Juliette Gordon Low (October 31, 1860 – January 17, 1927) was the founder of Girl Scouts of the USA. Inspired by the work of Lord Baden-Powell, founder of Boy Scouts, Juliette Low joined the Girl Guide movement in England, forming a group of Girl Guides in Great Britain in 1911.
In 1912 she returned to the United States, and established the first U.S. Girl Guide troop in Savannah, Georgia, that year. In 1915, the United States' Girl Guides became known as the Girl Scouts, and Juliette Gordon Low was the first ever leader. She stayed active until the time of her death.
Her birthday, October 31, is commemorated by the Girl Scouts as "Founder's Day".
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Early life
Juliette Magill Kinzie Gordon was born on October 31, 1860 in Savannah, Georgia. She was named after her grandmother, Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie, and nicknamed Daisy, a common nickname at the time, by her uncle. She was the second of six children born to William "Willie" Washington Gordon II, a cotton broker with the firm Tison & Gordon, which was later renamed to W. W. Gordon & Company, and Eleanor "Nellie" Lytle Kinzie, a writer whose family played a role in the founding of Chicago.
Six months after her birth, her father joined the Confederate States Army to fight in the American Civil War. In 1864, due to the close proximity of Union troops to Savannah, she moved with her mother and two sisters to Thunderbolt, Georgia. After the Union victory in Savannah the same year, her family received many visits from General William T. Sherman, who was a friend of her uncle. Sherman arranged an escort to take her family to Chicago in March 1865. Upon arriving in Chicago, Gordon Low became sick with brain fever, although she recovered without severe complications. A few months later, after President Andrew Johnson issued the amnesty proclamation, her father reunited with the family to move back to Savannah.
As a child, Gordon Low was accident-prone, and she suffered numerous injuries and illnesses. In 1866, her mother mentioned in a letter that "Daisy fell out of bed – on her head, as usual...." That same year, she broke two of her fingers so severely that her parents considered having them amputated. She also suffered frequent earaches and recurring bouts of malaria.
Hobbies
Gordon Low spent more time pursuing art and poetry than she did working on school work. She wrote and performed plays, and she started a newspaper with her cousins called The Malbone Bouquet, which featured some of her early poetry. She formed a club with her cousins, with the goal of helping others. The Helpful Hands Club learned to sew, and tried to make clothes for the children of Italian immigrants. She was dubbed "Crazy Daisy" by her family and friends, due to her eccentricities. Her cousin Caroline described her by saying, "While you never knew what she would do next, she always did what she made up her mind to do."
Education
Gordon Low's parents raised her with traditional Southern values, and they emphasized the importance of duty, obedience, loyalty, and respect. By the age of 12 she had started boarding school, attending several boarding schools during her teen years, including Miss Emmett's School in New Jersey, the Virginia Female Institute, the Edgehill School, and Mesdemoiselles Charbonniers, a French finishing school in New York. While studying at Edgehill, she joined the secret group Theta Tau (based on the sorority of the same name), where members held meetings and earned badges. In 1880, after she had finished boarding school, Gordon Low took painting lessons in New York. Among her teachers was Robert Walter Weir, a prominent landscape painter.
