Area Scouters receive council’s highest award

Four area Scouters from Mahoning and Trumbull Counties have earned the highest award a Boy Scout Council can present to adult volunteers – the Silver Beaver Award.

Recently at the Great Trail Council Annual Meeting and Recognition Dinner held at St. Thomas Eastern Orthodox Church in Fairlawn, awards and recognitions were presented to many individuals of the Great Trail Boy Scout Council who have given service in many of the programs and activities throughout the areas served by the council.

Four of the eleven recipients of the Silver Beaver Award come from the valley. They are John Barkett, David Chauvin, Robert Guesman and Kurt Hilderbrand.

Barkett recently retired from FujiFilm Medical Systems as the Government Accounts Manager. He is on the Board of the Great Trail Council with a support position in the Pathfinder District (Scoutreach) in both Mahoning and Trumbull Counties. A key role of this position is to capture funding from local, regional and national charitable foundations. This role also puts him in contact with school administrators as a “Scoutreach Ambassador.” It includes being a point of contact in partnering with various community organizations, such as United Way and the Youngstown Kiwanis Club.

Barkett was previously the Vice President of Community Service with the Greater Western Reserve Council in a similar support role with Scoutreach. He is an active supporter of Youngstown State University with the YSU Penguin Club for both football and tennis, and the YSU Foundation. He is a member of the Boardman Civic Association and contributor to the Boardman Scholarship Fund. He is a past President for of the Boardman Gridiron Club that supports Boardman High School football, not only on the gridiron, but in the classroom that funded academic scholarships. He is also a supporter of Catholic Charities and St. Charles Church.

His son, Brent, presented his award.

Chauvin is retired from the Ohio Turnpike Commission with 32 years of service. He is also a retired Chief Warrant Officer-4 with the United States Marine Corps Reserve. While in the Marine Corps Reserve he served as unit coordinator for the “Toys for Tots” campaign during 1981-1992. He worked with the U.S. Naval Sea Cadet Program from 1982-1984. He works as the Scouting Coordinator with the Junior Fair Board at the Canfield Fair since 2007.

Chauvin is currently the Scoutmaster of Troop 54 in the Brownlee Woods neighborhood of Youngstown, beginning in 1998. In addition he is a Unit Commissioner, serves on the District Committee, is coordinator for the Canfield Fair Scout Encampment and was on the 2016 National Youth Leadership Training staff. He has served for 16 years as a Campmaster for Camp Stambaugh.

He earned his Wood Badge Beads in 2001, the Order of the Arrow (OA) Cheerful Service Award in 2004 and received the OA Vigil Honor in 2008. He has also earned the Scouter’s Key, Scoutmaster’s Key Commissioner’s Key and District Committee Key Training Awards. He has been a New Unit Organizer and has been awarded the District Award of Merit.

Chauvin’s award was presented to him by his Eagle Scout son, Dylan.

Guesman is a retired pipefitter and worked for 16 years out of Local 225 Plumbers and Pipefitters of Warren. From 1985 until retiring in 2012 he worked for General Motors in Lordstown.

He started as a Committee member in 1989 with Troop 25 in Champion and soon became Troop 25’s Committee Chairman. In 1992, he transferred to Troop 8 in Warren where he was a Committee Member. In 1994 he became a District Committee member and served on the Training Committee for 10 years, five as chairman. From 2006-2009 he served as Scoutmaster of Troop 8.

Guesman is a Vigil Honor member of the Order of the Arrow, He has led more than 50 young men on 50-mile canoe trips in northern Ontario and has earned six 50-Mile Awards himself. Upon his retirement from GM, he became a Unit Commissioner and recently became an Assistant District Commissioner.

Guesman’s award was presented by his Eagle Scout son, Josef, and Gabriel Illes.

Hilderbrand is an engineer and the Product Manager for Processing Lines at Primetals Technologies in Pittsburgh, Pa. He has worked in the steel industry for 30 years, designing and implementing mill process equipment. He has been a Scouter since 1985 and currently serves as the Scoutmaster of Boy Scout Troop 80 in North Lima, Order of the Arrow Neatoka Chapter Adviser for Marnoc Lodge and is Camping Chairman on the Whispering Pines District Committee.

Hilderbrand has earned his Wood Badge Beads, Scoutmaster’s Key and District Committee Key Training Awards and has been presented the Adult Religious Award and District Award of Merit. He earned his Eagle Scout Award in 1979 in Boy Scout Troop 2 of Poland and is a Lifetime Member of the National Eagle Scout Association. He was presented the Vigil Honor in Wapashuwi Lodge, Order of the Arrow in 2015.

Hilderbrand served as Whispering Pines District Chairman from 2012-2015. He was a Woodbadge Course Guide, Philmont Contingent Leader and served on staff at the 2013 National Boy Scout Jamboree and will once again this July at the 2017 National Boy scout Jamboree.

Hilderbrand and his wife, Donna, have been married for 29 years and their son, Kent, is a third generation Eagle Scout from Boy Scout Troop 80 and is President of Venturing Crew 101 in Struthers. He has served as Assistant Scoutmaster of Boy scout Troop 2 and 44 in Poland and Boy Scout Troop 80 in North Lima. He was also Cubmaster of Cub Scout Pack 116 from 2001-2005.

Hilderbrand is a proud member and volunteer at St. James Episcopal Church in Boardman and serves as Eucharistic Minister, Lay Reader, Vestry and Buildings and Grounds. He has served as Parade Marshall for 13 years on the Mahoning Valley St. Patrick’s Day Parade, Technology Committee member for the American Institute for Steel Technology and an associate member of the Galvanizing Association. His award was presented by his wife, Donna, and his Scoutmaster James Pearce.

During the evening, the Great Trail Council recognized their Scout Executive, Mike Jones, for 22 years of service to the Great Trail Council, who will be retiring as of July 1. Jones has been a Professional Scouter for 37 years.

The Great Trail Council, one of more than 300 local BSA councils across America, is headquartered in Akron, serving families in Summit, Medina, Portage, Trumbull, Mahoning and northern Wayne Counties in northeast Ohio with more than 13,000 youth members in 421 units.

For more information about the Great Trail Council, go to www.gtcbsa.org.