Figure 1.--Here is a group of French Cubs (Louveteau) in 1952. They are standing in fron t of a church so presumably they belong to the Catholic Scout association, Scouts de France. Notice the berets beret with badge a rather than the British-styled peaked caps that French Cubs originally wore. The beret and scarfe (foulard) are the only item all the boys wore. There was a light-colored uniform shirt and dark-blue corduroy short pants, but mny boys wear ordinary shirts and shorts. They all wear white socks. This was probably because of some special church program, note the formal white gloves, still common in France. Also notice the Scout in the background who was the den leader. Note the altar boy at the right. Put your cursor on the image to see the rest of the group. We see some of the sane boys at a wedding a year earlier.

Louveteau/Louvettes refers to Cub Scouts. The originl name in England was Wolf cubs, explaining the useof the French term for wolf. Louveteau refers to the boys and Louvettes to the girls. Jeannettes is also used for the girls. The singular is Louveteau and the plural is Louveteaux. Cubbing was founded in England (1916). So many younger boys expressed an interest in Scouting that Baden Powell created Cubbing for them. Cubbing was formed in America much later because the BSA was concerned that involving the younger boys would make the program less attractive to the older boys. We believe that French Cubbing began around the same time as the British program. Of course with several different associations, there presumably was no single date. Many French Cub groups are today mixed gender programs, but there are some traditional single gender orograms. The children here are about 8-11/12 years old. They go on tio Scoting some time after turning 12 years old. We have been unable to find much information on French Cubbing. In Britain and America Cubbing is a more home based program than the Scouting program for the older boys. The Scouting asctivities are designed to be appropriate to the younger age group. The programs are largely run by Akelas (Den Mothers) with home meetings. The French Cubs like the British call their den mothers Akéla. Games are especially popular with the younger children. There are fuiekd triops as well as outdoor adventures and short-term camping adventures to prepare them for Scouting. The original French Cub uniforms, like the original Scout uniforms, were very similar to the early British uniforms. Here we see a new styled uniform adopted after World War II by the Catholic Scouts de France association (figure 1). Tghese boys seem to be wearing mostly dark blue corduroy shorts. A French reader tells us that some boys had flannel shorts.