The Early Years: 1873–1916

2.1 Introduction

[p. 18] When the Young Men’s Christian Association was founded by a dozen young men employed at a dry goods store in London, England in 1844, its declared purpose was the “improvement of the spiritual condition of young men employed in the drapery and other trades, by the introduction of religious services among them.”¹ The original idea behind the YMCA was to create an association of men that could counter the perceived threats of the emerging industrial, urban order to individual Christian faith and character. Through prayer meetings, Bible study, missions work, the keeping of a reading room with a library of “wholesome” materials, and a variety of classes and lectures, the London Association sought to strengthen the faith of young men, to rescue them from the city’s innumerable temptations and vices.

While the original aim of the London YMCA was individualistic and purely spiritual, based on a conception of religion that was, as one historian has noted, “puritan and ascetic,” its spirit and work rapidly broadened to include the “social ideal of service.”² Thus, in addition to the work of saving souls and developing personal piety, soon after its founding the YMCA became involved in what was called “rescue mission work,” which included general welfare and relief services to the poor and sick. It even became a mild force for political reform, organizing lectures on public issues and pushing for the improvement of working conditions and the reduction of working hours for young men. But these public efforts, especially those that were explicitly political, were secondary and peripheral to the essentially private work of strengthening individual faith.

By 1850, the YMCA had become an international movement, spreading to sixteen cities throughout England, Scotland, and Ireland. The first American Associations were founded in 1851 in Montreal and Boston. Mirroring the London Association, the Boston Association adopted a constitution and purpose aimed primarily at individual spiritual and moral development. The preface [p. 19] to the Boston Association’s constitution declared that it was to be

a social organization of those in whom the love of Christ has produced love to men; who shall meet the young stranger as he enters our city, take him by the hand, direct him to a boarding house where he may find a quiet home pervaded with Christian influences, introduce him to the Church and Sabbath School, bring him to the Rooms of the Association, and in every way throw around him good influences, so that he may feel that he is not a stranger, but that noble and Christian spirits care for his soul.³

The work of the Boston Association also mirrored the London Association. While it focused mainly on personal evangelism, it also offered welfare and relief services. Its activities included prayer meetings, Bible study, evangelistic meetings, and missions and relief work. It kept a reading room and library, well-stocked with religious materials and dozens of newspapers from small towns across New England. The keeping of these “hometown” newspapers was meant to attract young men who had moved to Boston from the country. In addition to these elements, the Boston YMCA developed an active social program, a host of classes and lectures, athletic and recreational activities aimed at enhancing physical health, and various services such as an employment bureau and a boarding house register.

By the end of the 1850s, the YMCA in the United States was developing around the “great ideal” of a voluntary association devoted to a “fourfold” program: the spiritual, mental, social, and physical “salvation” of young men. Like in England, it was explicitly Protestant, while remaining nondenominational. Full membership, which included voting and office-holding privileges, was restricted in most Associations to those who could pass an “evangelical test” showing that they were members in good standing of an “orthodox” Protestant church. The evangelical test was adopted as official YMCA policy in Canada and the United States at the international convention in 1869 in Portland, Oregon. Thereafter, it became known as the “Portland Basis.” It served to exclude Unitarians, Universalists, Catholics, and all non-Christians from [p. 20] active membership. However, “associate” memberships were offered in most YMCAs to men who were deemed to be of “good moral character.”

As the account in this chapter of the first forty-three years of the history of the YMCA at the University of Illinois will make clear, the student wing of the YMCA movement, begun in 1858 with the founding of YMCAs at the University of Virginia and the University of Michigan, initially resembled city YMCAs in both mission and program. The 1873-1916 period can be understood as the first major phase in the life of the Association at Illinois. To be sure, these were years of significant growth and change with respect to the scale of operations. But they were also years of much consistency in mission and work. With respect to this study’s theme of the integration of spiritual and civic aims—broadly understood as the integration of personal and public aims—the founding era was marked by a consistent balance that was weighted towards personal spiritual growth and development.

2.2 Mission and Work

1873-1899

The announcement in the February, 1873, issue of The Student that a YMCA had been organized at what was then called “Illinois Industrial University” gave little hint as to what its mission and work were to be and what had inspired its creation. The full announcement read:

YMCA Organized February 3d, 1873. Social and business meetings on the second Tuesday of each month, at 7 p.m., in room No. 23. Regular prayer meetings, Mondays and Thursdays, at 6 1/2 p.m., in the room above mentioned, and in the Adelphic Hall Sunday mornings at 9 o’clock. President—E. Steele. Cor. Secretary—J. S. Romine. Rec. Secretary—C. Graham.⁴

The main work of the Association during its first few years, as this statement reveals, was the holding of “regular prayer meetings.” It brought this work to a campus that, in 1873, had a total of two buildings, with 25 faculty and 400 students.

[p. 21] The YMCA at Illinois Industrial University was organized by an outsider: Robert Weidensall, the first field secretary of the International Committee of the YMCA.⁵ Weidensall was hired in 1868 to organize new YMCAs, especially in the midwest. At the international YMCA’s annual convention in 1870, Weidensall and two others—Richard Morse, Weidensall’s YMCA staff colleague, and Adam Spence, a professor from the University of Michigan—succeeded in securing the adoption of a resolution calling for a special effort to be made to organize YMCAs on college campuses. The adopted resolution read:

Resolved, That this convention hails with joy the organization, in some of our Academies and Colleges, of YMCAs, and commends this feature of our work in behalf of the young men of America, and hopes that Christian Associations may be planted wherever practicable in our Academies, Colleges, and Universities, and that we urge especially such Societies already existing that they seek to extend their work in this important field.⁶

During the five years after this resolution was passed, Weidensall organized 24 new student associations, including the one at Illinois. Student work grew to such an extent that in 1877, an intercollegiate department of the International Committee was created to oversee it. Luther Wishard was hired to staff the committee, serving under the title of secretary. In 1879, college work was made a permanent department of the International Committee. The Intercollegiate YMCA had been born, and Illinois would become one of its leading and longest-lasting associations.

A statement of purpose for the University YMCA at Illinois during this period was included in the Association’s constitution and annual reports. The statement declared that

The object of this Association shall be to promote growth in grace and Christian fellowship among its members and aggressive Christian work, especially by and for students; to train them for Christian service; and to lead them to devote their lives to Jesus Christ not only in distinctive religious callings [p. 22] but in secular pursuits.⁷

A second, slightly different purpose statement for this first period of the Association’s life was printed in the first Students’ Handbook for the 1884-85 academic year. This statement declared that

The object of our association is to form in the University a center of Christian life and activity, to which will gather all students who desire to develop their Christian character, and from which there shall flow influences on the side of morality and all Christian virtues.⁸

When the intercollegiate department of the YMCA was created in 1877, the ideal student association was to include four main lines of work: religious meetings, Bible study, personal evangelism, and inter-association visitation and correspondence. In the first few decades, several more lines of work were added to this list, including missions, neighborhood activities, conferences, deputations, and new student work.⁹ Each of these would become a part of the work of the YMCA at Illinois.

