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From Savannah to St. Petersburg: The Start of Girl Scouting in Pinellas County
March 12 is celebrated as the official birthday of the Girl Scouts. On this day in 1912, Juliette Gordon Low founded the first Girl Scout troop in Savannah, Georgia, launching a movement that would soon spread across the United States.
The organization quickly expanded. In 1913, Jessamine Flowers Link, a friend of Low’s, organized what is widely considered the second troop in the nation at her church in Tampa’s Hyde Park neighborhood.
The movement also had an early connection to St. Petersburg through naturalist and educator Walter J. Hoxie. Hoxie had organized groups of girls in Savannah for swimming, hiking, and other outdoor activities, experiences that helped shape the early ideas behind Girl Scouting.
His daughter, Mary Russell Day, carried those ideas with her when she moved to St. Petersburg in 1923. A primary school teacher, Mary (pictured, center) founded Pinellas County’s first Girl Scout troop in March 1924, marking the beginning of organized Girl Scouting in the community. Known locally as “Cappy,” Day remained active in civic life for decades.
Today, the organization founded by Low continues worldwide through the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, with chapters in more than 145 countries.
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