Girl Scouts in Arizona, 1920-1940

The Phoenix Girl Scouts were formed into the Maricopa Girl Scout Council in 1936. By 1968, the 50th Anniversary of Girl Scouting in Arizona, the Maricopa Girl Scout Council had grown into the Arizona Cactus-Pine Council (GS - ACPC) and covered the northern 2/3 of the state. In 1988, Dorothy Canfield Foster compiled a history of the GS - ACPC, relying on the artifacts and memory of Jean Clark, leader of Girl Scout Troop 1 for 50 years. Barbara Anderson, a Council staff member, was inspired by this history and later used it as a foundation for creating the Historical Society after her retirement in 1985.

In 1986, a small group of volunteers and interested staff members, led by Barbara Anderson who had become a full time volunteer and who had decided to donate her large collection of Girl Scout memorabilia to the Council, met and formed a society to learn about and to preserve the history of Girl Scouting in Arizona. Thus was born the Arizona Cactus-Pine Girl Scout Historical Society.

During the first few years of its existence, members of the society spent time learning and defining their mission and collecting memorabilia under the leadership of Barbara Anderson.

In the 1990's, first came a closet, then a room in the administration building, and finally, in 1999, the Barbara Anderson Girl Scout Museum opened in the Girl Scout Retail Shop at 3806 N. 3rd Street in Phoenix, with a small room in the adjacent warehouse for collection and storage of archival materials and memorabilia.

In Spring 2009, the Council offered the use of the vacant Carriage House located at 119 E. Coronado, by the site of the administrative offices. The move was accomplished in early September and the site was renamed The Heritage Center. Today The Heritage Center is managed by the History Committee with the support of the GS - ACPC Historical Society.

Founding Members of the GS-ACPC Historical Society:

• Barbara Anderson, Chair
• Phyllis Gay
• Bettye Mobley
• Kay Utke
• Rebecca Whitney