When the University YMCA was organized, it claimed about a dozen members. By 1899, its membership had grown to 278. Full membership, following the official policy of the national YMCA, was restricted to men who were “members in good standing of an evangelical church,” although men of “good moral character” could become associate members by a two-thirds vote of the members present at a regular meeting. During the period of 1873-99, the University YMCA was housed in various rooms in University buildings. When it moved in 1883 into a room on the fifth floor of University Hall—the University’s main building—the Association invested $250 in a carpet, stove, window hangings, and other items to make the space more attractive. The University’s student newspaper, then called The Student, reported on the dedication of this room, declaring that it was a “notable event in the history of the Association,” a “step forward” which would allow it to “fulfill its mission by exerting a constant influence for good at the University.”¹⁰

The work of the University YMCA grew and expanded dramatically [p. 23] in its first few decades. While city YMCAs developed a “fourfold” program, including physical, mental, social, and spiritual dimensions, the student YMCA at Illinois played down the physical and mental dimensions and focused on spiritual, social, and service work. Seven different areas of work developed during the 1873 and 1899 period.

1. Religious Meetings

The core work of the University YMCA in its founding era, as it was for other student associations, was the holding of religious meetings. These meetings were often devoted to prayer. Special days and weeks of prayer were called by the national YMCA, which the University YMCA generally observed. Religious meetings also featured speakers who lectured on theological and spiritual topics.

Religious meetings in student YMCAs built on a tradition begun by earlier student groups such as Societies of Inquiry. While the exact nature of religious meetings at the University YMCA during this time is impossible to determine, they were generally described as “practical” devotional meetings where men shared their religious experiences and convictions and sought to learn how to apply them in daily life. This marked a contrast to the nature of the meetings in precursors to the YMCA, which tended to be more abstract and academic, focusing mainly on theological debates.¹¹

2. Bible Study

While Bible study was not initially a part of the University YMCA’s work, it developed soon after its founding. By 1891, formal classes were being offered each year. A Department of Bible study was created in 1893 to oversee recruitment and the development of materials. Classes were eventually created for each of the four years of undergraduate life. All classes were led by University of Illinois faculty until 1897, when student-led classes were added. Annual Bible Institutes and lectures by leading theologians and popular ministers were also added in the 1890s.

3. Missions

While missionary work became a formal element of student [p. 24] YMCA work nationally in 1879, it was not until after the Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions (SVM) was founded in 1888 that the University YMCA showed signs of strong work in this area. Sometime during the early 1890s, the University YMCA created a missions department, which recruited students for missionary service, held classes, organized lectures, and maintained—in cooperation with the University YWCA—a library of missions-related books and pamphlets.

In 1892, the University YMCA and YWCA created a “City Mission Band.” The “Band” was not musical but evangelistic. It translated the SVM’s ambitious slogan, “The evangelization of the world in this generation,” to the local level. There were twelve members of the Band in 1893, both men and women. Members signed a pledge declaring that “It is my purpose, God permitting, to do city mission work.” They took a two-year course of study, and did evangelistic work in Champaign-Urbana and other towns surrounding the University.

4. Services to New Students

One of the main features of the work of the University YMCA during this period was the development of a set of services for new students. Beginning in 1884, a handbook was co-published with the University YWCA that included information about the campus and surrounding community, a listing of local churches, and advice to new students about how best to survive the registration process and their first few days as students. These handbooks, which came to be known as “I” books, were an annual feature of YMCA and YWCA work until they were discontinued in 1955. They were eventually distributed free through the mail to all new students before they arrived on campus. Legend has it that the handbook idea, which was adopted by many student YMCAs around the country, was the brainchild of Samuel Parr, a professor of chemistry and long-time supporter of the University YMCA.

In addition to the handbooks, the University YMCA and YWCA cooperated in providing several other services to new students. Members of each association met new students at the local train stations when they arrived on campus in the fall, providing a [p. 25] friendly greeting and useful information and advice to many a nervous and homesick student. Each association kept a list of available rooms for students to rent, offered new students assistance with personal problems, helped them find roommates, and hosted a reception which typically included music, food, and a greeting by the president of the University.

One of the problems new students had was finding jobs to support themselves while they were in school. Beginning in 1897, the University YMCA created an employment bureau that kept a listing of local jobs. That same year it created a “visitation and invitation” program that sought both to provide companionship to sick or lonely men and to recruit them to become members of the Association.

5. Socials

In addition to the receptions held for new students, the University YMCA hosted several social events each year for all University students. A few of these, such as a mid-year reception and a spring picnic, were joint programs with the YWCA. Other events, such as membership “stag” parties, were offered by the YMCA for more limited audiences. The YMCA and YWCA’s social events were often attended by large numbers of students. In part, this was due to a lack of competition. During this period there were few other active student groups on campus, and little in the way of entertainment available in the surrounding community.

6. White Cross Army

In the early 1890s, the University YMCA joined a movement that had originated in England in 1883 called the “White Cross Army.” The aim of the movement was “to discountenance indecent language and coarse jest, and to spread by every possible means the principle that the law of purity is equally binding upon men and women.”¹² Men signed a “purity pledge” to become members of the army. The army then promoted its cause through lectures and pamphlets. By 1899, the University YMCA reported that it had recruited 185 men to join the army. The White Cross Army was the first organized effort by the YMCA related to the difficult [p. 26] subject of sex. It was opposed by many, including Robert Weidensall, who thought that it violated YMCA principle by suggesting that a man might be made “pure” simply by signing a pledge. Weidensall believed that “No man’s heart is pure unless made so by the acceptance of Jesus Christ as a personal Savior and the work of the Holy Spirit.”¹³

7. Conferences

A final area of work that developed in this period was participation in local and regional conferences. Annual conferences of YMCAs from Illinois were established in the 1880s. The University YMCA sent a small number of delegates to each of these. An annual regional conference of student YMCAs from the midwest was begun in 1890. These were held for ten days each summer at Lake Geneva in Wisconsin. They included Bible study, religious discussions, inspirational meetings, lectures, special trainings and workshops for officers of student associations, and recreational activities. The Lake Geneva conference became an annual tradition which lasted until the mid 1960s.

1899-1908

During the period from 1899 to 1908, the core work of the University YMCA remained the same. It consisted of Bible study, religious meetings (sometimes called “devotionals”), various services for and outreach efforts to new students, missions-related and evangelistic activities, and social events. New work added in this period included the conducting of an annual religious census of the students, the founding of a department of music and a YMCA quartet, departments aimed at recruiting students from the College of Law and the Preparatory School, and a Post-Exam Jubilee. The White Cross Army and City Mission Band were apparently discontinued, as no mention of them can be found after 1899.

With respect to statements of the University YMCA’s mission and purpose, two new versions appeared in this period. The first was printed in the Annual Report of 1901-02. It stated that

[p. 27] The Young Men’s Christian Association aims to send out each year from the University a company of men trained to be religious leaders, as they will be business and intellectual leaders, in their communities. It stands for the highest, all-round development of the man, and aims to reach and influence all classes of University men. Through its agencies and departments, it is a practical, helpful factor in University life, and it offers to its members Christian fellowship and training in intelligent, aggressive Christian work, both public and personal.¹⁴

A second version, similar to the one above, appeared in the Illinois Student Handbook of 1904-1905:

To befriend and help men who need friends and help; to apply in practical college life the principles of the Christian faith; to stimulate men to develop a well-proportioned, all-around manhood; to train men for intelligent, aggressive Christian work; to bring to bear upon the University life a vigorous and healthful religious influence;—in short, to prepare an army of men to go out from the institution to become religious and spiritual leaders, in their communities, as they will there become the business and social and intellectual leaders,—this is the mission of the Young Men’s Christian Association.¹⁵

While these statements suggest that the work of the University YMCA was focused on personal or individual religious matters during this period, there are hints of a larger public purpose, both on and off the campus.

