THE PLAGE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 (SSfllpK! 
 
 lip YOUNG MEN’S CHRISTIAN 
 H||' ASSOCIATION 
 
 IN THE 
 
 NEW RURAL AWAKENING 
 
 Kenyon L. Butterfield 
 
BHMERSITY OF JLUWOIS LIBRARY 
 
 THE PLAGE 9 
 
 OF THE 
 
 YOUNG MEN’S CHRISTIAN 
 ASSOCIATION 
 
 IN THE 
 
 NEW RURAL AWAKENING 
 
 Kenyon 
 
 President Massachusetts Agricultural College 
 
 > 
 
 L. Butterfield 
 
 Sfegouatton Crests 
 
 124 East 28th Street, New York 
 1917 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2017 with funding from 
 
 University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Alternates 
 
 https://archive.org/details/placeofyoungmensOObutt 
 
Al n b tsnt 01 <^cJ b! ^ LT 
 
 
 The 
 
 Place of the Young Men’s 
 Christian Association 
 in the New Rural 
 Awakening 
 
 From the days of Washington, Ameri¬ 
 can agriculture has received constant and 
 intelligent attention from the Government 
 and from thoughtful men. A system of 
 agricultural education has been de¬ 
 veloped, unequalled in any other coun¬ 
 try for inclusiveness of design and 
 generosity of financial support. The 
 United States Department of Agricul¬ 
 ture is doubtless the largest government 
 organization in the world devoted to 
 agricultural affairs. Both national and 
 state legislation have reflected the 
 farmers' interests and needs. Mean¬ 
 while, too, a vast, rich' continent has 
 been subdued to the plow. Nowhere 
 else can we find so many yeoman farm- 
 ' ers with so high a standard of life; no- 
 £ where so free a movement from the 
 if^nrier class to the ranks of professional 
 /life and public leadership. 
 
 3 But we have discovered serious 
 ( S deficiencies in our agriculture and coun- 
 
 j 
 
try life. We have found that our pro¬ 
 ductivity per acre is low; that our sys¬ 
 tem of distributing farm products is 
 costly and unjust both to producer and 
 consumer; that too much of the best 
 farm blood flows permanently to the 
 city; that soil fertility is often quickly 
 depleted; that transient tenancy is 
 alarmingly increasing; that the scarcity 
 of farm labor is driving farmers from 
 their occupation; and that educational 
 and social advantages often lag behind 
 business success and urban standards. 
 
 The gradual recognition of such rural 
 defects as these has, in very recent 
 years—only a half-dozen years, in fact 
 —molded a public opinion that has now 
 reached a constructive stage—or one 
 that at least demands a plan for rural 
 amelioration. This public opinion is the 
 possession of both the rural and the 
 urban groups. It is not always intelli¬ 
 gent, full-orbed, wide-visioned; but it 
 is insistent, and therefore calls for wise 
 leadership, sane counsel, and immediate 
 but fundamental plans. This public 
 opinion is, I take it, “the new rural 
 awakening/’ 
 
 Inherent in this “new rural awaken¬ 
 ing” is the desire to utilize social ma¬ 
 chinery, organized effort, for making 
 plans and for carrying them into effect. 
 
 4 
 
Old agencies are being rejuvenated and 
 new ones created for this purpose. One 
 of these agencies, neither worn by age 
 nor yet untried, is the County Work 
 Department of the Young Men’s Chris¬ 
 tian Association. Strong in the confi¬ 
 dence of a real mission, conscious of 
 proved powers, alert in aggressive 
 leadership, and yet thoughtful of funda¬ 
 mental values, this organization pauses 
 to ask the question: “Are we finding 
 our place in this great, new, significant 
 rural awakening in America ?” 
 
 To attempt an adequate answer to 
 this frank questioning of the Associa¬ 
 tion I think we must first press a little 
 further the query—What is the real 
 purpose of “the new rural awakening”? 
 We have defined it broadly; what is its 
 inner meaning? This purpose, this 
 meaning, has several elements. First of 
 all, there is a new appreciation by city 
 people, especially by important business 
 men, of agriculture as a national asset, 
 to be cherished on statesmanlike lines. 
 Again, urban consumers have come to 
 see that the food problem is a pressing 
 one and is in the hands of the farmers. 
 Moreover, the farmers themselves, 
 although in an era of relative prosperity, 
 realize that they have come to the end 
 of a characteristic epoch in American 
 
 5 
 
agriculture and are entering upon a new 
 chapter which presents new problems. 
 There is, furthermore, a general recog¬ 
 nition that concerted effort is necessary 
 in order to remedy the defects of our 
 agriculture and rural life and to meet 
 the twentieth century farm questions. 
 
