Olivia Ares of Johnson City is one of 29 girls to earn a 2021 Gold Award from the Girl Scouts of the Southern Appalachians.

If someone asked you to name some notable women in history, who would you list? Eleanor Roosevelt? Marie Curie? Juliette Gordon Low? Amelia Earhart? Rosa Parks? Ada Lovelace? What if you were asked to name a notable woman from your own hometown…could you do it? Many of us would find that question harder to answer.

Girl Scout Olivia Ares used her Gold Award Project to address this issue in her hometown of Johnson City. She created a system of historical markers and a website to inform the public of women who influenced the history of Johnson City as well as the world.

Olivia began her Girl Scout adventure as a Brownie in second grade. As a Junior, she earned her Bronze Award by co-hosting a book drive. Olivia then earned her Silver Award as a Cadette by redoing a children’s room at a local homeless shelter. Earning these awards and supporting a friend as she earned her Gold Award inspired Olivia to start thinking of potential projects for her own Gold Award.

In 2018, Olivia began contemplating possible Gold Award-worthy project ideas. She found that while coming up with ideas was easy, following through with them wasn’t. One idea that she pursued involved creating a women-centric mental health website. However, Olivia decided that wasn’t enough of a service project as the majority of such a project was just sharing information. Eventually, she settled on doing a project focused on history.

Olivia calls herself a “history buff.” Through her Gold Award project, she would create and place historic markers, that she designed herself, throughout Johnson City that highlight remarkable women. She also chose to present plaques recognizing these women to their families.

So far, she has created and placed markers for:

• May Ross McDowell – First female mayor of Johnson City, elected 1961
• Ella Ross – Dean of Women and later Dean of Students at East Tennessee State College
• Mary Hardin McCown – Official historian of Johnson City
• Gwen Terasaki – Author of the National Book Award-nominated memoir, A Bridge to the Sun

Presenting Mary Hardin McCown plaque to Dr. Lynn at Johnson City Chiro-Health.

Presenting Gwen Terasaki plaque to Julia Turpin at the Johnson City Public Library.

Olivia created a website where visitors can learn more about these extraordinary women and about her Women Who Made Johnson City project in general.

While working on her project, Olivia learned time-management and people skills. For her, as a visual person, it was nice to have a hands-on project. She was the recipient of a Joyce Maienschein grant and used those funds on registering the domain name and hosting rights to her website, business cards to spread the word, and paying for the first four plaques to be installed around town. Olivia had to do some aspects of her project differently than originally planned due to the COVID-19 pandemic. She had planned on having a booth and activities at some local festivals over the summer of 2020, as well as participating in the Women’s Suffrage Centennial celebration, but she had to find other ways to connect with the community. So, she created a set of classroom materials for different grade levels to use for remote and in-person learning for years to come.

Congratulations to Olivia!  Visit girlscoutcsa.org to learn more about the Girl Scouts.

Presenting May McDowell plaque to Mayor Brock at Johnson City’s City Hall.