This was a period of great strength, growth, and optimism for the international YMCA’s student movement. In 1902, there were 650 student associations in North America claiming more than 40,000 members. By 1906, there were 734 associations claiming 54,281 members.¹⁶ In addition to the Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions (SVM), student YMCAs in North America were connected to a global organization, founded in 1895, called the World’s Student Christian Federation (WSCF). By the turn of the century, the SVM’s ambitious slogan—”the evangelization [p. 28] of the world in this generation”—appeared to some to be within reach.

The YMCA at the University of Illinois showed remarkable growth during this period in several areas. The most dramatic and visible growth occurred in its home. Back in 1892, a “building movement” had been launched, with the help of International Student Secretary John R. Mott, to secure funds to build a large facility for the YMCA’s work. While the effort netted pledges and contributions of nearly $30,000, it fell far short of its goal. Still, enough funds were raised to allow the YMCA to purchase several pieces of property, which eventually led to the purchase of its first building in 1899, a 12 room house on the southwest corner of Wright and John streets which it shared with the YWCA. The two Associations moved into this house, which they named “Association House,” during the fall semester of the 1899-1900 academic year. The house was attractive and inviting, with a large wrap-around porch and several quaint parlors. It added a sense of dignity and importance to both Associations, and gave much needed space for their expanding programs.

Dramatic growth occurred during this period in membership and program participation for the YMCA. While membership totaled 225 men at the close of the 1888-89 academic year, by the end of the 1907-08 year it stood at nearly 800. All program areas except missions reported strong growth during this period. Missions remained strong until 1906, when a sharp decline was reported. By 1900, Bible study was named as the most important phase of the Association’s work. It was in this area that the University YMCA gained national recognition. Beginning in 1903, it led the nation for at least four straight years in the number of men participating in Bible study, with over 1,000 signed up for more than a dozen different classes in 1907-08. This period was the height of a national Bible study movement, which involved 538 institutions of higher learning offering classes that enrolled nearly 50,000 students in 1907-08.¹⁷

Another area of growth was in institutional matters. On September 26, 1892, the Association was officially incorporated as “The Young Men’s Christian Association, University of Illinois.” [p. 29] The first paid staff for the Association (called a “General Secretary”), W. E. Durstine, was hired on a part-time basis in 1896.¹⁸ During the 1899-1908 period, the General Secretary position was made full-time. An assistant secretary was added in 1903, and when the Association began a new building campaign in 1905, a building secretary was also hired. An Advisory Board composed of four members of the faculty, two students, one alumnus of the Association, and two community members was created in 1898 to help the Association oversee its property and financial and legal matters. The Advisory Board increasingly had much to oversee, as the budget of the Association grew from $746 for the 1899-1900 academic year, to $4,800 for 1907-08.¹⁹ But the centerpiece of their work during this period was the oversight of a major new building campaign, initiated in 1905. The success of this campaign launched the Association into a new phase of its life and work.

1908-1916

In his Annual Report for the 1908-1909 year, General Secretary W. A. McKnight declared that

This year marks the beginning of a new epoch in the history of the Young Men’s Christian Association of the University of Illinois. In many features of its work it has for several years been one of the leading Student Associations of the country. It should now lead in the solution of the problems connected with administration of a large material equipment.²⁰

The “large material equipment” was the YMCA’s enormous new building, named Association Hall, which it occupied and dedicated during the fall of 1908.

Association Hall, which cost a total of $107,500 (including land and furnishings), was constructed on a piece of property the YMCA acquired on the northwest corner of Wright and John streets, directly across the street from Association House.²¹ It was a three story building of brick and stone, 154 feet long and 84 feet wide, modeled after the large facilities city YMCAs were building [p. 30] across the country during this time (minus the “swimming tank” and gymnasium). In the basement were a barber shop, cafeteria, lunch room, “smoking” room, and bowling alley. The first floor included a spacious lobby, an auditorium with a capacity to seat 450 people, a reading room and library with “hometown” newspapers from small towns across Illinois, a game room, meeting rooms, and an office. The second floor featured several meeting rooms and offices, fourteen dormitory rooms, and two guest rooms. The third floor had 28 additional dormitory rooms. Association Hall was the first dormitory on the University of Illinois campus, housing a total of 88 men. While the University YMCA’s work during this period would increasingly come to be focused on its attempt to “lead in the solution of the problems connected with administration of a large material equipment” (and there were many), it maintained most of its earlier program and even added a few new areas of work.

As part of its new epoch, the University YMCA adopted a new Constitution and By-Laws in 1909. The Constitution included an article creating a Board of Directors to replace the old Advisory Board. The new Board was to be composed of four members of the University of Illinois faculty, five students, two local citizens, and one alumnus. One point of interest in the new Constitution was the Association’s continuing restriction of active membership to men who were “members in good standing of evangelical churches.” While the Association still allowed any student or faculty member judged to be of good moral character to become a “general” member, only members of evangelical churches were allowed full membership, which included the right to vote and hold office. While this was still the official policy the International YMCA held at this time, student associations were not bound by it. At the 36th International Convention of the YMCA in 1907, student associations were granted a special provision that allowed them to grant full membership to all those who were willing to accept “Jesus Christ as He is offered in the Holy Scriptures as their God and Savior.”²² While this fell far short of embracing the full diversity of religious views and faiths that would be welcomed in the future, it did immediately allow student YMCAs to [p. 31] open their membership to many students that had previously been excluded. That the University YMCA did not adopt this new membership provision at this time suggests that it was on the more religiously conservative side of the student movement.

The 1909 Constitution included a new purpose statement for the University YMCA. It declared that

The object of this Association shall be to serve the men of the University in practical ways; to lead in the endeavor to solve the moral problems of university life; to surround non-Christian men with such influence as shall lead them into open discipleship with Jesus Christ; to promote Christian fellowship and aggressive Christian work especially by and for students, and to train them for permanent Christian service, not only in distinctly religious callings, but also in secular pursuits.²³

Two other statements were published during this period. The first, from the Student Handbook for 1911-12, presented a six-part aim for the Association:

The aim of the Association is six-fold: (1) To unite all of the men of the University who are either followers of Jesus Christ or in sympathy with Him and His program. (2) To win students to discipleship with Jesus Christ. (3) To counteract and overcome the forces or influences which tend to disintegrate character, faith and influence. (4) To build men up in faith and character. (5) To train men for permanent Christian service. (6) To enlist men for and relate men to the great work of Christ that awaits them in the world.²⁴

The second statement, slightly different from the above, appeared the following year in the Student Handbook for 1912-13:

The aim of the Young Men’s Christian Association is as follows:—to promote a spirit of Christian fellowship among the students; to offer a rendezvous where the atmosphere will be wholesome and refining; to counteract influences which tend to the disintegration of character; to assist men in choosing a helpful course in Bible study and in maintaining their interest [p. 32] in it; to present the claims of Jesus Christ upon the life of every man; to enlist men for and relate men to the great work of Christ that awaits them in the world.²⁵

The work the Association engaged in during this period included the same work from the previous period, with some significant changes and additions. Bible study continued to thrive through the 1914-1915 year, with well over 500 students enrolled in more than a dozen classes every year. The tone and approach used in the classes changed, however. Picking up on the so-called “progressive” educational ideas of John Dewey and other theorists, group work and critical thinking began to be emphasized over the old model of individualized rote learning. An attempt was also made to explore how Christian faith and principles applied to politics and the “practical” affairs of vocation and daily life. Association Press, the national YMCA’s own publishing house, published Bible study texts which encouraged this shift. One of the most popular texts of the era, which the University YMCA used, was The Political and Social Significance of the Teachings of Jesus (1906), by J. W. Jenks, a professor from Cornell University.

