In April 1988, Nentico hosted the NE-6 Conclave at Broad Creek; I was elected Section Secretary that weekend. A few months later, the Northeast Region reorganized and NE-6 grew from six to nine lodges; we needed to create a new logo and patch for the new section.
My design was based on the development of the Northeast Region logo. Before 1983, the councils in Maryland were in the Southeast Region. The Northeast Region was divided into five areas, with a logo of five stars surrounding a Scout Sign, superimposed on a blue field with a red wedge pointing to the Northeast. In 1983, the Maryland councils became the sixth area of the Northeast region; a sixth star replaced the Scout Sign in the center of the region logo.
Since we were that sixth area, I modified the region logo by eliminating the other stars and making the central (sixth) star large and gold, and superimposing a red arrow. I made this logo into a shield with dangling “feathers” representing the nine lodges, including the traditional Roman numeral for Susquehannock Lodge XI.
Until 1988, the area NE-6 was named the “Mid-Atlantic Area”. Unfortunately, the patch was approved and produced before anyone told us that the name no longer applied. A later run of the patches substituted “Boy Scouts of America” around the bottom of the shield.
The arrows in the “BSA” batch showed a decided tendency to wander away from their assigned place across the center of the star.
The central part of the logo was also used for a Section NE-6 flag. The flag has no lodge numbers; we thought the Region might once again tinker with our boundaries and wanted to avoid having to make a new flag in the event of a minor change.
That plan proved useful; in the 1994 realignment of the region, the section was re-named NE-4C and Ahtuhquog Lodge 540 was moved to a different section. The flag was updated by changing the “6” to a “4C”, as seen here.
In 1997, Wunita Gokhos 39 and Black Eagle Lodge 482 were also moved out of the section; the remaining six lodges operated as NE-4C until the Northeast Region realignment of 2008. Beginning after the 2008 NE-4C conclave, Nentico 12, Nentego 20, Guneukitschik 317, and Amangamek Wipit 470 became the new Section NE-6A and Susquehannock XI and Tuckahoe 386 joined with other Pennsylvania lodges to become the new Section NE-6B.
I am told the flag will again be updated, this time to say “NE-6A”. The image below shows the flag flying over Broad Creek’s Camp Spencer during the final NE-4C Conclave in May 2008.