OCR Text |
Show TOO YEARS OF BROTHERHOOD YMCA Plans to Expand Services In Small Towns and Rural Areas (The first of two articles.) One hundred years ago the Young Men's Christian Association, known familiarly to four generations of Americans as "the Y", was founded in the U.S. to fight vice, degradation degrada-tion and delinquency in the cities. Since then, its aims have broadened. Today, the Y teaches Christian ethics, through good fellowship, to the entire community. With 3,500,-000 3,500,-000 members, the Y has been successful suc-cessful in the cities. Now, in planning plan-ning its next century, the YMCA is going to move into small towns and rural areas. Always a self-searching organization, organiza-tion, the Y is taking into account the somewhat humiliating fact that in this new campaign they are joining join-ing the tail-end of the parade. The 4-H clubs, the Epworth League, the Camp Fire Girls, the Future Farmers Farm-ers of America, the Girl Scouts, the Roman Catholic Rural Life Conference Confer-ence and even the youth program of the Mormon church are far ahead of the YMCA in respect to rural area activity. Even their arch-rivals, the Young Women's Christian Assoc., is better organized outside of the cities than the Y. Some advisers at last year's Y conferences argued that other organizations or-ganizations held such a decisive edge in the farm country that competition com-petition would be a waste of time. The social service program of the Y, however, is without parallel, offering of-fering as it does everything from recreation in the swimming pool or on the basketball court to a course in auto mechanics or professional advice in marital or parent-child relations. No organization which attempts at-tempts to do similar work in any of its fields of activity is as well organized nationally or internationally internation-ally or has such tremendous resources re-sources in manpower, equipment and experience. In rural areas, however, the Y has a lot to learn. Fifty-four per cent of the YMCA's established in cities under 25,000 have died of inertia and disinterest in the last fifty years. For its failures in the past the Y freely blames itself. The organizations have failed to leam what people in small towns are like, what services they need and want and how they are best reached, Y officials recently declared. In the cities, the Y has been particularly par-ticularly successful in handling restless, idle youngsters from all social and economic classes who, anxious for something to do, can just as easily be attracted by a stimulating hobby or a vigorous, healthy sport as by a pool hall or a low-class movie. The same need for legitimate outlets for aggressive energy does not exist in rural surroundings, sur-roundings, Y researchers have discovered. dis-covered. Nor are they interested in the same skills or educational trends. On the other hand, people in non-urban non-urban areas are likely to be anxious about health problems, and the Y will turn its attention to promoting good health in the country. THE LACK OF PROPERLY trained teachers, the movement for consolidation of schools, the decline of the rural church, the absence of recreational programs for both children chil-dren and grown-ups will be its other major concerns. It will attempt to introduce a new awareness of the importance of mental health and study, in conjunction with trained scientists, the emotional stresses and strains peculiar to country living. liv-ing. The program sounds overly ambitious am-bitious to those not acquainted with the Y's last century of progress, but the organization has proved its right to plan on a grandiose scale. Its influence on American life in the past century is almost without parallel. par-allel. Basketball, now called the country's coun-try's most popular sport, was invented in-vented by a YMCA physical education educa-tion instructor who was looking for something to replace the dreary up-down-up-down calisthenics of his day. A few years later another instructor in-structor introduced volleyball. 'The Y was the first to establish summer camps and to encourage the now multi-million dollar summer camping camp-ing movement. They gave the Boy Scouts their start-off push. A quarter-century ago the Y first recognized the psychological dangers in the decline of father and son relationships relation-ships and devised the Indian Guide program to bring fathers and sons back together. They were the first to declare a holiday to honor the nation's fathers, and they have taught millions of young Americans how to swim. |