The YMCA’s leadership in Bible study classes was short-lived. Classes were cut to only three per year in 1915-1916, and enrollment was sharply reduced. In part, this was a result of the creation of several campus churches and religious foundations, marking the advance of a new era for religion on campus which had begun shortly after the turn of the century. The 1908-1916 period marked the end of the YMCA and YWCA’s near monopoly on religious activities on campus.

Despite this change, much of the religious work of the two Associations’ remained strong. The strength was fed in part by a dramatic increase in interest and participation in missions work. The regular religious meetings the YMCA conducted also remained strong through this period, though the character of the meetings grew increasingly secular. In addition to the traditional focus on personal faith, the meetings began to focus on subjects of broad public interest. They featured prominent national and local speakers from industry, education, and the clergy who addressed various [p. 33] political, economic, moral, and ethical issues of the day.

The social events and services the YMCA offered to new students all remained strong during this period, with each drawing or serving hundreds and sometimes thousands of men. The new building greatly enhanced the social and recreational side of the Association’s work. The growing importance of social activities was reflected in a statement in the Student Handbook of 1908-09, which declared that “the YMCA stands above everything else for good fellowship.”

Several new departments of work were added during this period. The first to be added was a department of “extension” work in 1908 which aimed at serving non-students in the local community and nearby cities and towns. It sent “gospel” or “deputation” teams of five or more students out into these communities to set up boys’ clubs, boys’ Sunday School classes, and mission Sunday Schools. These teams also organized religious services at the County jail and “County Poor Farm.” “Winning men and boys to the Christian life” was stressed as the most important result of this work. Out of this work, a new department for “boys’ work” was established in 1910 that focused on involving boys from Champaign and Urbana in athletic and recreational activities. This work was taken on in part because the University YMCA was the only YMCA in the area at this time. Another new department, created in 1914, was named “industrial service.” Under the work of this department, students went out into local factories and mills to teach mathematics, mechanical drawing, and English to “employees who have lacked educational advantages.” Students also went into the bunk houses of railroad laborers to teach English to “foreigners.”

Budget, staff, and membership all increased dramatically between 1908-1916. While the Association’s annual budget stood at just under $5,000 in 1907-08, by 1914 it totaled nearly $20,000. The expense side of the budget included a vast list of items, reflecting the many demands of owning and operating a large facility. The bulk of the budget went to maintain the building and support the staff, which by this time included three full-time secretaries, several support staff, and staff to operate the bowling alleys and game rooms. While membership initially (and ominously, [p. 34] given the investment in the building) dropped from a peak of 780 in 1907 to a low of 470 in 1910, by 1913 it rose to just over 1,000 students and 60 faculty, before dropping back down again in 1915-1916.

Overall, the period from 1908-1916 was a mix of success and disappointment, of growth and set-backs. From the start, there was an ironic mix of optimism and anxious self-criticism. The Annual Report for 1908-09 included both a glowing vision of the enhanced prestige and influence the new building would bring to the Association, along with blunt self-criticism for certain unnamed “mistakes and failures” and a sober assessment of the challenge it would be to operate a large facility. The difficulties of operating the building proved to be substantial. The minutes of the Board of Directors meetings from this period are filled with discussions of problems related to the building. The 88 residents were rowdy and noisy, and refused to adhere to house rules. The cafeteria was leased to incompetent management, resulting in at least one lawsuit. Finding good management for the cafeteria proved to be so difficult that in 1913, the Association decided to take it over and run it itself. This succeeded for a time, but soon business dropped off, and the operation ran at a substantial loss.

By February of 1914, the Association was carrying a $6,000 deficit. Due in part to its inability to keep up with payments on the building, the deficit grew by 1916 to $40,000, about twice the annual budget. By that time, the new building was looking less and less like something that would help to usher in a new epoch, and more and more like an albatross that threatened to bring the Association down. The recognition that the building no longer served the Association’s mission marked the end of the first major era of the University YMCA’s history.

2.3 Discussion

What meaning did the promise of association have during the University YMCA’s early years? What balance did it embrace of personal and public, of spiritual and civic aims? From the materials I have been able to review and consider, I believe that it would be fair to conclude that those who were leading the Association [p. 35] during these years believed that its promise and work was to include a balance of personal and public dimensions, with personal religious development being of highest importance. However, while its main aim was to foster the personal religious life of students, it also sought to bring a kind of public religious influence to bear upon University life and the surrounding community.

The central importance of the “religious life and influence” work was reflected in all of the purpose statements quoted above. It was given a special justification in the Association’s Annual Report for 1899-1900. The second paragraph of that report included the following statement:

This being a state institution, the principle has been established that nothing can be done officially to foster the religious life of the student body. This work has therefore been left to the voluntary effort of Christian students. The Young Men’s and Young Women’s Christian Associations have occupied the field as the organizations best adapted to carry on the work.²⁶

The promise of association, then, was that it made possible religious work which otherwise could not or would not be done. The degree to which this work was understood to be of deep importance was signaled by the inclusion on the inside cover of the 1899-1900 Annual Report of a quote from Francis L. Patton, the staunch Calvinist who served as president of Princeton University in the 1890s:

Therefore I do not hesitate to say that far beyond the question as to whether a university shall have any new buildings or large endowments, far beyond the question as to whether it shall keep pace with the advancements of the times in an ever advancing science and philosophy—immensely beyond these things is the question whether the undergraduates who assemble year after year shall come under right religious influences, such as will make for righteousness, for morality, for the perpetuity of the Christian faith. I do not regard Christianity as one of the accidents of a college: I do not regard religion as one of the things you have to tolerate because men [p. 36] bring it along with them here. I look upon it as the prime necessity of University life.²⁷

For the purposes of this study, the key question to ask about the religious life and influence work is the extent to which it was understood in private or individualistic terms, and the extent to which it was understood to have public or civic dimensions. What was the point of fostering the religious life of the student body, of bringing a religious influence to bear upon the University? Was its purpose to save individual souls? Was it to put into practice the Christian ethic of service, of welcoming and serving “strangers?” Was it to develop private “character” or piety in individual students and faculty members? Was it limited to these personal meanings, or was it also understood to have broad public significance?

