KINGSTON — Harriet Muhrlein didn’t really have a choice when her mother enrolled her in Girl Scouts in 1943. But it didn’t matter because Muhrlein discovered she loved it — so much so, she’s still a Girl Scout today.

And after more than five decades of contributing to the girls-only national organization, the Girl Scout-Totem Council chapter honored Muhrlein in February at its general meeting with a 55-year Membership Pin.

When she heard she was going to be honored for her longtime membership, she thought “it couldn’t be that long,” she said with a laugh.

Muhrlein started when she was in second grade as a Brownie in Flint, Mich., her earliest memory was being a participant in a large assembly where each neighborhood dressed up and represented different devastated countries and occupied territories around the world at the time. Muhrlein and her fellow scouts represented Estonian and Latvian women.

Muhrlein still has her uniform from when she was 7 years old — the only year they made the uniforms using a fabric with a tiny brown checked pattern. The symbol at the time was of a nymph-like figure, which is stitched onto the breast pocket.

She worked her way up through the ranks of scouting as a junior and a cadet leader. When she was at the age to be a senior scout, there weren’t enough girls in the county to make a troop, so she and other girls from surrounding counties worked as a senior scout group in Flint once a week. As an adult, Muhrlein took on the role of being an leader in various capacities until her daughters were old enough to be scouts. She served as a troop leader until her oldest daughter graduated from high school.

She earned 27 badges during her time as a Girl Scout, including radio, first aid, sewing, home nursery, clothing, child care, backyard camper, handiwoman, interior decorating and cyclist.

“That was a hard one because I didn’t have a bicycle to ride until I was 12 because I wasn’t allow to ride,” she said.

In 1949, she earned the Curved Bar, which is equivalent to today’s Girl Scout Gold Bar or Boy Scout Eagle Scout Award.

She also sold those famous Girl Scout cookies but the selection was limited at the time and they were much cheaper, she said. The varieties offered were shortbread, cream-filled cookies and chocolate mint cookies and three boxes sold for $1. In 1949, Muhrlein sold 480 boxes and got to spend two weeks at Girl Scout camp.

At the honoring ceremony in February, she got to try out some of this year’s newest flavors, but “I still like the plain ol’ shortbread,” she said.

Being a Girl Scout allowed her to have experiences that she would not have had otherwise.

“I enjoyed the friendships, I enjoyed the activities,” she said. “I got to experience all kinds of things that I would not have been able to experience as a person living in a small town.”

Some of those friendships have lasted, as she gets together a couple times a year with some of her old scout pals.

While she and her husband Hal are more financially than actively supportive of the group these days, Muhrlein believes the basic premise of the organization is the same but it has slightly changed, such as the addition of a scouting group for younger girls, Daisys.

“It’s the same, but it’s different because it’s changed as society has changed,” she said.

One of her favorite things about being a Girl Scout was the camping “because those were things we never did at home,” she said. “But the other parts, the camaraderie, the learning experiences, it was just all kinds of things.”

To this day, she believes it’s important for young women to get involved.

“It’s important to develop good strong female relationships, both with adults and other girls, and they might not get those through relationships through school… or in their neighborhood,” Muhrlein said. “Plus it allows them to explore different types of careers.”