By Mitchell Pierpont
If you were at NOAC, chances are you had a great time celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Order of the Arrow. The centennial NOAC brought 15,000 Arrowmen from all over the country to Michigan State University, where there was something for everyone. The entire staff was busy at work before the arrival of the guests with some even working since the last conference ended in 2012. There is one group, however, that made everything run a little more smoothly. This is the foreman corps.
All summer long, the foremen are hard at work at their respective high adventure bases making sure that every Arrowmen who visits has a once-in-a-lifetime experience while making a lasting impact through cheerful service. They also made sure to bring the same energy and dedication to make the conference run smoothly. If you’ve been on an OA High Adventure trek, then it will come as no shock to you that the foremen keep service at their very center, and whenever you saw them at NOAC, they were always hard at work while wearing a smile.
One of the key roles that the foreman corps played was to guide guests through the conference check-in process. As soon as a contingent stepped off of their bus, a foreman was there. They handled opening instructions, the distribution of conference materials to individual guests and everything in between. Noah Shepperson, a veteran foreman at OA Trail Crew, was one such cheerful staffer. As he guided contingents to each step in the process, he made sure to converse and joke around with guests. But perhaps the most humorous were his sunglasses, which he embellished with zip-ties so that they truly stood out. These standout acts of cheerful service were characteristic of the foremen who staffed the conference.
While at NOAC, the foreman corps was the behind the scenes group that made tough jobs easy. They set up tables and chairs in the hot sun everyday, as well as helped to staff many areas in The Hub. They shipped water from site to site, as well as support during the Hodag and the Centennial Festival. The conference could not have happened without them. When they weren’t setting up outdoor events in the hot sun and making sure that all the other duties were well taken care of, these gentlemen were promoting OA High Adventure, making sure Arrowmen knew what great opportunities are available to them. You may have seen some of the Northern Tier foremen portaging canoes across the roads of East Lansing or maybe the Philmont foremen carrying their large backpacks. The foreman corps is made up of great Arrowmen who eat, sleep and breathe high adventure, and they wouldn’t want it any other way.