In seeking to answer these questions, it is useful to consider the larger context and culture in which the University YMCA was working. During its founding era, the YMCA in America developed as a religious movement. It was a voluntary association grounded in what has been called the “democratization” of Christianity, meaning, in part, that it was led by “ordinary” lay persons rather than credentialed clergy.²⁸ While its work had public dimensions, it was not viewed as being explicitly political. The YMCA was mainly viewed as a benevolent remedial force, a social club, charity or a relief agency working to salve the dislocating and damaging effects of the industrial urban economy on personal character, faith, and health. In short, the YMCA developed an identity in its first half-century of work in the United States as a semipublic association pursuing a purpose which was self-consciously thought to be personal rather than public, and religious rather than political.

The YMCA’s personal rather than public-oriented identity reflected an embrace of what the historian of religion Martin Marty has called “private” Protestantism.²⁹ Private Protestantism, according to Marty, emphasized individual salvation “out of the world” through a personal faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Its “worldly” work was aimed at personal service to the sick and needy, combating various personal sins and vices, and encouraging and [p. 37] developing a “Christian” moral life in individuals. While private Protestantism was the dominant force in American religion, a major split developed in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries which gave birth to a counterforce, which Marty called “public” Protestantism. Those who advocated public Protestantism were convinced that soul-saving and individual acts of charity and service must be combined with concern for justice in political and economic life. They believed that Christian faith and principles compelled Christians—and therefore Christian associations such as the YMCA—to work for both personal and public reform.

Walter Rauschenbusch, a professor of history at Rochester Seminary who spent eleven years (1886-1897) as a pastor of a church near the infamous Hell’s Kitchen area of New York City, was one of the most articulate advocates of the new “public” wing of American Protestantism. He was a key leader of the Protestant Social Gospel movement that developed in American life in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.³⁰ His 1907 book, Christianity and the Social Crisis, became a key text for the movement, outselling every other religious book between the years 1907 and 1910. The book, like the movement itself, was built on the “discovery” that the principles and promise of Christianity were to apply as much to public life as to private life. The Social Gospel movement was a response both to the broad “social revolution” of the times—the many changes and dislocations in American life related to industrialization, commercialization, urbanization, immigration, and the rise of science—and to the detached, otherworldly private Protestantism that emphasized personal piety and individual salvation. Richard T. Ely, an influential figure in the movement who was a professor of “political economy” at the University of Wisconsin, argued in 1889 that the church had been “preaching a one-sided half-gospel, and not a whole gospel.” Ely declared that “The gospel of Christ is both individual and social. It proclaims individual and social regeneration, individual and social salvation.”³¹

“Western civilization is passing through a social revolution unparalleled in history for scope and power,” Walter Rauschenbusch announced in 1907. “The vastness and the free sweep of our concentrated [p. 38] wealth on the one side, the independence, intelligence, moral vigor, and political power of the common people on the other side, promise a long-drawn grapple of contesting forces which may well make the heart of every American patriot sink within him.” Rauschenbusch had no doubts about the appropriateness and scale of religions’ involvement in this “grapple.” He declared that “It is realized by friend and foe that religion can play, and must play, a momentous part in this irrepressible conflict.”³²

In a book designed to be used as a text for Bible study classes organized by student YMCAs, Walter Rauschenbusch wrote that

From the beginning an emancipating force resided in Christianity which was bound to register its effects in political life. But in an age of despotism it might have to confine its political morality to the duty of patient submission, and content itself with offering little sanctuaries of freedom to the oppressed in the Christian fraternities. Today, in the age of democracy, it has become immoral to endure private ownership of government. It is no longer a sufficient righteousness to live a good life in private. Christianity needs an ethic of public life.³³

In developing this ethic, Rauschenbusch looked with hope to youth, especially those who were privileged enough to attend higher education. He wrote that

while we are young is the time to make a forward run with the flag of Christ, the banner of justice and love, and plant it on the heights yonder. We must not only be better men and women than we are now. We must leave a better world behind us when we are through with it. . . . If fifty thousand college men and women a year would range themselves alongside of Jesus Christ, look at our present world as open-eyed as he looked at his world, see where the social standards of conduct are in contradiction with his spirit and with modern need, and work to raise them, the world would feel the effect in ten years. And those who would strive in that way would live by faith in the higher commonwealth of God and have some of its nobility of spirit.³⁴

[p. 39] The Social Gospel, as expressed by Walter Rauschenbusch, contained a blend of personal and public, of spiritual and civic aims. It offered a powerful vision of the relevance of the Christian faith in a rapidly industrializing and urbanizing nation. It offered answers for how the work and promise of the new student Christian associations (both YWCAs and YMCAs) that were organized in the late nineteenth century at colleges and universities across the nation might be understood. The work was to build a better world through the application to daily life of the social principles of Jesus: the building of a “Christian commonwealth” where justice and love might prevail over the selfish and oppressive greed of “mammon.” Here, the promise of association was not to provide “little sanctuaries of freedom to the oppressed in the Christian fraternities,” but rather to offer an organized means for developing strength for and solidarity in addressing the many pressing problems and challenges of modern life.

While the YMCA at the University of Illinois during its founding era was in some ways caught between the private and public wings of American Protestantism, it leaned strongly towards the private. While its religious life and influence work had a mix of private and public aims and dimensions, the public dimensions were not especially in tune with the aims of Social Gospel advocates such as Walter Rauschenbusch. Rauschenbusch felt that institutions and systems—such as capitalism—needed to be reformed or changed, not just individuals. He focused much of his work on what might be called “social sin” as opposed to “personal sin.” While Rauschenbusch and other Social Gospel leaders such as Richard Ely did not ignore the importance of individual or personal work—in fact, they believed such work was of great importance—they argued for a balance between the personal and the social (i.e., public) that was weighted toward the social. This was not, however, the path that student YMCAs—including the Association at Illinois—followed in this era.

In his centennial history of the YMCA, Sherwood Eddy wrote that the chief emphasis of the work of student YMCAs during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was on “personal religion [p. 40] and personal evangelism.”³⁵ This accurately describes the core work of the YMCA at the University of Illinois during this period. Consistent with this view, W. W. Dillon, the General Secretary of the University YMCA from 1898-1900, declared in an article published in The Illini that

The very cornerstone of the Association movement is a belief in Jesus Christ as a personal Savior of men. It is this faith that inspires every activity which it puts forth. And in accordance with it, its ultimate purpose is to lead men into the Christian life. To this end are its devotional meetings, its Bible study, its endeavor by clean living and manly bearing to prove the truth of its profession.³⁶

It would be a mistake, however, to miss the public intentions that lay behind the focus on personal religion and evangelism. While such work was primarily understood to be of private or personal significance, it was also imagined to have public significance. This was given voice by David Kinley, the future President of the University of Illinois (1919-1930), who wrote in 1893 that the development of individual moral and religious character was key to the solving of social ills. Kinley believed that the growing complexity of modern life

increases the dependence of man on man, and so necessitates a formal altruism in life which can be gradually changed into a vital and moral altruism. Thus light is thrown on the direction in which we should expend our efforts at improvement. We should seek to develop the moral and religious character, and industrial and other social ills will then largely settle themselves on the basis of greater existing justice and brotherly love.³⁷

Kinley’s view reflected a strand of the public wing of American Protestantism which was more conservative than the Social Gospel strand. While the University YMCA did not embrace the Social Gospel at this time, it did embrace Kinley’s view of the public significance of personal work. This can be glimpsed in several of the mission and purpose statements of the era (quoted above), [p. 41] especially that of 1901-02, which declared that the University YMCA’s mission was to “train” students in “intelligent, aggressive Christian work, both public and personal.”³⁸

