The med scout

A Joan C. Edwards School of Medicine employee spends his spare time hiking and leading a local Boy Scout troop.

   Ed Dzierzak, director of the health sciences library for the Joan C. Edwards School of Medicine, is Boy Scout master of troop 762, adviser for the Venturing Crew and a recreational hiker.

   "I started Boy Scouts when my sons were about the right age and wanted to join," Dzierzak said. "I decided to go with them and have fun with them, too. We have pretty much kept with it for about 15 years."

Dzierzak's wife, Deb Strivers, is also involved with the scouts and the crew committee.

   "My wife and I essentially started the troop that I am Boy Scout master of about 13 or 14 years ago," Dzierzak said. "The two of us were mainly the adults involved until we started getting some of the parents involved."

   Strivers said not many women used to be involved in Boy Scout troops.

   "There are so many families that go separate ways," Strivers said. "Either the father does stuff with the boys or the mother does stuff with the girls, and with our two boys we decided to do stuff together."

  Strivers said her family started the Venturing Crew in 2000.

   "We had many families in the troop who liked what we were doing and they had daughters," Strivers said. "We started the co-ed Venturing Crew so they could be part of it."

   Dzierzak said the Venturing Crew program differs slightly from Boy Scouts.

   "Boy Scouts are supposed to plan all of their own activities," Dzierzak said. "The Venturing Crew takes that a little further by deciding what the group is going to do and when we are going to do it."

  Dzierzak said both of his sons graduated from Marshall University and are involved with the Eagle Scouts.

   Dzierzak said he and one of his sons are planning to take a group of scouts on a hiking trip to Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico.

   "Our Boy Scout council takes a group to New Mexico every other year," Dzierzak said. "So on even number years, we are going out there with anywhere from 24 to 36 scouts and adults and hike for two weeks. It is a lot different hiking than it is here, because we are at least 6,000 feet higher and the air is a bit thinner."

   Dzierzak said his troop of Boy Scouts do a fair amount of hiking.

  "There is a nice local trail that starts out around Barboursville, W.Va. and goes all the way up to Frazier's Bottom on the Kanawha River called Kanawha Trace," Dzierzak said. "The trail is about 32 miles long."

     Dzierzak said he tries to get the group going to New Mexico on the Kanawha Trace once a week.

   "We try to get them out for at least five miles," Dzierzak said. "We have been using the Kanawha Trace as kind of a training trail."

    Strivers said each member in her family has received Vigil Honor, the highest honor that the Order of the Arrow can give its members for their service.

   "Very few people get Vigil Honor," Strivers said. "Up until two years ago, we were the only whole family with Vigil Honors."

    Dzierzak not only hikes with his Boy Scout troop, but he also enjoys hiking on his own on the Appalachian Trail.

   "This year is going to be the fourth year I have done any distance," Dzierzak said. "I have spent anywhere from a week to two weeks on the Appalachian Trail."

   Dzierzak said he hopes to finish the part of the trail through Pennsylvania this year.

    "The trail is 2,179 miles this year," Dzierzak said. "It changes because of re-routes or bad sections get placed elsewhere."

    Dzierzak said last year's Appalachian Trail was 2,174 miles.

   Strivers said she admires her husband's hiking abilities.

   "I totally support my husband," Strivers said. "He is 61 years old and I think there are people half his age that wouldn't attempt anything like this."

    Dzierzak said he is originally from Chicago and moved to Huntington with his wife 34 years ago.

   "I got my bachelor's degree from Mundelein College in Chicago, then moved to Huntington," Dzierzak said. "When I moved here, I got my master's degree in library science from the University of Kentucky."

   Dzierzak said he and his wife were married at the Campus Christian Center in 1977.

   Dzierzak said the health science library is for anyone who needs medical information.

   "It is a well-used library that medical students, staff, faculty, residents and researchers utilize," Dzierzak said.

   Andrea Poling can be contacted at poling26@marshall.edu.