 There is also a new definition of the 
 problem of rural life. This problem, in 
 a sense, is defined by the defects already 
 mentioned. From .the public point of 
 view it is a question of food supply, of 
 conservation of soil resources, and of 
 the preservation of the social and eco¬ 
 nomic status of the farming class; from 
 the point of view of the individual it 
 means greater business success for the 
 mass of individual farmers and a con¬ 
 stantly improving type of life in farm 
 communities. Thus we now recognize 
 that the rural problem is very inclusive 
 and exceedingly complex, and must be 
 approached cooperatively on large lines. 
 In fine, “the new rural awakening” con¬ 
 sists in a general recognition of the 
 existence of a real rural problem, sig¬ 
 nificant to national wealth and welfare, 
 and meaning nothing more nor less than 
 the task of planning and of securing, by 
 collective effort, a higher and better 
 rural civilization. 
 
 I have said a rural problem advisedly. 
 
 6 
 
No phase of “the new rural awakening” 
 is more significant than the admission 
 that there is a rural problem. We must 
 think of it as a unit. This is fundamen¬ 
 tal. But, of course, while we must 
 solve it as a whole, after all, practically 
 speaking, we are obliged to attack it at 
 many, many points; for it has many 
 elements. It is far too big, too complex 
 to be met by any one simple method. 
 
 It may clarify our thought as to the 
 task of solving the rural problem if we 
 break the question into groups of ques¬ 
 tions. I wish to suggest three main 
 groups of rural problems that must be 
 met, I believe, by organized effort; at 
 any rate, they are classes of questions 
 that the individual farmer must face. 
 
 i. The first group includes the prob¬ 
 lems of farm improvement. How can 
 we improve the soil? How can we have 
 better breeds of plants and animals? 
 How can we secure better systems of 
 farm management? How can we bet¬ 
 ter protest against the ravages of plant 
 and animal diseases and pests? These 
 questions all have a vital bearing on 
 our ability to produce the maximum 
 amount from our soil. But from the 
 standpoint of the consumer, as well as 
 from that of the farmer, we have not 
 yet solved the farm problem when we 
 
 7 
 
have increased productivity; so we find 
 naturally a second group, namely: 
 
 2. The problems of marketing and 
 exchange. How can the farmer get 
 money in order to carry on his business 
 to advantage? This involves the ques¬ 
 tion of rural credit. How can he best 
 buy his supplies ? How can he % best sell 
 his products? In America we have 
 heretofore relied largely on the ability 
 of the individual to settle these ques¬ 
 tions for himself; in Europe they have 
 found it necessary to do these things 
 collectively, and we believe now that 
 the American farmers will soon be 
 forced to the use of the same method. 
 Here are matters of the highest impor¬ 
 tance. But we have not yet exhausted 
 the questions that arise in connection 
 with the development of our agriculture, 
 and there comes to mind a third group 
 of problems that may be called: 
 
 3. The problems of the community 
 life. This group comprises such ques¬ 
 tions as the efficiency of rural govern¬ 
 ment; the influence of the rural home; 
 the enrichment of the rural school; the 
 leadership of the rural church; the at¬ 
 tainment of adequate social and recre¬ 
 ative facilities; the maintenance of good 
 morals; and the beautification of home¬ 
 steads and roadsides. 
 
 8 
 
Of course this is not absolutely a 
 scientific grouping. I have not men¬ 
 tioned at all the great scientific ques¬ 
 tions that are the subject-matter of 
 costly research by the nation and by 
 states. Nor have I included certain 
 questions of large import such as tax¬ 
 ation, the tariff, tenantry, and financial 
 systems, in their influence on the busi¬ 
 ness of agriculture. I have just made a 
 grouping for the purpose of defining a 
 little more clearly what is ahead of us 
 if we are to meet this demand of “the 
 new rural awakening” for a construc¬ 
 tive plan. 
 
