Stacy A. Cordery

Stacy A. Cordery is an author of notable biographies of fascinating people.

Today's featured book is:

Here is the Remarkable Founder of the Girl Scouts

Juliette Gordon Low

The Girl Scouts of the USA is the largest and most beloved organization for girls and women in the United States. In this exciting new biography of its founder, Juliette Gordon Low, Stacy A. Cordery tells the story of the intrepid, charming, and idiosyncratic woman at its core.

Juliette, or “Daisy,” as she was called, was born in Savannah on the eve of the Civil War to a brash and independent young mother and a deeply patriotic Rebel father. Growing up in post-war Georgia was a challenge for Daisy, who struggled to reconcile her training as a good Southern belle with her desire to run barefoot through the fields. Known fondly to her family as “Crazy Daisy,” it was no surprise when Juliette eventually fell in love with the dashing, aristocratic, and slightly dangerous Willy Low. Nor was it a surprise that their marriage failed. Daisy’s frequent illnesses—including her hearing impairment—and Willy’s fondness for racing and gambling took a toll on their relationship. Once Willy publicly took up with another woman Daisy tried to free herself in a very messy and fraught divorce. He died before it was finalized, leaving her widowed and wealthy, but wounded.

Daisy entered a new and unlooked for chapter in her life. Dissatisfied by the emptiness of the aristocratic lifestyle, she was free to travel and do the charity work which her husband had so vigorously disapproved. Daisy searched the world for diversion, but also for a sense of greater purpose. She shot tigers in India and traveled through its provinces buoyed by the same zeal with which she visited the great cathedrals of Rome and other wonders of the world. But the real discovery came when she met Robert Baden-Powell, a war hero, adventurer and founder of the astoundingly popular Boy Scouts. Daisy was instantly enamored of Scouting, which aimed to teach young boys useful outdoor skills and good moral values while insisting they have fun.

Juliette eagerly fell in with Baden-Powell’s Girl Guides, a sister organization to the Boy Scouts, and created three Girl Guide troops in the United Kingdom. Not content to stop there, Daisy imported the Girl Guides to her hometown of Savannah, changed the name to Girl Scouts, and became a one-woman grassroots campaign spreading the excitement up and down the East Coast.

Her success surpassed Daisy’s wildest expectations—and the nation’s. While her goals for the organization were to provide a place for girls to learn useful domestic and career-related skills, maintain their health through sport, and above all, to have fun, darker days expanded the reach of the Girl Scout organization as the nation entered World War I. Girl Scouts aided the Red Cross, sold liberty bonds, learned to can and preserve food, made trench candles for soldiers—and were positively recognized across the nation for their efforts, after which Girl Scouting grew exponentially.

Daisy Low was a Southern belle both brazen and modest, traditional in manner and yet impossibly forward-thinking. Her failed marriage turned her into a fierce advocate for the broadened potential of all young women, rich and poor. She studied the fine arts and knew royalty, but taught herself to be a social entrepreneur and community organizer whose achievement is still revered around the globe.

Juliette Gordon Low: The Remarkable Founder of the Girl Scouts is a lively, probing and empathetic account of a true pioneer, who, with all her wonderful contradictions, embodied the heart, soul, and spirit of her beloved Girl Scouts.

Interactive Timeline

Juliette Gordon Low was born Juliette Magill Kinzie Gordon on October 31, 1860, in Savannah, Ga. She was the second of six children of William Washington Gordon and Eleanor Kinzie Gordon. Family members on her father's side were early settlers in Georgia, and her mother's family played an important role in the founding of Chicago, Illinois.

A sensitive and talented youngster, Daisy Gordon spent a happy childhood in her large Savannah home, which was purchased and restored by Girl Scouts of the USA in 1953. Now known as the Juliette Gordon Low Girl Scout National Center, or often referred to as the Birthplace, the handsome English Regency house was designated a registered National Historic Landmark in 1965.


Young Daisy Gordon developed what was to become a lifetime interest in the arts. She wrote poems; sketched, wrote and acted in plays; and later became a skilled painter and sculptor. She had many pets throughout her life and was particularly fond of exotic birds, Georgia mockingbirds, and dogs. Daisy was also known for her great sense of humor.

Juliette Low was very athletic. From her childhood on, Daisy was a strong swimmer. She was Captain of a rowing team as a girl and learned to canoe as an adult. She was also an avid tennis player. One of her special skills was standing on her head. She stood on her head every year on her birthday to prove she still could do it, and also celebrated nieces’ and nephews’ birthdays by standing on her head. Once, she even stood on her head in the board room at National Headquarters to show off the new Girl Scout shoes.

Early Adulthood

Daisy Gordon, age 10.

In her teens, Daisy attended boarding school at Virginia Female Institute (now Stuart Hall School) in Staunton, Va., and later attended Mesdemoiselles Charbonniers, a French finishing school in New York City.

