World War II

[p. 77] The years just before World War II were good ones for the YMCA. In a 1939 report to Professor Arthur Mays, Chairman of the Y Board, Chief Wilson said, “Freshman Camps are highly successful. The students enrolled were high-grade, fun-loving, human fellows and I believe more serious than usual. This incoming college generation can be depended upon to assume responsibility for maintaining high ideals if given encouragement and guidance.” He pointed out that Fireside Forums had been held in fifty-one fraternity and rooming houses with 1,097 students participating. The topic for discussion at these forums was “What Are The Fundamental Ends of Life—The Reasons For Living.” One forum discussion leader reported, “The majority of the students in the University are more religious minded than persons outside the University generally credit them with being.” Were the theme for the forums and this reported student attitude reactions to the shadow of Hitler’s war?

The YMCA during the early war years, but particularly after Pearl Harbor, tried very hard to highlight and preserve values which it was feared the war would weaken. Writing on behalf of the World Faculty-Student Service Fund, Paul Van Arsdell, Chairman of the Faculty Committee and later a Chairman of the Y Board, said, “If you believe educational processes should endure in a critical period of social dislocation, please grant a moment’s attention to an urgent problem confronting professors and students who are victims of war.” The preservation of human values and leadership for the day of peace were objectives of the Y.

Addressing the 75th Anniversary Convocation of the University of Illinois in 1943 Professor Ernest Bernbaum said: “Both democracies and universities are wrenched from their proper functions in time of war—harassed and warped almost beyond recognition. Our permanent objectives are those of peace. The only wars we wish to wage are against ignorance and folly, prejudice and superstition, poverty and ugliness, crime and disease. We want to heal and invigorate the body, free and enlighten the mind, fortify the moral conscience, purify the taste, and liberate the imagination—and by such means aid men and women in their pursuit of happiness. We want to upbuild a peaceful, prosperous, humane, and progressive civilization.”

[p. 78] While some of the Y’s activities were curtailed during the war, others were initiated. An announcement of a party for trainees read, “Coeds will be on hand to entertain all service men, signal, diesel, and V-12.” The Campus Crier, a mimeographed publication of the Y, encouraged its readers to contribute to the War Chest Fund and to help the war effort in other ways. Though there was a scarcity of men for Y programs, many strong leaders such as Dean Leeper, Robert Trobaugh, and Loren Beal, all Presidents of the Y between 1940 and 1943, emerged.

During the war years both Chief Wilson and Mic Coldwell were thinking ahead about the role of the Y when the war ended. This foresight, as we shall see, helped the Y step into the role it assumed after the war. In 1944 Mic celebrated his twenty-fifth year with Y. Letters of congratulation came in from around the world where men had been scattered by the war. Garrett Loy, who lost his life piloting a “Black Widow,” wrote from New Guinea, “My mind is back in Urbana reminiscing over such programs as Freshman Camp, Freshman Fellowship meetings out of which have come sturdy, reliable defenders of Christ’s way, summer vespers, beautiful and natural, man-to-man talks with you, Fireside Forums where faculty appear as human beings, vocational guidance, the salvation to many doubtful careers, Bible classes where we faced reality and made practical application of the Good Book and leadership conferences where men were given untold resources for spiritual guidance.”

Lieutenant Colonel C. R. “Chuck” Frederick wrote an open letter to the editor of the Daily Illini saying in part, “As one of thousands who have learned to love and increasingly admire Mic and his good works, I wish to express publicly my high regard for this intensely human, earnestly spiritual man who has served Illinois so faithfully these twenty-five years. The more I see of young men throughout the Army Airforce and study military leadership and morale, the more I am impressed with the lasting values resulting from such programs as the University of Illinois Young Men’s Christian Association.”

The Veterans Return

Many experts proved to be wrong about the desire of discharged World War II veterans for education. A writer for the Saturday Evening Post conducted some interviews which served as a basis for an article entitled “The Veterans Reject Education.” This was somewhat like the famous headline proclaiming Dewey winner of the 1948 presidential election. The veterans not only returned; they returned in unpredictably large numbers either bringing with them or acquiring soon thereafter wives and children, also in unpredictably large numbers.

At a conference called in the Spring of 1946 by the American Council on Education to consider emergency problems in higher education caused by this influx, President Harry Truman said, “The happiest thing to me is the fact that these returned soldiers and sailors, marines, WACs and WAVES are giving you such a headache in education. I hope they will continue to do that and if they do, I think the country is perfectly safe.”

The Y and the GI

[p. 79] School was not the same after the veterans came to college. Among other things there was less tolerance for teachers who couldn’t cope and for rules which could not be supported by at least a preponderance of the evidence. Sitting at the edge of the campus and watching while the University struggled with its problems the YMCA was in an excellent position to fulfill needs as they appeared.

Writing about this period, William Irwin, Y President in 1948-49 said: “The campus climate was one of rapid growth as it changed from a war to peace orientation. Faculty support, although effective, was somewhat diminished by the tremendous burdens put on them by the increased student body, while the student clientele was heavily influenced by veterans wanting an education and possessing an unusual amount of self confidence based on beliefs in goals thought out during military service.” Speaking of the Y’s reaction he said: “Perhaps the most outstanding achievement of this era was the tendency to break out of the institutionalized thinking in operation of the YMCA. With the reorganization and restructuring of the Y we separated those committees operating and strengthening our organization from within from those designed to move out into the campus community to make an impact on behalf of Christianity.” He recalled that in 1946 and 1947 the Y membership grew from 300 to 1,300, largely he states due to the efforts of Ernie Stevenson.