 What is the place of social institu¬ 
 tions generally in meeting such issues 
 as we have raised? 
 
 At the outset we recognize two main 
 classes of institutions—those managed 
 by Government at public expense, and 
 those wholly voluntary and supported 
 at private expense. We are not called 
 upon here to discuss at any length the 
 function of Government in helping to 
 solve the rural problem, because we 
 recognize that an institution like the 
 Young Men's Christian Association has 
 no purpose to do work that the Govern¬ 
 ment is doing. At the same time, even 
 in Association work, it is necessary to 
 have a clear notion as to where the 
 
 9 
 
work of the Government shall cease and 
 where reliance must be placed upon 
 voluntary effort. Let me then state 
 rather arbitrarily my present attitude 
 toward the work of the Government, 
 national, state, or local. The Govern¬ 
 ment certainly has an educational func¬ 
 tion. We are committed to publicly sup¬ 
 ported education, even of a technical 
 character. It is also obvious that the 
 Government must administer certain 
 laws relative to agriculture. We are 
 not yet quite sure of the extent to which 
 Government may go in attempting to 
 correlate the various activities on be¬ 
 half of the agricultural movement; 
 though personally I believe that Gov¬ 
 ernment may and should, at least as a 
 temporary leader, seek to correlate and 
 ally the various agencies for rural prog¬ 
 ress. 
 
 Is there a limit beyond which the 
 Government may not go in these mat¬ 
 ters of education, administration, and 
 correlation ? This much seems clear: 
 The Government should investigate, for 
 the purpose of discovering facts and 
 principles; it should interpret these 
 facts and principles in the light of exist¬ 
 ing need; it should inform the masses 
 of the people of the significance of these 
 facts and principles in their application 
 
 10 
 
to existing need; it should stand ready 
 to advise as to the way in which these 
 facts and principles may best be applied; 
 and it may even go so far as to demon¬ 
 strate its faith in its own advice, and 
 thus give objective illustration of the 
 way in which truth may be made appli¬ 
 cable to practical conditions. But the 
 Government may not participate in agri¬ 
 culture. It cannot run a man’s farm 
 for him; it should not try to run the 
 farmers’ collective business for them, 
 nor to manage a rural community. 
 
 I like to think that this three-fold 
 work of the Government in adminis¬ 
 tration of laws, education, and correla¬ 
 tion applies to the entire range of the 
 problems of agriculture and country life, 
 and may be just as helpful in solving 
 all problems as in solving any one prob¬ 
 lem. But I am bound to say that, prac¬ 
 tically, there are serious limitations to 
 governmental activity. For example, 
 how far can the Government go in its 
 advisory work with reference to the 
 country church? As a practical matter, 
 would a Government investigation of 
 the influence of the tariff on agriculture 
 be regarded as unprejudiced, no matter 
 what party was in power? Then there 
 are limitations as to the amount of 
 money available for Government work. 
 
 ii 
 
We are soon to find in our agricultural 
 program that it is impossible for the 
 Federal Government or for the states to 
 appropriate sufficient money to do all 
 that could legitimately be done by the 
 Government, and, consequently, that 
 more and more reliance must be placed 
 upon local and private support and ac¬ 
 tivity. Moreover, it is well for farmers 
 to manage their own affairs. In the long 
 run they will do it better than anybody 
 else. It strengthens them as a class. 
 The Government can and should do what 
 neither individuals nor voluntary or¬ 
 ganizations can achieve. Speaking 
 broadly, the Government should seek to 
 stimulate the maximum of activity and 
 self-management on the part of farmers, 
 both individually and through associated 
 effort. 
 
 Turning now to these associated or 
 voluntary efforts for the betterment of 
 agriculture and country life, we find a 
 multitude of agencies. Some of these 
 agencies are of primary importance, 
 such as the home, the church, and the 
 school. Others are evidently supplemen¬ 
 tary in character, such as the village 
 improvement society, the horticultural 
 society, etc. Apparently, as time goes 
 on these voluntary associations will 
 group themselves quite naturally into 
 
 12 
 
agencies chiefly for farm improvement, 
 or chiefly for marketing and exchange, 
 or chiefly for the betterment of com¬ 
 munity life. Of course, there will be 
 some associations, like the great farm¬ 
 ers’ organizations, that will cover more 
 than one field, but there will surely be a 
 tendency toward a pretty sharp divi¬ 
 sion of labor among these institutions. 
 I think we will all agree that the Young 
 Men’s Christian Association is not im¬ 
 mediately concerned with the problems 
 of farm improvement, nor indeed with 
 the problems of marketing and ex¬ 
 change. It recognizes that a permanent 
 rural community life can be built only 
 on a thoroughly developed farm produc¬ 
 tivity and a sound and economical 
 method of distribution of products. But 
 its especial task is not primarily to for¬ 
 ward these technical interests; it is 
 essentially a community life agency. 
 
