Hide Article Text (OCR)
Presbyterian Church Crowded At Every Session By Men And Women In spired By the Great Work Being Done And To Be Done. The Presbyterian Church is these days a veritable hive swarming with activity. There is not a drone about the place. The product of this indus try is a sweetening which is hav ing its effect not only upon our boys and girls but upon our homes and our whole community life. The Queen Bee is Miss Estella Chase who with a quiet enthusiasm and zeal has brought about in Marshall county a renaissance in Bible Study. The twenty-sixth annual convention of the Marshall county Sunday School Association is being held in Plymouth beginning Thursday after noon and closing late Saturday after noon. The program arranged for is excel lent, abounding in stars of the first magnitude. C. S. Ellis, a farmer of German township, is serving his fourth term as President of the Marshall county Sunday School Association. He is a man of remarkable executive ability and has the county thoroughly or ganized. There has been a wonderful awak ening of workers all over the world. Mr. Ellis has been keen to keep abreast of the times and has intro duced into the Marshall County As sociation all the progressive move ments to be found elsewhere. Though zealous, Mr. Ellis has kept his poise well and has not allowed himself to get astride of any hobbies. He feels the Sunday School to be one of the most important of the world’s institutions because it is the only one which makes its chief busi ness the moral and religious educa tion of the young. The school at tends to the intellectual, and the home—well, does it, in this strenu ous age, care for much more than the physical ? The guiding theme of this conven tion, announced in a streamer made by one of the T. T. Itdies and stretch ed across the church where none can fail to see it, is ‘‘Self Improvement for Sanctified Service,’’ Service with soul, heart mind and strength, service which involves the Spiritual, Emotional, mental and physical being. Those from abroad who came to assist in this convention are Rev. Moerdyke, Mr. Burnie, Prof. Del marter, Miss Lewis, and Dr. Humble. Rev. Peter Moerdyke, pastor of the Reformed church in South Bend, preached the convention sermon this afternoon and will give an ad dress at the banquet in the evening on ‘‘The Spiritual Value of Teacher Training.’’ He aided in a district meeting here two years ago and was so well liked that our people were glad to invite him back. Rev. Moor dyke was for sixteen years a worker in Chicago and is at present in charge of the Teachers’ Training class in the Y. M. C. A. in South Bend. He is a strong man and a pleasing State Secretary George N. Burnie of Indianapolis is head of the State Sunday School forces of Indiana. He is a young man, still in the thirties. Having had former experi ence as a business man he is now devoting his entire time to the work of State Secrrtary. _He came four years ago from the Dominion of Canada where he had a broad reput ation in the same work. Prof. J. E. Delmarter is the head of a musical publishing house in Chicago. B+. was here last year and his singing was a very pleasing in the singing throughout the convention Miss Hazel Lewis is a new worker in Indiana. She is the State Ele second. Her ‘‘Story Hour’’ at 3:45 on tomorrow afternoon, promises to be a most interesting occasion Miss Lewis, in her modesty expects only teachers, but has said that if any others are there they will not be sent home. On the strength of this many who are ‘‘wise’’ will be ‘‘there’’. The Story feature of Education is a late development in the intellectual world and now many Public Libraries and Institutions of Learning have their regular ‘‘Story Hour’’ open to the public and the profession of ‘‘Story Teller’’ is a new and remunerative occupation. The coming of Dr. Christopher Humble, of Chicago, is proof of what importunity will do. It had been the dream of the county authorities to draw one of the biggest guns—an international worker—to this conven tion. To several letters, they re ceived the same reply: the Interna tional Staff could not attend county convention. Their whole time was taken with State and Provincial meetings in the large cities. Finally a letter came saying that Dr. Hum ble’s itinerary was so arranged that, en route to the east, he could stop off in Plymouth from 6 P. M. until it is M. Friday night. He ws a very scholarly man and an educator of wide experience. The subject of his address will be ‘‘ Applied Psychology in the Home and the Sunday School.’’ The public will be admitted free to this as to all the rest of the con vention meetings. Tables and hot coffee will be pro vided free to all who wish to bring their lunch on Friday and Saturday The Exhibit. The Exhibit consist of maps of the ‘Holy Land’’ drawn by the T. T. classes, and of charts illustrating Bible history ‘‘as it unfolds the re ligious meaning of events.’’ There are also samples of tests and other teacher training work which was on exhibit at the State Conven tion in Indianapolis last April where Marshall county stood alone as com pared with the other exhibits and re ceived honorable mention. One picture which is looked at by all is of a men’s Bible class of 500 members in Nelsonville, C., a town of 6000 population. There are 341 men in the picture. On the tables are much literature useful in the graded work and to the teacher. There is a large missionary exhibit consisting of mottoes and lit erature, Friday Afternoon Session. At one o’clock Miss Laura Cara way, of Warsaw, State Supt. of Tem perance talked interestingly on her work. Supt. Burnet had charge of the Township President’s hour which followed. Marshall county has town ship organiations in all but Green Township. It is this alone which keeps it from being a Banner county. There are 71 Sunday Schools in the county, a decrease of seven since the last convention. There are certain standards which have been adopted to distinguish the state of Sunday School affairs in the various counties. Counties are Or ganized, Banner or Front Line coun ties according as they reach up to these qualifications. There is but one Front Line County so far—Tip ton. An Organized County. 1. Must be organized auxiliary to the State Association. 2. Must hold Annual Convention and elect officers. 3. Must have Home Departments by State Association. 4. Must make an offering to State A Sanner County. 1. Be organized auxiliary to the State Association. 2. Hold Annual Convention and elect officers. 3. Have all the townships organized alone or with another. 4. Include 2 report of every school in the county in its annual re to the State. 5. the State Apportionment in full. 6. Be operating four or more de partments of work recommended by the State. 7. Be represented by delegates at the State Convention. A ‘‘Front Line’’ County. 1. Must be a banner county. 2. Must have Cradle Rolls in 50 per cent of the schools. 3. Must have Home Departments in 40 per cent of the schools. 4. Must have adult organized class es holding certificates in 30 per cent of the schools. 5. Must have students or classes in Teacher Training work in 20 per cent of the schools. 6. Must increase county enrollment 10 per cent. Mrs. Ella Davis county Supt., of the House to House visitation work explained how ‘‘Home Visitation will meet Township Needs.’’ She said the needs were; an increase of attend ance, a better directed energy, and more active workers. About 25 per cent of the inhabitants of Marshall are enrolled in the Sunday School. How else can we get the other 75 per cent than to go out’’ into the highways and hedges and compel them to come in.. This is a great Missionary work. Mrs. F. W. Bosworth talked on ‘*The Home Department.’” As her friends know, Mrs. Bosworth’s atten tion has been chiefly paid to sickness in her family of late. For this rea son she said apologetically that her paper was a ‘‘hit and miss’” one like the popular stipe in an old-fashioned rag carpet. At the close of her ex cellent address, Mr. Ellis remarked that it surely was a ‘‘hit’’ paper for it hit the nail on the head but he failed to see the ‘‘miss’’ as there seemed to be nothing missing. The Home department brings a systematic Bible study to invalids, aged shut-ins, mothers kept at home, the army of those necessarily employ ed on Sunday. It even follows the boys in the Army and Navy. It must not be neglected for if it is some will not be reached who ought to be. The Conference of County and Township Presidents was in charge of Mrs. M. E .Hume and was very helpful. From first to last Mrs. Hume has been an indefatigueable worker and a large share of the credit of making this a wonderfully successful convention is due to her. The Story Hour. One of the most pleasing parts of the whole convention was the ‘‘Story Hour’’ in charge of Miss Mary South worth, assisted by Mrs. Ira Garn and Miss Lewis ‘‘and the girls and boys’’ Only primary teachers were ‘‘expect ed’’ but the word had gotten out how good this would be and the leaders were embarrassed by the presence of a church-ful of eager listeners. Miss Lewis told a typical story, The story of Elisha and the Shuna mite woman, explaining first what the essentials of a story are. Every well built story, she said, must . Have a beginning, a note of in terest, a key thought. 2. Must array all the characters. 3. Must have the series of events in their proper order. 4. Must have a Climax. 5. Must have an ending. It must not leave the characters away up in the air where the climax takes them. She she we need not only Scriptual stories, but stories which touched the experience of the child more closely. Christ might have chosen his stories from the Scriptures but he did not. Instead he told of the lost sheep and the Good Samaritan. Fearing that she might consume more than her share of time, Miss Lewis asked, ‘‘ How long is the story hour to last?’’ ‘*Till seven thirty’’ responded one of the delighted listeners. It would be impossible for paper and ink to tell the stories as Miss Lewis did and those who did not hear her can only regret their loss. Mrs. Ira Garn was called upon to tell a story and sur prised those who did not know of her ability by proving a close second to Miss Lewis. Her auditors could not but feel how fortunate was little Katherine Garn in having such a story teller for her mother. The story of the lost sheep was dramatized by those who were willing to ‘*become as little children.’’ This was very instructive to those who wished to learn more of this latest feature of education. Miss Lewis called attention to the fact that in story dramatization with little children, the make believe is Many Visitors In City From Seven Coun ties To Witness First Great Trial of the Kind in Our History. The Judges and Contestants. It took about four hours to single out the “lone star’’ in spelling. Starke county lost all of her repre sentatives before the written contest which occurred as soon as half of the contestants were down. Fulton was the only county to go into the writ ten contest with all three representa tives in the field. St. Joe county had not lost any, but it only sent two in to the fray. Not one of the ten who took the written contest missed a word and all returned to the oral spelling. It took an hour to spell the next one down, but one by one they tlipped over some little letter until tut six were left. The last six were Marie Denman and Vivian Lewis of Marshal, Este Sheetz, of Fulton, Golda Eaton of Elkhart Robert O’Connel of Koscius ko, and Jennings Gordon of St. Joseph county. It seemed that these six could not be spelled down and they yended slowly. The interest of the spectators grew more intense, each one hoping and believing that his own would win. The last two to remain on the floor, Jennings Gordon of St. Joe, and Vivian Lewis of Marshall were given about 150 words apiece. They knew the ‘words perfectly, spelling them with ease. It was rapid firing for a time, neither side being worst ed. It really looked ridiculous to see seven County Superintendents and three Judges in dispair before two children who could not be spelled down. They finally decided that the hour was getting late and these two knew all the spelling words in the book and the only way to make a decision was to give them words at random from the stories for dictation which are given in the spelling book but are not regular spelling lessons. Accordingly the name ‘‘Hans Chris tian Andersen’’ was given to Jennings Gordon. He had never spelled it before and it proved his undoing. This left Vivian Lewis to carry off the palm of victory, which she did in all modesty, amidst a storm of con gratulations, Vivian Lewis, Argos. St. Joseph County Jennings Gordon, Nappanee. Orson Marble, New Carlisle. Starke Willie Sweazey, Helen Knachel, Esther Carlson. Fully a hundred and fifty visitors from over the Thirteenth district were in Plymouth today attending the District Spelling contest which began at the Webster school building at one o’clock. About fifty of these took dinner at the Ross house. They were contestants, county superinten dents, judges and others. The Plym outh business men kindly made the contestants their guests at the hotel, which was appreciated by the visitors The matter of choosing judges was a hard one, but the following were finally decided upon because every one believed they would give all a fair deal: Supt. Randall of Plymouth, Supt. I. S. Hahn of Culver, and Supt. Whitmer of Rochester. All being in the district, it was felt to be a deli cate matter to select the proper ones. All seven of the county superinten dents were here and these gentlemen took turns in pronouncing the worda. Their names are: Elmer E. Rodgers of Starke, Homer Rogers of Pulaski, R. H. Longfield of St. Joseph, John C. Werner of Fulton, Edson B. Lar ber of Kosciusko, E. Weaver of Elk hart, L. E. Steinebach of Marshall. The auditorium was well filled and fully half those present were grown men—so great is the interest in this school work. Among them were many teachers and trustees. It is noticeable that among the contestants most of the names are foreign, which shows that students of foreign par entage are taking more interest in the language than our own ‘‘home grown’’ students. The contest opened with twenty contestants, Orson Marble and Mitchel Charnley being absent. Lucile Freyberger substituted for Charnley. No one went down until ninety words had been pronounced, when Victor Crowel of Walnut town ship failed on the word ‘‘idle,’’ spelling it i-d-e-l. The winners in Saturday contest will represent the district at the State contest at Indianapolis on March 30. This was as much a contest of endurance and of nerve as of spell ing. There seemed to be no excit able children in the contest. If there were, they soon dropped out. It took a cool head to remember to say ‘*hyphen”’ or ‘‘capital’’ when they were needed. It took strength to spell constantly for almost four hours, in public and where there was so much at stake. While the three prize winners were probably the best spellers yet there is a great element of chance in it too. If some of them had not happened to have just the word they did they might have stood much longer and even perhaps have been winners. Marshall County is the only county to have two among the Winners and Alternates. Marie Denman of In wood will be an alternate. Miss Marie was so far as known, the youngest contestant present, being but eleven years old. While she did not seem the least bit flurried, but entered into the contest as bluthly as if it were some pleasant game, yet she is a small and rather delicate looking child. ' Marshall County is proud of her and the Egg she has — to pers ¢ ’ ¥ i eral 3 ee oy Fat ycy* ‘his ealm ee er and shor me od he
Newspaper Details
Plymouth Weekly Republican
Plymouth, Indiana, US
Thu, Feb 23, 1911
Page 1
Full Page
Clipped by
Foster B.
CA 29 Jan 2026
Other Publications Near Plymouth, Indiana
Plymouth Republican
Plymouth Democrat
Plymouth Banner
Plymouth Marshall County Republican
Plymouth Semi Weekly Independent
