Scout Corps Flamberg

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Logo of the Flamberg Scout Corps

The Scouts Corps Flamberge is a 1921 founded politically and religiously independent scout corps in the city of Zurich and the surrounding area.

history

The foundation

In 1921 Adolf Souviron (Suri), Edgar Crasemann (Bari) and Werner Burri (Porridge) decided to found a scout department in the city of Zurich. The three founders came from Bern, where they had been members of the Patria department . On February 19, 1921, the name "Flamberg", which was found in the song "Am Wellenspiel der Aare", was chosen for the new department. The song - slightly changed - became a department song; That the Flamberg is a sword with a wavy blade and not a burning mountain was only established after the department was named.

After the establishment of the department, the cantonal association demanded its dissolution, and later the incorporation of the Flamberg into the city corps. Thanks to the good friendship between the three founders and Walther von Bonstetten , who was then President of the Swiss Boy Scout Association and who had known the Flamberg founders from his time in the Bernese Patria, the department was incorporated into the Cantonal Association of Zurich Boy Scouts as an independent department in 1922 with the status of a corps (KVZP) included.

By 1937 the department grew to over two hundred scouts in eight platoons. In addition to the Glockenhof and the Catholic Scout Corps, it was the third largest scout department (or the third largest scout corps) in the city of Zurich. On May 1, 1937, the Jungflamberg, an age group for boys from nine and a half years, was introduced. The Jungflamberg is not based on the jungle book , like the wolf levels in other departments, but on Swiss history. Instead of packs and packs, it is therefore divided into hardest and rotters , which are named after Swiss castles or cantons.

When military style was considered good form

When General Guisan visited the national exhibition and the Zurich government on October 20, 1939 , the Flamberg scout department was given the task of providing the guard of honor in front of the town hall.

In the 1930s, military forms met with increasing acceptance in the Swiss scouting movement. The Zurich City Corps and the Flamberg Department are the starting point for this development. One of the reasons they attracted attention was because they switched from scout salute to military salute to underline their solidarity with the army. This development soon spread to the entire boy scout movement and culminated in the 1938 federal camp on the Adlisberg in Zurich. With sporting competitions and mass demonstrations, the aim was to prove that one could raise a good Swiss citizen. On the national holiday , around 7,000 camp participants marched through Zurich's Bahnhofstrasse, past personalities from politics and the army.

When the Second World War broke out, the Flamberg supported the army's mobilization work, like most boy scout departments, as part of the boy scout relief service. Later he made his contribution to the cultivation battle with field service assignments and after the war organized holiday camps for war-damaged children.

In 1957, the proceeds of the family evening and an appeal for donations in the Old Scout Association (APV) made it possible to organize a scout camp for refugees from the Hungarian uprising . The three-week camp was so successful that it was possible to continue the Hungarian train. Due to language problems, the leadership of this procession was given to a Hungarian teacher and scout leader. The Hungarian train was regarded as an independent train and was not subject to the Flamberg, but was allowed to continue to wear the department badge at his request.

The Flamberg receives its current structure

In 1960 the division into several equal levels - Jungflamberg, Scout and Rover level - was introduced. This level system has been retained until today with one change: in 1967 the trapper level was added. In it, the older boy scouts should be able to apply the learned scout technique in practice before they would be trained as leaders after about six months.

The strong increase in population in the agglomeration of the city of Zurich meant that many scouting departments founded branches in the communities near the city. In 1964 some enthusiastic scouts, above all Victor Bataillard (ivy), decided to found the IX. Zug and Harst Habsburg in Birmensdorf . On October 24, 1970, these two units officially became the Birmensdorf Department. This gave the Flamberg the usual structure for a scout corps with several departments, namely Zurich and Birmensdorf. In 1974 the Birmensdorf department was reinforced by a train from Wettswil , which separated from the Felsenegg department. Since then, this 10th train - together with the later founded Harst Rothburg - has been an integral part of the Birmensdorf department.

Youth riots and merger negotiations

The early 1980s were marked by the youth unrest in Zurich. The corps leadership distanced itself from the part of Zurich's youth who made themselves heard in the opera house riots with an open letter to the city government. She called on the city government to keep the relations; two hundred rioting young people are neither representative nor identical with the Zurich youth.

In 1980 the first joint federal camp of the Swiss Boy Scout Association (SPB) and the Federation of Swiss Girl Scouts (BSP) took place with 22,000 participants. The Flamberg - together with the St. Georg District and the Girl Scout Region Zurich City - organized a sub-camp on the theme of “Seelüüt in the Middle Ages”, which took place on Lake Gruyère near La Roche . The joint federal camp is considered a milestone in the history of the Swiss boy scouts; shortly afterwards, the two associations started merger negotiations and founded the Swiss Scout Movement in 1987 . Flamberg was not opposed to the merger. But he showed no interest in it either and decided to remain a pure scout corps and to continue not accepting any girls.