Another public dimension of the personal religious work during this era had to do with the Association’s view of itself as a force for affecting both the University as an institution, and the experience and nature of University life for students and faculty. The Association’s purpose statement for 1884 captured this, declaring that the Association’s aim was to “form in the University a center of Christian life and activity, to which will gather all students who desire to develop their Christian character, and from which there shall flow influences on the side of morality and all Christian virtues.”³⁹ It was also captured in the purpose statement for 1904, which declared in part that the Association’s aim was to “bring to bear upon the University life a vigorous and healthful religious influence,” as well as in the purpose statement included in the 1909 constitution, which stated that the Association was to “lead in the endeavor to solve the moral problems of university life.”⁴⁰ The new building the Association occupied in 1908 was even understood to offer something of public significance to the campus. This was repeatedly emphasized in the Students’ Handbooks. For example, in the Students’ Handbook for 1911-12, it was declared that “The building is open to all men at all times. It is a place where men may meet on a common basis, without the baseless social distinctions which sometimes exist in college life. In other words, the Association desires to promote a social life which is wholesome and democratic.”⁴¹

One of the most important aspects of the YMCA’s public work related to the University was tied to a view of the Association as a force for promoting a whole, balanced education for male students in an environment that, it was argued, would otherwise provide only a narrow technical education. In an article on Association principles, W. W. Dillon wrote that the YMCA stood for the “symmetrical development of the man,” which included spiritual, intellectual, social, and physical dimensions.⁴² The Students’ Handbooks of the era included statements that presented both the YMCA and YWCA as forces for helping students to achieve this balance. [p. 42] For example, in the Students’ Handbook for 1888-89, the presidents of the YMCA and YWCA declared that “As students we value very highly the knowledge and intellectual culture we receive here, but we value also character, which is even better than culture. This we endeavor to promote by meetings for social prayer and conference and a common interest in work which will make us strong in the better life.” A similar statement was included in the Students’ Handbook for 1890-91. In that document, the presidents of both Associations wrote that “We highly appreciate the technical training and intellectual culture we as students receive in the University of Illinois, but we also remember and strive to receive the instruction of wisdom, justice, and judgment and equity.”

The importance of a broad education that included a religious or spiritual dimension was strongly argued by David Kinley. In an article published in The Illini in October of 1897, Kinley complained that “education has come to mean not the production, morally and intellectually of men and women, but of mere specialists.” Kinley believed that such education was “degenerate,” that it

turns out engineers and political economists and clergymen and journalists and other specialists, who are specialists, and so far as training goes, nothing more. . . . Each may be an expert in his particular field; but unless he has the instincts of culture; unless his mind is tempered, rather than merely great; unless his moral sense is delicate and true; unless his mind is great enough to see, and his heart big enough to feel, as it were, into the influences and relations of life beyond his own sphere; unless he senses and sympathizes with the great pulsating heart of humanity outside himself; . . . neither engineer, nor political economist, nor clergyman, nor journalist, can exert so ennobling an influence, or leave behind so sweet a memory as he might.⁴³

Here was an argument that added seriousness and strength to the public significance of the personal religious work of the University YMCA.

With its mix of personal and public aims—weighted towards the personal, following a more conservative side of public Protestantism—the [p. 43] University YMCA was reflecting the culture and values of the larger student YMCA movement in North America during this time. The leading figure in this movement was John R. Mott. Mott, who served as the staff director of the North American movement between 1890 and 1915, began his involvement in student YMCA work while he was a student at Cornell University in the mid 1880s. Deeply influenced by the popular evangelist Dwight Moody, Mott shaped the social or public dimensions of the student movement around a deep core of personal evangelism. The central importance of the personal side of the work was evident in his description of the sixfold purpose of the student YMCA movement in 1894:

The secret power of the Movement is found in its sixfold purpose; to unite the Christian college men of the world; to win to Christ the students who are not his followers; to guard college men against the many temptations which assail them, not only in the body but also in the realm of the intellect; to deepen the spiritual life of the Christian men; to increase their efficiency in Christian work; and to lead them, as they go from college, to place their lives where they will count most in advancing the Kingdom of Christ.⁴⁴

Mott’s view of the public importance of the work of the student YMCA movement was in part shaped by a book he read in 1888, during his first year as a staff member. The book, Prayer for Colleges, by W. S. Tyler, a professor from Amherst College, included the following passage:

We should pray for colleges because, in so doing, we pray for everything else. In the present members of our colleges, we have the future teachers and rulers of our nation,—the professional men and men of influence of the coming generation,—the rising hope of our country, the Church, and the world. In praying for them, therefore, we pray for our country in its magistrates, for the Church in its ministers, for the world in its missionaries, for every good cause in its future agents and representatives,—for all the streams of influence in their fountain and source. If prayer is the lever that is to [p. 44] raise this fallen world, here, in our colleges, is the place to apply it. If prayer is the conductor, which is to convey divine influences from heaven to earth, these are the summits where especially it should be set up, and whence those influences will spread, like the electric fluid, through all the ranks and departments of society.⁴⁵

This passage, Mott once remarked, convinced him that “there was no more important work on earth than influencing students.”⁴⁶

With its strong flavor of noblesse oblige and its elitism (students were approvingly seen as the “future rulers of our nation”), the personal religious work of the student movement was in tune with one strand of the Progressive reform movement that developed during the turn of the century era. This strand—which ironically championed, in the name of “democracy,” the rule of society by an elite of scientifically trained experts—was displayed in a 1910 essay by Frederick Jackson Turner on the role of state universities in American life. In his essay, Turner declared that the “industrial conditions which shape society are too complex, problems of labor, finance, social reform too difficult to be dealt with intelligently and wisely without the leadership of highly educated men.” “Educated leadership,” Turner wrote, “sets bulwarks against both the passionate impulses of the mob and the sinister designs of those who would subordinate public welfare to private greed.” Turner was convinced that in building a nation with “supreme allegiance and devotion to the commonweal,” there was “no more promising agency than the State Universities; no more hopeful product than their graduates.”⁴⁷ While Turner and many other Progressives embraced science and scientific expertise as the key sources of progress and hope, Mott and others in the student YMCA movement embraced Jesus. While there were obvious and important differences between these two embraces, each viewed the “training” or converting of a privileged group of individual students as holding great promise for social reform.

