During our firmwide meeting this year, McMillan Pazdan Smith donated hundreds of blankets to Cub Scout Pack 502 to aid in a Guiness World Record attempt and benefit the community. A group of 108 Scouts from Cub Scout Pack 502, BSA Troop 502B, and BSA Troop 502G made history on Saturday, May 13, 2023, by building the world’s largest blanket fort at Waterfront Park in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina. The fort took four-and-a-half hours to construct and measured 12,290.12 square feet–breaking the previous record of 9,935.30 square feet set in 2019.
Evidence of their effort and dedication was submitted to Guinness World Records for verification and officially accepted on August 13th, 2023. “We are thrilled to inform you that your application for largest blanket fort has been successful, and you are now the Guinness World Records Title Holder!” said the message sent to the Scouts from the Records Management Team at Guinness World Records.
The record-breaking fort was the culmination of a blanket drive service campaign that collected blankets from schools, businesses, churches, friends, and family to donate to homeless and animal shelters in the community.
The Scouts will spend the rest of the year donating all the blankets used to construct the fort to homeless shelters and animal shelters to make sure they end up in the hands of those in need.
The purpose of the campaign was threefold:
To empower the Scouts toward meaningful service.
To engage and raise awareness of the needs within the community.
To achieve a world record by undertaking a challenging project that would be both creative and fun!
The responsibility of building the blanket fort fell primarily on the youth Scouts (boys and girls), with adult supervision and guidance. “These Scouts invested themselves in this pursuit, spending many meetings practicing the skills needed to accomplish their goal, from organizing teams to testing construction methods,” said Cub Pack Leader Nathan Schutte, “I couldn’t have been prouder supporting this effort. They will remember this accomplishment for the rest of their lives.” Schutte is an architect in our Charleston Studio. He rallied MPS to be among the businesses that donated blankets used for the fort.
The Scouts of P502, T502B, and T502G are part of the Coastal Carolina Council of the Boy Scouts of America, which serves over 6,000 youth in 11 counties in South Carolina. The council’s mission is to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Law.
MPS congratulates the Scouts for serving the community in a creative way and breaking a world record in the process!