Figure 1.--Here we see a group of Cubs and Scouts from Cook Island. Of course the familiar British green Cub jumper (sweater) is not worn. The photo is undated, but we would guess it was taken during the 1940s. Fortunaley for these Scouters, the Cook Islands was just outside the World War II area of Japanese expansion.

The Cook Island archepelago consists of fifteen small islands located in the South Pacific northeast of New Zealand. The different Cook Islands first was united as the Kingdom of Rarotonga (1858). Britain established a protectorate and created a federal parliament (1888). A New Zealand began to become a more independent Dominion, Britain transfered authority for the Cook Islands (1901). The Islands were beyond the area conquered by the Japanese in World War II and thus escaped the damage expeienced by other South Pacific islands. The Cook Islands today are a self-governing parliamentary democracy, freely associated with New Zealand. The only youth groups we know of are the Boy Scouts and Girl Guides. As both groups are very small, they are associated with Scouting New Zealand an arrangement which developed before the Cook Islands became a self-governing dependency of New Zealand. We have been unable to find much informstion about Scouting on the islands, but we know that there was some Scouting activity in the pre-World War II era. The boys had British looking information.