 And now at length we face the real 
 question. Does the County Young 
 Men’s Christian Association desire to 
 serve as a general community-life 
 agency, or has it a specialized task? Is 
 it not fair to approach the answer to 
 this question by calling attention to the 
 very name of the Association ? It is 
 first of all a voluntary Association, seek¬ 
 ing to band people together; it is not a 
 13 
 
public agency, nor supported at public 
 expense; it is independent of state con¬ 
 trol; it evidently seeks a function that 
 lies outside of state effort. Moreover, 
 the idea of associated or cooperative 
 purpose and effort is emphasized. The 
 comradeship of like-minded men for 
 meeting a great need is encouraged. 
 In the second place, it is an Association 
 of young men; it seeks to band together 
 boys and young men. Older men may 
 help mightily; but the object is to help 
 boys and young men. It is essentially 
 religious; it marches under the Chris¬ 
 tian flag; it inculcates the Christian mo¬ 
 tive; it proclaims itself a regiment of 
 the Christian army. 
 
 There are many questions that arise 
 in this connection. What type of work 
 is to be done in this outreach for btiys 
 and young men under the Christian 
 banner? Is it work that some other 
 institutions ought to do, or is it work 
 that none other can do? Is the Asso¬ 
 ciation religious only in the narrow 
 sense, or does it seek to develop the 
 religious motive in all human activity 
 in the country ? Again, how does it 
 reconcile its work with that of the 
 Church or of the Sunday school? Has 
 it not, as a matter of fact, an even larger 
 aim growing out of a fundamental rural 
 14 
 
necessity? Should it not seek to be the 
 great rural clearing house and attempt 
 to integrate or coordinate all local rural 
 activities ? 
 
 The County Young Men’s Christian 
 Association, in seeking to take its place 
 in “the new rural awakening,” must first 
 of all define its work. I suggest this 
 definition: “The special mission of the 
 County Young Men’s Christian Asso¬ 
 ciation is, by means of helpful comrade¬ 
 ship and inspiring leadership, to influ¬ 
 ence boys and young men living in the 
 country, on behalf of a complete man¬ 
 hood motived by the Christ spirit.” The 
 Association will teach that this complete 
 manhood can be secured only by a 
 growth that comes when one’s play, 
 one’s toil, one’s study, one’s thinking are 
 directed by and suffused with the spirit 
 of self-control and of loving service. It 
 will, in other words, seek to relate the 
 country boy both to his special task of 
 individual character-building and to his 
 problem of assisting in the work of 
 rural-community-building. The boy or 
 young man is to be brought to see that 
 these fundamental issues of life must be 
 met under the inspiration of the reli¬ 
 gious motive, and must be solved on 
 Christian principles and by Christian 
 methods. 
 
 IS 
 
Hence the Association will direct its 
 efforts to the youth of the countryside. 
 These will be asked to band themselves 
 with others, in order that they may be 
 helped to work out this dual problem 
 of character-building and community¬ 
 building on the highest possible lines. 
 The conventional division of effort and 
 emphasis will be followed—that is, the 
 development of the physical, the intel¬ 
 lectual, and the spiritual. But the great 
 effort will be to try to bring the boy 
 and young man to see that religion is 
 a life and not a doctrine; that it is an 
 attitude and not a garment; that it is 
 a motive and spirit and not an artificial 
 classification of men; and consequently 
 that all life can be made religious. The 
 splendid historic emphasis of the Asso¬ 
 ciation upon leadership-training will, 
 therefore, be forever enforced because 
 of a fundamental belief in the power 
 of personality, and an abiding faith in 
 the influence of allegiance to persons— 
 an allegiance that culminates in a per¬ 
 petual and conscious loyalty to the 
 crowning Person of all. The Associa¬ 
 tion will regard itself not as a primary 
 social institution, but as supplementary; 
 not as intended to take the place of 
 home, school, or church, but as perform¬ 
 ing a service that is difficult, under the 
 
 j6 
 
present conditions, for home, school, or 
 church to fulfil. 
 
