Alicia Robinson
The girls pictured in their berets and saddle shoes in old news
clippings from 1949 could never have imagined their counterparts
today would be wearing jeans and sneakers, carrying cellphones and
giving each other henna tattoos.
Girl Scouting has changed immensely over the last 50 years, though
one of its settings in Newport Beach has not. The Neva B. Thomas Girl
Scout House on Balboa Boulevard, opened in 1949, is one of six sites
in Orange County used by area Girl Scouts.
The house could use some rejuvenation, and that could be coming
soon if Newport Beach voters approve a November ballot measure that
would change the city's general plan to allow the Marinapark resort
to be built in the area. Marinapark developer Stephen Sutherland has
proposed building a new Girl Scout house as well as refurbishing the
nearby American Legion facility as part of the luxury hotel plan.
A history of service
The Girl Scout house was built in 1948 and 1949 with time,
materials and funding contributed by the community. The now-defunct
Balboa Bay Lions Club oversaw the construction of the building, which
had an estimated worth of $30,000.
At the time, Orange County had a number of different Girl Scout
councils, and the local Girl Scout house was headquarters for the
Newport Harbor Girl Scout Council, said Tom Olivas, assistant
executive director of property and technology for the Girl Scout
Council of Orange County.
Neva B. Thomas grew up in the area and worked for the Newport
Harbor Girl Scout Council in the 1950s, and she became part of the
Orange County organization when the various councils merged, said
Lisa Hinshaw, who is in her 41st year with Girl Scouts and serves on
two committees of the Orange County Girl Scout Council.
A petite woman, who was always neatly dressed, Thomas had a big
influence on girls growing up in Newport in the 1950s and 1960s, Hinshaw said. Thomas kept an office in the Scout house, which was
named for her sometime before she died about 15 years ago.
"One of the things that Neva really believed in is that it didn't
matter where the girl came from or what her experiences were, it was
that Girl Scouting was a good place for girls to be," Hinshaw said.
"She wanted to ensure there was a place, physically and
metaphorically, for girls to be involved in Girl Scouting."
The Scout house's large, open room with a fireplace and raised
stage and the nearby beach keep the facility in high demand for troop
meetings, training programs and weekend camp-outs, Olivas said.
