even more fortunate is that youth can and do still attend. If you're considering your local council's NYLT, consider White Stag Leadership Development Monterey and White Stag Sierra for your scouts. These courses are both reputable examples of the effective, formative, impactful, meaningful White Stag method.
The goal of Page10.org is to preserve and share the history and heritage of the White Stag program in the Crossroads of America for generations to come.
As I understand it, the concept of the White Stag program was brought to what is now the Crossroads of America Council in or about 1972 by Mr. Rex Hatch. The program, possibly once known as Silver Bars representing the silver-colored bars on the BSA leadership office patches of the time, and later TLTC believed to be an acronym for Troop Leader Training Conference, became White Stag under the leadership of Mr. Hatch. From about 1972 through 1996, the White Stag program in the Crossroads of America Council consisted of only one course. This course was held in June at Camp Red Wing, near Muncie, Indiana. In 1997, the White Stag course was moved to Ransburg Scout Reservation because of complications with Camp Red Wing. In 1998, White Stag would return to it's home at Camp Red Wing, and a second session, to be held in July, would be added. In 1997, at Ransburg Scout Reservation, White Stag consisted of four troops, each on a ridge at Ransburg. The size of the program at that time likely contributed to the launch of the two session program in 1998. The initial July session was to be held a month after the June session, and was initially run exactly the same way. July, however, eventually took on it's own flavor. New staff was hired as usual every year to replace those youth staff who had aged out the year prior, and the staff that remained of the 1997 course was split up between the two sessions. New adult staffers were hired to fill any absences that existed. The creation of the second session in July created a division in the White Stag program.
Both sessions of White Stag ran in June and July in 1998 and 1999. In 2000, a new adaptation to White Stag was developed and launched. This session was known as the White Stag Woods and Water session. Woods and Water was an adaptation on the classic White Stag method for a high-adventure environment. White Stag Woods and Water drew it's staff from the returning staff of the 1999 June and July sessions, and new staffers were also hired who had attended White Stag the previous year. Most staff members of the initial Woods and Water session held in 2000 were experienced, returning staff members. White Stag Woods and Water session was based out of Adventure Point at Ransburg Scout Reservation.
In the summers of 2000, 2001, and 2002, White Stag operated three sessions. These were White Stag June, White Stag July, and White Stag Woods and Water. June and July were the traditional static sessions, and Woods and Water was our high-adventure session. In the summer of 2003, however, more change came to the White Stag program. The Woods and Water session was discontinued, partly because of the establishment of a similar White Stag course operated by the Hoosier Trails Council in southern Indiana. Added to the White Stag calendar in 2003 was the second July session. This session was first held in late July and early August of 2003 at Camp Krietenstien, which had been acquired by the Crossroads of America Council when it merged with the Wabash Valley Council in west-central Indiana. The June and July sessions at Camp Red Wing and the second July session at Camp Krietenstien absorbed the staff of the disbanded Woods and Water session. Additionally, new staff were hired to supplement all three sessions.
The White Stag Krietenstien session ceased to exist around 2005. White Stag June and July sessions absorbed the staff remaining from the Krietenstien session. In 2006, the new NYLT syllabus was adopted, replacing the Junior Leader Training Conference syllabus that the White Stag program had great success with for many years. Retrospectively, I think its fair to say that the adoption of the NYLT syllabus was effectively the beginning of the end of the White Stag program.
In 2023, some of my fellow brilliant members of White Stag Staff had the foresight and drive to start a staff reunion at Camp Red Wing. This reunion has now become an annual thing, and as of 2025 we have grown to over fifty staff in attendance. This basic, static website, which is a direct evolution of the first personal White Stag website I first published in 2004 on my former nwjcra.org domain, will serve as a repository of White Stag history, documents, photos, memoribilia, links to relevant social media locations such as The White Stag Reunion Discord Server, Facebook, and whatever else I can think of to put up here. I have been entrusted with some fantastic resources, some of which are digitized and some of which still need to be digitized; I will be working on that as time allows.
This site and the White Stag Staff Reunion are not affiliated with the Crossroads of America Council, Scouting America, the White Stag Academy or the White Stag Association. The information presented on this site pertains to the White Stag program as it previously existed in the council service area of the Crossroads of America Council in Indiana and should not be construed in any way to pertain to present-day activities of or intellectual property owned by the White Stag Association or the White Stag Academy. Notwithstanding this statement of non-affiliation, I wholeheartedly appreciate and support the two aforementioned organizations' efforts in keeping White Stag alive for the youth of today and tomorrow.
Page last updated 15:11 12/5/2025.
© 2004-2025, Dennis M. Boyle. All rights reserved.
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