1973 was the year I took-over the Scouts Group of Boys' Town English School (later became Assumption English School, AES) as a Troop Leader. The Scouts Master then was Mr Ang Leng Sze who was also a full time teacher of the school.
The boys of the Scouts group as I recalled were all from the lower secondary and none coming from the upper secondary. The group’s equipment was minimal, some cooking pots and pans, a couple of axes and mallets, 1 decaying two-hundred pound tent, 1 two men tent and a group’s treasure with not much money in it.
I was a secondary 3 student then when I organized the first Troop Camp at the school field and 13 scout campers attended the camp. I recalled how I had to stay up late into the night to conduct the Scouts Standard tests to each camper on the eve of 'break camp'.
After my completion of secondary education at AES, I continued as a volunteer and led the group. For how long was I going to be with the group I wondered as I knew many former scouts before me had tried but eventually gave up and faded away after a year or so and without much headway. I had a goal though and that was to build the group to outshine and outperform all other Scouts and Sea Scouts Group and particuarly the Sea Scouts Group that I was formally from.
I also knew that in order to be ahead of all other groups, we must have a goal, not just any goal but one that the boys would believe in and more importantly the goal must be both realistic and achievable. The boys’ primary goal that was, to learn all the outdoor skills of a scouts must also be met or I would fail as a Scouts Leader. So with these two goals in mind, I began the search for the …’catalyst’. My search landed me with thought of turning to the sea, the introduction of sea activities to the group would be a good fit. I foresaw that by introducing sea activities, the boys would have a goal and they would be proficient on both land and sea and that the group would be able to ‘take-on’ all other Scouts Groups of both land and sea.
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| Campers of 1st Sea Training Camp on Pulau Serimbun |
The final push came in 1975, the year that I was greeted with an unexpected surprise that came as a huge disappointment, that our application to hold our annual camp at Sarimbun Scouts Camp for the year was rejected due to the campsite being occupied by other campers. This rejection was something that I could not accept as I was of the view that no scouting program should be put on hold or disrupted by such absurd cause. As it was, we already had our hands full of obstacles, from sustaining interest of the boys, to lack of funds, low recruitment rates and now to be bounded with camping only when there is availability of camping site at Sarimbun Scouts Camp was something I would not tolerate. I cannot recall how we overcame the problem that year, probably by either changing our camp dates or we simply camped in the school compound then but I was determined to eradicate this problem indefinitely. Again, the answer to the problem was …through the sea.
Through the sea and beyond mainland Singapore and onto the smaller islands, we could reach numerous camping sites. To be able to have free access to these islands would mean unrestricted and unlimited opportunities for the group and in order to be able to reach these islands, going into sea activities and owning our own fleet of boats would be the ticket out.
I honestly believed that Scouting should not be confined to either land or sea with Sea Scouts doing sea activities and Scouts doing land activities. I was determined to challenge and to change this concept. Scouts with me would be both proficient in land and sea and we would set a new standard that all scouts or sea scouts group to follow. The group would then be unique and we would be a class of our own.
In 1976, I set upon a plan to purchase and own a boat. It was to be a wooden row–boat with 5 oars and together with it, at least 5 life jackets, a life bouy and some emergency flares to be acquired. This idea of purchasing a boat was put forth at one of the group’s Court Of Hornour (COH). I recalled that members of the Court were very concerned and thought that I had gone ‘mad’. Another concern was that the boys feared that I would eventually turn the group into a Sea Scouts unit. However after much explanation and assurance, the idea was supported.
The funding then would have to come from contributions from our own scouts and a bigger portion from the Scout Master Mr Ang and myself. Despite all these, we were short of a couple of hundreds and I had to approach my good friend Mr Sim Mong Kiat who willingly assisted in the funding of our craft and on the condition that he could have access to the use of the craft should he need to.
Whilst fund was being raised, I then set on to design the craft. From the experiences as a Sea Scout in my younger days, I recalled that the rowboat that I was on had a major design problem. The spacing between the rowers were too narrow and that each time a rower trust his hands forward to row, it would hit the back of the front rower resulting to bruises and injuries. If this were to happen, boys would not look forward to be on board the boat, this must not happen to our craft, I vowed to myself. To overcome this, I sat down to measure the space needed from each rower and using my limited technical drawing skills, I designed the rowboat. Priority was given to the distance between rowers and working from the aft towards the bow of the boat, the overall length came to 24 feet including a 2 feet extension beyond the transom. Another important feature that the boat must have was that it must have a ‘V’ hull, as this would give better speed than a ‘U’ hull craft. All details were clearly drawn and marked onto the technical plan.
On completion of the drawing, I began searching for a boat builder at Kallang as I knew that there were workshops located by the Kallang river. After approaching no less than 2 boat builders with each asking for a hefty price above our budget, I was fortunate to have found a 50 odd year old stout Chinese man who was willing to build the boat in accordance to the plan at a price of $1000/- after some haggling. The boat would need about 2 weeks to be completed.
Leading to the completion of the boat, I paid frequent visits, each time reminding the boat builder the importance of sticking to the technical plan. With each visit, I saw the gradual transformation from simple planks and wood into a handsome boat that we dreamt off.
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| Pioneer 11 in action |
On near completion, a couple of our boys made its way to paint the boat with marine paint, the chosen color was a light gray.
The boat was finally delivered by lorry (driven by one of my college friend) to a house by the sea near to Sarimbun Scouts camp where the house owner was willing to let the boat be stored. The second layer of paint was then given to the boat and was christened “PIONEER 11”. The name Pioneer was chosen, as we would pioneer the way scouting should be and for others to follow. The letter ‘11’ symbolized the group 11 taken from the group 1411 with 14 being the district and 11 being the unit number. It was sometime in late November 1976 then.
On 4th December1976, Pioneer 11 was launched in conjunction with group's first Sea Training Camp on Pulau Sarimbun and without worries of camping restriction. 1976 that year, marked the birth of sea training into the Pioneer Scouts Group Training Program.
That same year, the 1411 Scout Group of Assumption English School took the name PIONEER marking the birth of the PIONEER SCOUTS.
Written by David Neo Boon Tuan
