The Crystal Palace Rally was a historic gathering of Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts at the Crystal Palace in London on Saturday, 4 September 1909. The rally demonstrated the rapid popularization of Scouting with an estimated 11,000 boys attending with the prominent presence of Girl Scouts also being significant for the start of Girl Guides/Scouts. The rally was held a year and a half after the publication of Scouting for Boys and The Scout magazine, and two years after Robert Baden-Powell's demonstration Brownsea Island Scout Camp. The Rally was a precursor to the later Scout Jamborees and World Scout Jamborees. The concept of the Scouts' Own, a simple, non-denominational religious ceremony, was also introduced by H. Geoffrey Elwes at this rally. Members of the local Scout Troop, 2nd Croydon, formed part of the flag party for Princess Christian, the member of the Royal family in attendance. As a result, the Group, which is still in existence, has the right to call themselves Princess Christian's Own. The Group still meet near Crystal Palace Park and regularly use Crystal Palace park for Scouting activities.
Girls
Several hundred Girl Scouts also attended, including one group under their Patrol LeaderMarguerite de Beaumont. They dressed in the GirlScout uniform as given in the Scout handbook, and were officially registered as Girl Scouts. This was the first time Baden-Powell was able to discern clearly how many girls were interested in Scouting, although he knew there were several thousand. The media coverage of this rally, along with that in "The Spectator" magazine in October-December 1909 initiated by Miss Violet Markham, led to the formal founding in 1910 of Girl Guides under his sister, Agnes Baden-Powell. Girls had been part of the movement almost as soon as it began. A contingent of girls from Peckham Rye spoke to Baden-Powell at the Rally. In December 1909 Baden-Powell decided to create a similar but separate programme for girls. In those days, for girls to camp and hike was not common, as this extract from the Scout newspaper shows: "If a girl is not allowed to run, or even hurry, to swim, ride a bike, or raise her arms above her head, how can she become a Scout?", though it is a curiosity, as in those days many girls and young women belonged to bicycle clubs. In 1910, Baden-Powell and his sister Agnes Baden-Powell introduced the Girl Guides, in some other countries called Girl Scouts, a parallel movement for girls. Agnes Baden-Powell became the first president of the Girl Guides. Attendees who later influenced Scouting and Guiding included Nesta G. Ashworth née Maude, later instrumental in the setup of Lone Guides, Rotha Lintorn-Orman and Nella Levy, a pioneer of Guiding in Australia. To commemorate the event, Girlguiding UK open a Centenary Maze in Crystal Palace Parkin September 2009.