The nature and balance of the personal and public work of student YMCAs during their founding era were shaped by the culture of the larger YMCA movement. While the YMCA was founded in London in 1844 in large part as a response to the social [p. 45] dislocations and ill-effects of capitalism, industrialism, and urbanism, it developed a culture that focused almost exclusively on improving the spiritual life of individual men rather than on addressing problems related to social systems and institutions. As Galen Fisher argues in his history of the public affairs work of the YMCA, “The Association Movement during its early decades had neither a philosophy nor a program that embraced public affairs.”⁴⁸

In practice, the YMCA’s record with respect to engagement in public affairs during this time was contradictory. In the United States, the YMCA in the nineteenth century tried to walk on both sides of a line with respect to its view of work on public issues. On the one hand, both individual associations and national staff argued that the YMCA should not take positions on or involve itself in controversial “political” issues. However, internal discussion of such issues was deemed appropriate, and such discussions were conducted under what was referred to as the “open platform.” But taking action as an association was viewed as inappropriate. This was expressed in a resolution passed at the International Convention of YMCAs in 1871, which stated that YMCAs

have no politics, and know no distinctions among men . . . and it does not fall within the sphere of their duties to take part in any controversy, or to make official deliverance upon any topic . . . which does not relate directly to the work of evangelization among young men.⁴⁹

This position was reinforced in 1886 when the Conference of General Secretaries declared that “while we recognize the necessity there is for persistent effort to promote personal purity among young men . . . we are still of the opinion that it is inadvisable for the Association to engage in any organized effort for moral reform.”⁵⁰

On the other hand, the YMCA did not shy away from taking action on select social and moral issues. Throughout the nation, YMCAs regularly and actively campaigned against such things as pornography, intemperance, and other forms of “social vice.” The apparent contradiction between these actions and the policy stated above might be explained by noting the extent to which the YMCA [p. 46] was (and still largely is) closely associated with conservative business interests. Such interests were widely represented on YMCA boards of directors, and they contributed large sums of money for program work and the construction of YMCA buildings. Unlike taking action against business and corporate “vice,” such as child labor and near-starvation wages, taking action against intemperance was non-threatening. Indeed, the YMCA was viewed as a counteracting conservative force against the “socialistic” calls for economic reform of the time. This was clearly expressed in an editorial published in 1888 in the YMCA’s national journal, The Watchman:

Recently a railroad president in Boston, not a religious man, was asked to contribute to the funds of, or aid in some way, the YMCA, and he replied that he would gladly do so, as he considered the great property interests in his hands much safer from the anarchists for the presence of such an institution in the city. When the conflict comes, as it may some day if no check is placed upon socialistic ideas, what better force can be instantly called into action, outside the police and the military, than the young men of such an organization as the YMCA? If this is true, our business men having great interests in their hands will be wise if they strengthen the YMCA in every possible manner.⁵¹

Complementing the conservative influence of business was the cultural norm of avoiding conflict and argument on controversial political issues in order to preserve fellowship and brotherhood.

Gradually, however, the YMCA attracted not just conservative business men and men committed to personal religious work, but also men who had deep concerns for public problems, and who wished to see the YMCA play a direct role in addressing them. One of these men, Graham Taylor, a professor at the Chicago Theological Seminary, a leader in social settlement work and a passionate advocate of the Social Gospel, spent considerable effort in the 1890s trying to enlist YMCAs in social reform movements.⁵² In an address before the International Convention of the YMCA in 1895, titled “The Relations of the Young Men’s Christian [p. 47] Associations to Social-Economic Questions,” Taylor called on the YMCA to

make of ourselves and our buildings centers for social unification . . .; to make some of our meetings and educational classes schools in which the young men of the nation may study and learn their social and civic rights and duties as a part of their citizenship and religion; . . . to push the Association Movement into the lodging houses and labor unions and street life and recreative rendezvous of young men.⁵³

Taylor’s call was immediately attacked on the floor of the convention by Cephas Brainerd, a conservative lawyer from New York City who served as chair of the executive committee of the International YMCA from 1867 to 1892. Brainerd had consistently argued against YMCA involvement in social reform efforts, declaring in 1872 at the annual meeting of the Pittsburgh Association that since social wrongs were rooted in the “selfishness of the human heart,” they could not be “reached and remedied by outward application.”⁵⁴ In response to Taylor, Brainerd urged the “utmost caution and prudence” on questions of economic and political reform, arguing that “There does not seem to be anything in the present conditions to justify the Associations in going beyond the limits of the well-defined work in which they are now engaged.”⁵⁵ Wilber Messer, General Secretary of the Chicago YMCA, added to Brainerd’s comments by declaring that “if a man’s heart be changed, he will change his own conditions.”⁵⁶ In other words, following David Kinley’s brand of public Protestantism, Messer believed that public reform was best achieved through reforming individuals.

By the early twentieth century, this cautious, conservative position began to break down, especially in the student movement. In 1908, the same year that the relatively radical Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America was founded, John R. Mott publicly embraced the Social Gospel, writing that

Jesus Christ is Lord and therefore must reign. He only has authority to rule social practices. He must dominate His followers [p. 48] and all society in all their relationships: domestic, industrial, commercial, civic, national, and international. . . . There are not two gospels, one social and one individual. There is but one Christ who lived, died, and rose again, and relates Himself to the lives of men. . . . The Association is summoned imperatively to give itself more fully than heretofore to discharge its social responsibility.⁵⁷

Mott’s declaration challenged the conservatism and complacency of the YMCA’s position on social issues, marking a new course of active public engagement.

The key event for bringing the Social Gospel into student work was a “Conference on Social Needs” organized by Mott and held in April of 1914 in Garden City, New York. The conference brought together more than sixty representatives of student YMCAs and YWCAs in North America (almost all of whom were staff), along with leading Social Gospel figures such as Henry Sloane Coffin and Walter Rauschenbusch. The conference was hailed as a “summons to penitence for our share in the corporate sins of society and to a new faith, a new order, a new devotion of service.”⁵⁸ The official report that was issued and published from the conference, Social Needs of the Colleges of North America, was bold and forthright, embracing Rauschenbusch’s views about the implications of the Social Gospel for Christian associations. The report declared that

The crisis of the hour calls for men and women consecrated enough to be willing to see our social order for what it really is, to acknowledge that, resting as it does on competition, it is unchristian and contrary to the will of Christ, and then to dedicate themselves to the thinking out of a solution that harmonizes with His teaching and to withstand the scorn, misrepresentation and persecution of the men of this generation. More than all it calls for men and women of mighty faith in God, which nothing can shake, faith that will remove mountains of indifference, ignorance, and denial of the power of God to transform human society as well as individuals, according to the mind of Christ, faith which already sees the vision of a new order of human society, founded upon principles of cooperation and fellowship.⁵⁹

[p. 49] As Hopkins noted in his history of the YMCA, the Garden City conference marked the end of an era for the student movement. The era that followed was, at least at the national level, marked by a new concern for social problems, a more open attitude towards institutional engagement in public affairs work, and attempts to “democratize” the movement’s philosophy and organization.⁶⁰ At the local level, however, it was another story altogether. As we shall see in the next chapter, the YMCA at the University of Illinois did not fully embrace these new dimensions of student work until after the Second World War.

¹ C. Howard Hopkins, History of the YMCA in North America (New York: Association Press, 1951), p. 4.

² Laurence L. Doggett, A History of the YMCA (New York: Association Press, 1922), p. 79.

³ Hopkins (1951), p. 18.

⁴ The Student, February, 1873, p. 16.

⁵ “International” meant Canada and the United States. Until the 1960s, the term “secretary” was used to name paid staff in the YMCA.

⁶ Quoted in Hopkins (1951), p. 274.

⁷ Gleanings from the Records of the Young Men’s Christian Association of the University of Illinois for the Year 1896-97, p. 3.

⁸ Students’ Handbook (1884-85), pp. 7-8.

⁹ Clarence Prouty Shedd, The Origin and Development of the Student Young Men’s Christian Association Movement in North America (Unpublished Master’s Thesis, Clark University, 1914), pp. 190-222.