 It is obvious that any such policy as 
 this will immediately bring up the ques¬ 
 tions—what shall be the relationship of 
 the Association to home, school, church, 
 etc.? If the Association is supplemen¬ 
 tary, in what way is it supplementary? 
 Let me illustrate. 
 
 It is commonly believed that the home 
 is not fulfilling its full function in the 
 life of the boy. I think the Association 
 should attempt to supplement, though 
 not to supplant, the home. It should do 
 for the boy what the father ought to do 
 but does not do. But I think it ought 
 to go further and try, in an organized 
 way, to get the father to do more for 
 his boy. In other words, the Association 
 will be a father to the boy, and will do 
 for the boy what perhaps the father can¬ 
 not do, but will also seek to bring vision 
 to the father and will even go so far as 
 to help the fathers of a community in 
 their boy problems. So with the school. 
 I think the school should be the natural 
 recreative center for the pupils of the 
 school, but it is not so, and until there 
 is such support for the schools that this 
 work can be organized, the school is not 
 likely to fulfil this function adequately. 
 The Young Men’s Christian Associa- 
 . 17 
 
tion in the country community can sup¬ 
 plement the school, but it ought also to 
 help to bring the school to function fully 
 and properly. If the school is defective 
 in reaching boys on the educational side, 
 the Association can help there. 
 
 The question of the church and th<^ 
 Sunday school presents the greatest 
 difficulty, and yet I cannot see why the 
 same principle may not be valid. If 
 these agencies can do for the boy all 
 that needs to be done for him by institu¬ 
 tions professing the development of reli¬ 
 gion as their chief function, there will 
 be no place for the Association. But as 
 a matter of fact, these agencies are not 
 doing all that needs doing for the boy 
 and I doubt if they are likely to do so 
 for a long time to come. They ought, 
 therefore, to welcome the Association 
 as an ally. 
 
 Our agricultural colleges are now 
 reaching out to the country boys more 
 particularly through boys’ agricultural 
 clubs. The proper correlation of the 
 school and the Association and the agri¬ 
 cultural college has not yet been stated, 
 but I am inclined to think that the 
 school is the normal center of interest 
 for the education of youth; that the 
 agricultural college is the fountain of 
 information on agricultural matters; 
 
 18 • 
 
and that when the Association steps into 
 this work, it should be to meet a sup¬ 
 plementary need. 
 
 There are some who think that such 
 organizations as the county farm demon¬ 
 stration bureaus, county leagues for 
 rural improvement, and county federa¬ 
 tions for rural progress, may take the 
 place of the rural work of the Associa¬ 
 tions. I cannot agree, but I think there 
 ought to be close cooperation between 
 the Associations and this county farm 
 improvement work. 
 
 Why may not the Young Men’s Chris¬ 
 tian Association serve as the great inte¬ 
 grating agency in the rural community? 
 This is an attractive task and a vital 
 one. Why should we not ask the Asso¬ 
 ciation to make it its supreme task ? 
 Personally I do not believe that this is 
 the function of the Young Men’s Chris¬ 
 tian Association. In the first place, 
 there is a certain sense in which we do 
 not need an integrating agency. Inte¬ 
 gration must be on the federal or repre¬ 
 sentative principle. That is, no existing 
 institution can merge into itself other 
 institutions. Indeed, no existing institu¬ 
 tion can be the core of a system of 
 correlated activity. If we are to have 
 a real integration of country life inter¬ 
 ests, it must be by the voluntary or 
 19 
 
mutual cooperation of the agencies in¬ 
 volved and not by the pulling together 
 of these agencies under the leadership 
 of any one agency that dominates them 
 all. 
 