Following her school years, Juliette Gordon traveled extensively in the United States and Europe.

On December 21, 1886, her parents' 29th wedding anniversary, Juliette married William Mackay Low, a wealthy Englishman, at Christ Church in Savannah, Ga. Although the couple moved to England, Juliette continued her travels and divided her time between the British Isles and America.

Before her marriage, Juliette had suffered from chronic ear infections. She had lost most of her hearing in one ear because of improper treatment. At her wedding, when she was 26, she lost hearing in her other ear after a grain of good-luck rice thrown at the event lodged in her ear, puncturing the eardrum and resulting in an infection and total loss of hearing in that ear.

During the Spanish-American War, Juliette came back to America to aid in the war effort. She helped her mother organize a convalescent hospital for wounded soldiers returning from Cuba. Her father, who had been a captain in the Confederate army, was commissioned as a general in the U.S. Army and served on the Puerto Rican Peace Commission. At the end of the war, Juliette returned to England and to a disintegrating marriage. The Lows were separated at the time of her husband's death in 1905.

Girl Scout Life

Juliette Gordon Low spent several years searching for something useful to do with her life. Her search ended in 1911, when she met Sir Robert Baden-Powell, founder of the Boy Scouts and Girl Guides, and became interested in the new youth movement. Afterwards, she channeled all her considerable energies into the fledgling movement.

Less than a year later, she returned to the United States and made her historic telephone call to a friend (a distant cousin), saying, "I've got something for the girls of Savannah, and all of America, and all the world, and we're going to start it tonight!" On March 12, 1912, Juliette Low gathered 18 girls to register the first troop of American Girl Guides. Margaret "Daisy Doots" Gordon, her niece and namesake, was the first registered member. The name of the organization was changed to Girl Scouts the following year.

In developing the Girl Scout movement in the United States, Juliette brought girls of all backgrounds into the out-of-doors, giving them the opportunity to develop self-reliance and resourcefulness. She encouraged girls to prepare not only for traditional homemaking, but also for possible future roles as professional women—in the arts, sciences and business—and for active citizenship outside the home. Girl Scouting welcomed girls with disabilities at a time when they were excluded from many other activities. This idea seemed quite natural to Juliette, who never let deafness, back problems or cancer keep her from full participation in life.

From the original 18 girls, Girl Scouting has grown to 3.7 million members. Girl Scouts is the largest educational organization for girls in the world and has influenced the more than 50 million girls, women and men who have belonged to it.

Juliette Gordon Low accumulated admirers and friends of all ages, nationalities and walks of life. By maintaining contact with overseas Girl Guides and Girl Scouts during World War I, she helped lay the foundation for the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts. After her death from breast cancer in 1927, her friends honored her by establishing the Juliette Low World Friendship Fund, which finances international projects for Girl Scouts and Girl Guides around the world. Juliette Gordon Low died at her Savannah, Ga., home on Lafayette Square January 17, 1927. She is buried at Laurel Grove Cemetery in Savannah.

On July 3, 1948, President Harry S. Truman signed a bill authorizing a stamp in honor of Juliette Gordon Low. The stamp was one of the few dedicated to women.

•During World War II, she had a "Liberty Ship" named in her honor. Pictured here in the Southeastern Ship Yards, Savannah, Ga. is The S.S. Juliette Low, launched May 12, 1944.


•In 1954, in Georgia, the city of Savannah honored her by naming a school for her. A Juliette Low School also exists in Anaheim, California.

•The social unrest of the 1960s was reflected in organization actions and Girl Scout program change, including introduction in 1963 of four program age–levels for girls: Brownie, Junior, Cadette, and Senior Girl Scouts.

•The National Board went on record as strongly supporting civil rights. Senior Girl Scout Speakout conferences were held around the country and the "ACTION 70" project was launched in 1969, both as nationwide Girl Scout initiatives to overcome prejudice.

•On October 28, 1979, Juliette Low was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in Seneca Falls, New York.

•On December 2, 1983, President Ronald Reagan signed a bill naming a new federal building in Savannah in honor of Juliette Low. It was the second federal building in history to be named after a woman.

•In 1992, a Georgia non-profit honored Juliette Low as one of the first Georgia Women of Achievement. A bust of Juliette Low is displayed in the State Capitol. In 2000, The Deaf World in Wax, a traveling exhibit, featured her as a famous deaf American.

•On October 14, 2005, Juliette Low's life work was immortalized in a commemorative, bronze-and-granite medallion as part of a new national monument in Washington, D.C.

The Extra Mile Points of Light Volunteer Pathway pays tribute to great Americans who built their dreams into movements that have created enduring change in America. The monument's medallions, laid into sidewalks adjacent to the White House, form a one-mile walking path.

*I highly recommend this remarkable book by Stacy Cordery! :)