On September 7, 1985, after a long search, a new warehouse was inaugurated. It was the former ski house of the Unterstrass gymnastics club. The building now known as the “Flamberghuis” stands on the Stoos in the canton of Schwyz and was extensively renovated and rebuilt as a result.

The Flamberg today

The Swiss Scout Movement has lost around a quarter of its members since the 1990s. The municipal departments are hardest hit by this decline in membership. The Flamberg was able to hold its own comparatively well and today consists of around three hundred scouts. Its catchment area includes all districts of the city of Zurich, but mainly those on the Zürichberg , as well as the communities in the west of the city ( Birmensdorf , Wettswil etc.).

Every Saturday afternoon there are activities in the scout groups. The groups consist of 7–12 scouts, who, led by a group leader, experience an exciting adventure for a few hours. The focus is on the experience in nature and the joint accomplishment of tasks.

The Scout Flamberg still pays more attention to the uniform than other scout departments, which is often viewed as military. The printing of shirts with linocuts, which is common in other departments, is replaced by smaller camp badges (e.g. stamps on the belt). The Flamberg was also the only corps to cling to the blue Manchester trousers that were used in the past . The blue manchester trousers and the unprinted shirt have become a distinguishing feature, but have long since been decoupled from a military stance or a particular loyalty to regulations.

Personalities

The selection made here is limited to people whose activities were important for both the Flamberg scout corps and the scouts in Switzerland (at cantonal and / or national level):

  • Edgar Crasemann , born January 29, 1896, † July 18, 1973. Senior field master (department head) of the Patria scout department from autumn 1919 to February 1920. Founder and first chief of the Flamberg scout department from January 1921 to October 1928. Cantonal field master (KFM) from 1925 to 1932 Federal Commissioner for Eastern Switzerland (1927–1937) and Vice President and President (1950–?) Of the Swiss Scout Association. Chairman of the Department Council from 1928 to 1965. Prof. Dr. at ETH.
  • Hans Hubacher , born September 18, 1916, † May 11, 2009. Oberfeldmeister (department head) from December 1938 to July 1941 and from August to December 1942 and February to November 1945. President of the Cantonal Association of Zurich Scouts (KVZP) around 1950. Member of the Department Council, Architect.
  • Alex Rübel , * 1955. Head of the corps from October 1979 to October 1981. Cantonal field master and first canton leader of the Pfadi Züri (after the merger of the Cantonal Association of Zurich Scouts and the Cantonal Association of Zurich Scouts), Director of the Zurich Zoo.
  • Heinrich Zollinger (chemist) , born November 29, 1919, † July 10, 2005. Oberfeldmeister (head of department) from December 1941 to August 1942. Rector of ETH Zurich from 1973 to 1977.
  • Lorenz Zollikofer , born July 13, 1913 Zurich, † October 27, 2002. Oberfeldmeister (Head of Department) from April to December 1935. 1967–1973 Commander of Field Division 6 . 1975–1980 President of Swiss Mountain Aid .

Other Flambergers: René Burri , Werner Burri , Robert Frank , Benjamin Grüter , Andreas Nabholz , Beat Richner , Ambros Uchtenhagen , Heinrich Zollinger

literature

  • Anniversary publication for the 20th anniversary of the Flamberg scout department, Zurich 1941.
  • Anniversary publication for the 40th anniversary of the Flamberg scout department, Zurich 1961.
  • Anniversary publication for the 60th anniversary, Zurich 1981.
  • Anniversary publication for the seventy-fifth birthday, Pfadi Flamberg, 1921–1996, Zurich 1996.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Fritz Erb: 20 Years of the Scout Corps City of Zurich 1916–1936. Zurich 1936.
  2. ^ Felix Ruhl: 100 years of scouts. Reinhardt, Basel 2007, ISBN 978-3-7245-1440-4 . P. 35.
  3. ↑ Dominik Stroppel: The Swiss Scout Association 1918 to 1945. Dissertation from the University of Zurich, Zurich 1996. P. 157.
  4. ^ From the corps of Hans Waldmann
  5. ↑ Head of the Flamberg scout corps: Zurich youth, who is it? in: NZZ, No. 132, June 10, 1980, p. 46.
  6. ↑ Danielle Naegeli: When a youth organization gets married. Fusion of the scout organizations on different levels and their contemporary historical backgrounds. Unpublished Matura thesis of the Rychenberg Cantonal School , Winterthur 2011, p. 8.
  7. ↑ Some traditional departments and corps, such as the Patria scout corps, which emerged from the Zurich City Corps, or the Zürileu scout department, disappeared completely during this period.
  8. ↑ Dagmar Böcker: Hans Hubacher. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland . August 27, 2012 , accessed July 10, 2019 .
  9. ↑ Jérôme Guisolan: Lorenz Zollikofer. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland . December 9, 2013 , accessed July 10, 2019 .