 The County Young Men's Christian 
 Association is not as yet a universal 
 organization. Integration should go on 
 rapidly. It should exist as soon as possi¬ 
 ble in every agricultural county and 
 rural community. I am sure the Asso¬ 
 ciation is to grow, but I do not believe 
 it will grow fast enough for this pur¬ 
 pose. I think that if any institution is 
 to take a leadership in coordinating rural 
 activities, it must be some recognized 
 central voluntary committee, mutually 
 established through the cooperation of 
 all the agencies concerned, or else that 
 the Government as represented in the 
 United States Department of Agricul¬ 
 ture or in the extension service of the 
 state agricultural college, should take 
 the lead in stimulating the integrating 
 process. I think, however, that the 
 county committees of Young Men’s 
 Christian Associations may often be the 
 local leaders in bringing about the corre¬ 
 lation of rural activities either on neigh¬ 
 borhood or on county lines, or both. 
 
 I have not specified concrete tasks for 
 the Association. In fact, concrete tasks, 
 
 20 
 
while always the final achievement and 
 justification of social effort, gain their 
 value from their intimate relationship 
 to sound theory as well as sound method. 
 They are the fruitage of a well-rooted 
 tree. I have tried to describe the tree 
 that will bear the right fruit. The fruit 
 is a redeemed rural boyhood and young 
 manhood. Methods of growing and 
 ripening this fruit may and will change. 
 These methods may carry the Associa¬ 
 tion into many subsidiary activities and 
 relationships. But the one task to which 
 the County Work must forever address 
 itself, and of which, in the multiplicity 
 of practical devices, it must never lose 
 sight for one instant, is to reach rural 
 youth effectively with the Christian 
 message. 
 
 Lastly let me indicate my conception 
 of the ideal County Young Men’s Chris¬ 
 tian Association. 
 
 1. It will be more an influence than 
 an institution. It will attempt to create 
 an atmosphere rather than to build up 
 an elaborate machinery. 
 
 2. In so far as it has an institutional 
 character, this will lie in the comrade¬ 
 ship of multitudes of country boys and 
 young men. The band or group spirit 
 will be its great asset, and the fraternal 
 feeling will be developed for high ends. 
 
 21 
 
3- The heart of this enterprise is a 
 virile man, a rural secretary, backed by 
 a strong committee, all holding a clear 
 conception both of the opportunities and 
 the limitations of the Association, and 
 whose chief function is so to influence 
 boys and young men, that there will 
 gradually be gathered together bands of 
 comrades who are seeking to solve their 
 life problems on the highest lines and 
 who are anxious to help others to do the 
 same. 
 
 4. The Association will supplement 
 other institutions rather than seek to 
 become itself an institution. It will not 
 only supplement the school, and the 
 home, and the church, and the grange, 
 and the college, and the county demon¬ 
 stration work, in anything that seeks 
 to reach rural boys and young men, but 
 it will do k\\ it can to help those institu¬ 
 tions to a larger activity in order that 
 they may themselves reach boys more 
 adequately, “function” more completely. 
 
 5. The Association will hold itself 
 to be essentially a part of the common 
 church, the federated church if you 
 please, at work for the purpose of reach¬ 
 ing boys. 
 
 6. This means a temporary function? 
 Yes, in the willingness of the Associa¬ 
 tion, and, in fact, its desire to turn over 
 
 22 
 
tasks to primary institutions as rapidly 
 as they are willing to assume them; but 
 actually a permanent function because, 
 as we begin to realize the possibilities of 
 service for boys, we shall see the need 
 of a specialized branch of country church 
 activity on behalf of boys and young 
 men. I do not know what it may be 
 called fifty years from now; possibly not 
 the Young Men’s Christian Association, 
 though it will be that. For just as soon 
 as the country churches “find” them¬ 
 selves, are ready to take that leadership 
 in country life which the present situa¬ 
 tion imperatively demands, are prepared 
 to work together as a unit, and are will¬ 
 ing to sink institutionalism in vital reli¬ 
 gious service, then we will find the 
 churches demanding that the County 
 Young Men’s Christian Association 
 shall come into every agricultural 
 county in America. 
 
 I believe, therefore, in a permanent 
 County Young Men’s Christian Associa¬ 
 tion, but I believe that it will find its 
 permanency in specialized work, in 
 great elasticity of method, and in ever¬ 
 lasting appeal, before the public and be¬ 
 fore the boys themselves, to the power 
 of Christian comradeship in building the 
 Kingdom of Heaven into both individual 
 and community life. 
 
 23