ST. LOUIS – Brandon Barrett, a St. Louis-area Eagle Scout who recently turned 18, has joined an elite group of scouts by earning all 141 merit barges offered by Scouting America.
From the start of Scouting America (formerly Boy Scouts of America) in 1910 through 2025, only an estimated 621 scouts nationwide have earned every possible merit badge before turning 18, the deadline for youth to achieve Eagle Scout status.
For context, roughly 130 million youth have participated in Scouting America over the past century-plus. Less than one-thousandth of one percent of scouts have completed every available merit badge before aging out of the program, making the achievement exceptionally rare.
Barrett has proudly been involved in Scouting America programs since the first grade, beginning at the Cub Scout level. He has spent the last seven years working to earn every merit badge, including multiple added to the program in recent years…