By late 1946, the end of the first full post-war year, with the largest enrollment of men in the history of the University of Illinois, the Y was able to report substantial advances. Most of the programs discontinued during the war were reestablished. Several new activities were developed. These are succinctly described in the Secretary’s report for that year: “Ongoing programs included the work of the Freshman Fellowship committee with freshmen entering the University; the work of the International Friendship committee with students from other countries; the conduct of the twentieth annual series of Faculty Forums; the presentation to the campus community, together with the University YWCA, of a concert by the St. Olaf Choir; and participation in the support of the World’s Student Christian Federation, the World Student Service Fund (international student relief), and Mr. Lyman Hoover, American secretary representing the International Committee of the YMCA among students in China.

“The lifting of transportation restrictions permitted resumption of the Spring and Fall training camps, the first a three-day meeting in May at East Bay Camp of Y committee chairmen and members, and the latter a three-day orientation experience in September at Camp Seymour for 125 entering freshmen. Fireside Forums began again in fraternity and independent men’s houses. Six clubs of Champaign and Urbana youngsters were evidence of the reorganization of the work of the Boys Work Committee. This Committee also provided volunteer assistants for the boys activities at McKinley YMCA.

“The Wigwam Room, created by the YMCA-YWCA Social Recreation Committee in the YMCA basement, was opened on May 3, 1946, as a weekend [p. 80] canteen and social center for Y members and their guests. Operated through volunteer committee efforts, this service by year’s end had accommodated 5,612 people in 41 nights. Total attendance, including that of the committee workers, reached 6,234. A Dinner Pail Diner was set up to provide an eating place for students carrying box lunches. Many of these were married veterans who were joined at noontime by their wives.

“Initiated in the early months of 1946, a Family Living program quickly developed into remarkable proportions. Offering courses for unmarried students on Courtship and Preparation for Marriage and for married students on Adjustments in Marriage, Preparation for Parenthood, and Guiding Children’s Growth, this service won the appreciation of hundreds of students. Wives of veterans, mothers of pre-school children, have been trained to supervise play groups and have been helped to develop several such groups on a cooperative basis.”

A series on Successful Marriage and Family Life was conducted by Dr. Lester A. Kirkendall, a specialist in education for marriage and family life. Topics for discussion were developed under two main headings: “Building for Successful Marriage” and “Engagement and Afterwards.” But even before Dr. Kirkendall came to the Y, Dr. Katherine Whiteside Taylor had been brought in as a marriage counselor. Realizing that the married veterans had many needs which could not be met officially by the University, Miss Kathryn Maude Gwinn was employed to direct a Married Veteran’s Service Office. Besides arranging for hobbies and for cooperative child care, this office conducted a series of meetings on “Family Life on a Campus.”

Writing about this period Ralph Dralle, President of the Y in 1945-46, said: “The end of World War II brought many campus changes. Phil Morgan, who ably took over Mr. Wilson’s responsibility, built a staff of people who did an excellent job. International relations were developed and cultivated because the campus had many foreign students. This was extremely important in view of the founding of the UN in San Francisco and the drafting of the UN charter. Professor George Goble of the College of Law worked with groups of us as we debated and attempted to gain a greater understanding of the UN and its work.

“All of the activities were not built around work. The increasing use of liquor, especially by GIs, concerned all of us. As a result the first Wigwam room was built on the lower level and was put into action. A coke bar, a juke box and a place to entertain a date free of the influence of alcoholic beverages became a forerunner of the final construction of the downstairs area.”

About the year 1946 Ralph remembers that it “was truly a scramble as the campus was flooded with returning service men. As a veteran who had been discharged early, I tried to set up groups of men who attempted to assist in readjustment, housing, prisoner of war councils, and other endeavors. The program of the Y met the challenge because of the sound leadership of stalwart faculty members.” He listed a number of men who had meant much during his tour as President: Roger Adams, David E. Lindstrom, Frank Dickinson, Emil Lehmann, Alan Laing, George Dungan, Herbert H. Alp, John Franklin, Roger [p. 81] Little, Dean Joseph C. Blair, Professor Guy A. Tawney, and Professor William Templeman.

Though his planning and forward look helped get the Y set for the tasks it undertook after the war, Chief Wilson’s untimely death on September 15, 1946, prevented him from realizing how much the special efforts of the Y would mean to thousands of students, especially veterans and their wives. Much credit is due Phil Morgan, who took over as General Secretary, and to the able members of his staff—Howard Amerman, Mic Coldwell, Bill Black, Robert Matzke, Larry Cadwell and Wendell Walton.

The Y’s structured programs were only part of what it had to offer. The building itself, the atmosphere created by staff and officers and its convenient location offered enticement to many groups needing a place to think and plan. One such group formed as a result of this process was an organization of ex GIs named appropriately—after all, what else—Chi Gamma Iota.

But in the midst of all the new activity created by the returning GIs the Y did not forget its original purpose and the motives which brought it into existence. Religious activity was still very much a part of its program. One of the active committees during the post-war period was the YMCA Service Men’s Church Relations Committee.

For not being overwhelmed by the war spirit, for clinging to ideals and basic beliefs, and for pulling all stops to help returning veteran students and their families the Y deserved more recognition than it ever received.