William Durant Campbell (March 18, 1907 – October 20, 1995) was a highly-decorated leader of the

Scouting movement Scouting, also known as the Scout Movement, is a worldwide youth movement employing the Scout method, a program of informal education with an emphasis on practical outdoor activities, including camping, woodcraft, aquatics, hiking, backpacking ...

in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. Campbell was born in

Flint Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and start fir ...

Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...

, a grandson of

William C. Durant William Crapo Durant (December 8, 1861 – March 18, 1947) was a leading pioneer of the United States automobile industry and co-founder of General Motors and Chevrolet. He created a system in which a company held multiple marques – each s ...

, the founder of

General Motors The General Motors Company (GM) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturing company headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It is the largest automaker in the United States and ...

. He graduated from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

in 1929, and first went into banking. After a few years, he became a field associate of the

American Museum of Natural History The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. In Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 26 inter ...

and led six of their African expeditions in the 1930s. In 1937, he built Monte Carlo Ranch House in

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. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, Campbell served in the U.S. Army as a

battery commander In military organizations, an artillery battery is a unit or multiple systems of artillery, mortar systems, rocket artillery, multiple rocket launchers, surface-to-surface missiles, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, etc., so grouped to fac ...

. He retired as a

major Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...

Background

In 1940 he married Beatrice Hawn, who died in 1987. They had one daughter, Margot Bogert, who was also a world Scouting leader and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of

Sarah Lawrence College Sarah Lawrence College is a Private university, private liberal arts college in Yonkers, New York. The college models its approach to education after the Supervision system, Oxford/Cambridge system of one-on-one student-faculty tutorials. Sara ...

. Campbell was an officer of the

World Organization of the Scout Movement The World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM ) is the largest international Scouting organization. WOSM has 173 members. These members are recognized national Scout organizations, which collectively have around 43 million participants. WOS ...

from 1961 to 1965 and then from 1973 to 1985, and received Scouting awards from seven countries. He helped establish the

World Scout Foundation The World Scout Foundation (WSF) is an international, non-profit institution based in Geneva, Switzerland. Its mission is to develop World Scouting by the provision of financial and other support through the World Organization of the Scout Movement ...

and served as its chairman from 1969 to 1977. Campbell was awarded the Bronze Wolf, the only distinction of the

, awarded by the World Scout Committee for exceptional services to world Scouting, in 1959. Campbell was also an

Eagle Scout Eagle Scout is the highest achievement or rank attainable in the Scouts BSA program of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA). Since its inception in 1911, only four percent of Scouts have earned this rank after a lengthy review process. The Eagle Sc ...

and recipient of both the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award and

Silver Buffalo Award The Silver Buffalo Award is the national-level distinguished service award of the Boy Scouts of America. It is presented for noteworthy and extraordinary service to youth on a national basis, either as part of, or independent of the Scouting pro ...

. He is the only man in the history of the BSA to hold all five top-tier Scouting awards: the Bronze Wolf, the Silver Buffalo, the Silver Antelope, the OA Distinguished Service Award, and the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award. In 1971 he also received the highest distinction of the

Scout Association of Japan The is the major Scouting organization of Japan. Starting with boys only, the organization was known as Boy Scouts of Japan from 1922 to 1971, and as Boy Scouts of Nippon from 1971 to 1995, when it became coeducational in all sections, leading to ...

, the Golden Pheasant Award. He lived on Beekman Place in Manhattan, New York.

Background

References

Further reading