¹⁰ Quoted in Harold Hannah, One Hundred Years of Action: The University of Illinois YMCA, 1873-1973 (Champaign: University YMCA, 1973), p. 60.

¹¹ Shedd (1914), pp. 192-193.

¹² Students’ Handbook, 1894-95, p. 33.

¹³ Quoted in Hopkins (1951), p. 385.

¹⁴ Annual Report of the Young Men’s Christian Association of the University of Illinois, 1901-1902, unpaged.

¹⁵ Illinois Student Handbook: 1904-1905, p. 10.

¹⁶ Statistics from “Character Building in Seven Hundred Colleges,” a pamphlet published by the International Committee of the YMCA in 1906. The title of this pamphlet is misleading. Of the 734 associations reported to be in existence in 1906, only 308 of these were actually based at colleges and universities. The remainder included 169 at preparatory and high schools, 123 at normal and technical schools, 56 at medical, dental, and law schools, 46 at theological institutions, plus one each at the United States Military Academy and the United States Naval Academy.

¹⁷ Figures from a pamphlet titled, “Bible Study at the University of Illinois, 1908-1909.”

¹⁸ Hannah (1973) inaccurately wrote that Adam Millar was the Association’s first General Secretary. Millar, who served as General Secretary from 1897-98, was in fact the Association’s second General Secretary.

¹⁹ All budget figures named in this book are unadjusted for inflation.

²⁰ Annual Report of the General Secretary, July 1, 1909, p. 20.

²¹ This building still stands today. Owned now by the University of Illinois, it is called “Illini Hall.”

²² William H. Morgan, Student Religion During Fifty Years: Programs and Policies of the Intercollegiate YMCA (New York: Association Press, 1935), p. 77. There was intense debate at the 1907 Convention over the granting of this provision for student associations, at one point pitting William Jennings Bryan with John R. Mott. Mott, who supported granting the provision, prevailed. See Morgan, pp. 76-78.

²³ Article II, Constitution and By-Laws of the Young Men’s Christian Association of the University of Illinois, 1909.

²⁴ The Illinois Student Handbook, Vol. XXVIII, 1911-1912, p. 23.

²⁵ The Illinois Student Handbook, Vol. XXIX, 1912-1913, p. 10.

²⁶ Annual Report of the Young Men’s Christian Association of the University of Illinois, 1899-1900, p. 3. It must be pointed out here that while many state institutions such as the University of Illinois could not “officially” foster the religious life of students, many of these institutions—including Illinois—were in essence “nonsectarian but distinctly Protestant institutions.” See Bradley J. Longfield, “From Evangelicalism to Liberalism: Public Midwestern Universities in Nineteenth Century America,” in George M. Marsden and Bradley J. Longfield, The Secularization of the Academy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), pp. 46-73.

²⁷ Quoted in Annual Report of the Young Men’s Christian Association of the University of Illinois, 1899-1900, p. 2. Seemingly at odds with this statement was Patton’s strange declaration in his inaugural address that “College administration is a business in which trustees are partners, professors the salesmen and students the customers.” Quoted in Frederick Rudolph, The American College and University: A History (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1962, 1990), p. 161. Patton was quite conservative—even reactionary—both theologically and on a number of issues related to higher education. He resisted attempts to bring religion into harmony with many of the new findings and ideas of science, was adamantly opposed to granting students basic civil rights (“There are times when a man should be held guilty until he is found innocent,” he once declared), and resisted granting electives a more substantial place in the curriculum. See Laurence R. Veysey, The Emergence of the American University (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1965).

²⁸ See Nathan O. Hatch, The Democratization of American Christianity (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989).

²⁹ See Martin E. Marty, Righteous Empire: The Protestant Experience in America (New York: The Dial Press, 1970), especially pp. 166-209.

³⁰ See Paul M. Minus, Walter Rauschenbusch: American Reformer (New York: Macmillan, 1988). The best history of the Social Gospel movement is C. Howard Hopkins, The Rise of the Social Gospel in American Protestantism, 1865-1915 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1940).

³¹ Richard T. Ely, Social Aspects of Christianity (New York: Thomas Y. Crowell & Company, 1889), pp. 148-149.

³² Walter Rauschenbusch, Christianity and the Social Crisis (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1907, 1991), pp. xxxv-xxxvi.

³³ Walter Rauschenbusch, The Social Principles of Jesus (New York: Association Press, 1916), p. 91.

³⁴ Ibid., p. 92.

³⁵ G. Sherwood Eddy, A Century With Youth: A History of the YMCA from 1844 to 1944 (New York: Association Press, 1944), p. 82.

³⁶ W. W. Dillon, “Association Principles.” The Illini, April 7, 1899, p. 413.

³⁷ David Kinley, “The Law of Social Progress.” New York Christian Advocate, Aug.-Sept., 1893. Reprinted in Social Progress: Four Articles by David Kinley (Urbana: University of Illinois, 1893), p. 2.

³⁸ Annual Report of the Young Men’s Christian Association of the University of Illinois, 1901-1902, unpaged.

³⁹ Students’ Handbook (1884-85), pp. 7-8.

⁴⁰ Illinois Student Handbook: 1904-1905, p. 10; Article II, Constitution and By-Laws of the Young Men’s Christian Association of the University of Illinois, 1909.

⁴¹ Illinois Students’ Handbook, 1911-12, p. 28.

⁴² W. W. Dillon, “Association Principles.” The Illini, April 7, 1899, p. 413.

⁴³ David Kinley, “Culture the Aim of Education.” The Illini, October 15, 1897, p. 46.

⁴⁴ Quoted in Hopkins (1951), p. 625.

⁴⁵ Quoted in Basil Mathews, John R. Mott: World Citizen (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1934), p. 85.

⁴⁶ Ibid.

⁴⁷ Frederick Jackson Turner, “Pioneer Ideals and the State University,” in Turner, The Frontier in American History (New York: Dover Publications, 1920), pp. 285-289.

⁴⁸ Galen M. Fisher, Public Affairs and the YMCA: 1844-1944 (New York: Association Press, 1948), pp. 25-26.

⁴⁹ Quoted in Hopkins (1951), p. 401.

⁵⁰ Ibid., p. 51.

⁵¹ Quoted in Ibid., p. 49.

⁵² See Louise C. Wade, Graham Taylor: Pioneer for Social Justice, 1851-1938 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1964).

⁵³ Quoted in Owen E. Pence, The YMCA and Social Need: A Study of Institutional Adaptation (New York: Association Press, 1939), p. 81. It is significant to note that Pence served as a member of the cabinet for the YMCA at the University of Illinois while he was a student in 1909-10.

⁵⁴ Quoted in Hopkins (1951), p. 392.

⁵⁵ Quoted in Pence (1939), p. 81.

⁵⁶ Quoted in Emmett Dedmon, Great Enterprises: 100 Years of the YMCA of Metropolitan Chicago (New York: Rand McNally, 1957), p. 156.

⁵⁷ Quoted in C. Howard Hopkins, John R. Mott, 1865-1955: A Biography (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1979), p. 276. As Hopkins notes, Mott was recruited by the new Federal Council of Churches to be their director in 1909, but he declined the offer.

⁵⁸ Quoted in Ibid., p. 418.

⁵⁹ Quoted in Ibid., pp. 418-419.

⁶⁰ See Hopkins (1951), p. 639.