Boys' Life - The old covers were better. . . . . .

But then I have always felt you could dream more in a painting than you could in a photograph.

I am a life long lover of the Boy Scouts. I may not agree with everything they do now, but they still have my support.

Even now I can still remember some of my favorite covers from the Boys Life magazine.
And being a real big Norman Rockwell fan, his covers were just magic. He was active with the Boy Scout program for many years.

When a cover was illustrated by an artist, I am able to transport myself into the image or scene. While there are wonderful photos, they have never been able to move me the same way. Photos are exact and don't allow much in the way of imagination. Paintings, being less exact allow one, me, to adjust the image in my mind. ( I am not sure what that says about me?).

Here is a new cover. . . . and while it shows a young boy out on an adventure, it doesn't really invite me in or create a scene I want to participate in.

And here is another I feel the same way about.

While he looks like he is having fun I don't in any way feel I could be part of it.











And here are some older covers that I remember to this day. . . .

 I see these old illustrations and I am remind that I wanted to be in those 'pictures'. I wanted those adventures, and gear, etc.

 For some reason this is my all time favorite.

Two wonderful Norman Rockwell's.

And these two covers were so fun for so many reasons.

See if you can name all the images.


















While the illustrated cover had been slowly going away for a while when I got into Scouts, many covers were still done by artists. And I also had my brothers older copies.



Here is a self portrait of Norman Rockwell painting at a Scout camp.