The American Missionary — Volume 54, No. 3, July, 1900

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Title: The American Missionary -- Volume 54, No. 3, July, 1900

Author: Various

Release Date: April 8, 2009 [EBook #28541]

Language: English

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COURT SQUARE THEATRE, SPRINGFIELD, MASS.

PLACE OF FIFTY-FOURTH ANNUAL MEETING.

NEW YORK:

PUBLISHED QUARTERLY BY THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION,

THE CONGREGATIONAL ROOMS,

FOURTH AVENUE AND TWENTY-SECOND STREET, NEW YORK.

Price 50 Cents a Year in advance.

Entered at the Post Office at New York, N. Y., as Second-Class mail matter.

CONTENTS.

Page

Financial—Nine Months97

Editorial Notes97

Indian Progress102

Light and Shade104

COMMENCEMENT EXERCISES:

Fisk University, Tenn.106

Talladega College, Ala.108

Straight University, La.110

Tougaloo University, Miss.113

Grandview Institute, Tenn.115

Pleasant Hill Academy, Tenn.115

Fort Berthold Indian School, N. D.116

A Tribute To Rev. A. J. F. Behrends, D.D.118

Richard Salter Storrs, D.D.119

Obituary—Prof. A. K. Spence—Rev. W. S. Alexander, D.D.121

Porto Rico Notes122

Loss of Supplies for Alaska124

Department of Christian Endeavor125

RECEIPTS128

Woman's State Organizations142

Secretaries of Young People's and Children's Work144

THE 54th ANNUAL MEETING

OF THE

American Missionary Association

WILL BE HELD IN

SPRINGFIELD, MASS

October 23-25, 1900.

SERMON: REV. NEWELL DWIGHT HILLIS, D.D.

The AMERICAN MISSIONARY presents new form, fresh material and generous illustrations for 1900. This magazine is published by the American Missionary Association quarterly. Subscription rate fifty cents per year.

Many wonderful missionary developments in our own country during this stirring period of national enlargement are recorded in the columns of this magazine.

THE

American Missionary

FINANCIAL.

Nine Months, Ending June 30th.

The receipts are $237,141.25, exclusive of Reserve Legacy Account, an increase of $24,922,63 compared with last year. There has been an increase of $15,751.36 in donations, $5,800.96 in estates, $852,26 in income and $2,518.05 in tuition.

The expenditures are $249,148.75, an increase of $21,699.95 compared with last year. The debt showing June 30th, this year, is $12,007.50—last year at the same time $15,230.18.

We appeal to churches, Sunday-schools, Christian Endeavor Societies, Woman's Missionary Societies and individuals, and also to executors of estates, to secure as large a sum as possible for remittance in July, August and September. The fiscal year closes September 30th. We hope to receive from all sources every possible dollar. The Association closed the year 1897-98 without debt, and the year 1898-99 without debt, and it earnestly desires to close this year, 1899-1900 without debt.

Annual Meeting, Oct. 23d-25th.

The Fifty-fourth Annual Meeting of the American Missionary Association is to be held in Springfield, Mass., October 23d-25th. The Court Square Theatre has been secured, containing the largest auditorium in the city. A great gathering is anticipated. Rev. Newell Dwight Hillis, D.D., will preach the sermon. Reports from the large and varied fields will be presented by missionaries. The fields now reach from Porto Rico to Alaska, and present various and interesting conditions of life. The great problems of national and missionary importance that are pressing themselves upon the attention of Christian patriots everywhere will be ably discussed. Contributing churches, local conferences and state associations are entitled to send delegates to this convention of the American Missionary Association.

A New Departure Program.

Santee Training School presented a unique and interesting program at the closing exercises, June 15th, 1900. A New Departure Program for Closing of School was the title upon the printed page. The program was divided into two parts. Part first was confined to history. The general subject presented in the papers was The Development of Civilized Ways of Living. One of the Indian pupils read a paper on First Ways of Getting Food and Clothing. Another on First Dwellings. The future as well as the past in race development and elevation was considered. Beginning to Provide for the Future was the subject of another paper. Clothing was discussed in relation to its production and value.

The second part of this New Departure Program presented science in a practical and helpful way. The general subject was Natural Forces are for Human Use. Interesting and valuable papers were presented on such themes as Wind Mills, Non-conduction in Electricity, Plant Breathing, Food Stored, and other suggestive and important subjects. Throughout abundant illustrations were presented impressing upon these Indian boys and girls important lessons in independence and self-control and self-help essential to development and progress. Santee is to be commended surely for this new departure, which must prove not only interesting but of permanent value in race elevation.

A New Departure Program.

The attention of the whole world has been focalized on China during the past few weeks. Many hearts are deeply anxious for friends who are in the midst of this upheaval and whose lives are threatened. Beginning with mobs instigated by a secret society, apparently without preconcertion, a state bordering upon war now exists. Whether the Empress Dowager is at the head of this movement it seems impossible to decide. The conservative element of the Chinese is certainly in sympathy with the Boxers in their effort to exterminate the foreign devils. What the outcome of this insane uprising and mad onslaught involving substantial war against the civilized nations of the world will be, no prophet of modern times can foretell. Many of us wait with anxious and sorrowful hearts for messages which we hope and yet fear to receive, lest they confirm our apprehension and alarm.

We hope to present in the next issue of the Missionary an article from Rev. Jee Gam, the missionary of the A. M. A. in San Francisco, giving his views and interpretations of the trouble in China. This Association is closely related to the great work in this Empire through the missions in our own country among the Chinese. How much the civilized nations are responsible for the present condition through their eager and often ill-advised efforts to absorb the territory, or to gain political and commercial advantages, is a serious problem. The need of aggressive and earnest work for the Chinese who come to our own country is emphasized by these alarming conditions. Hundreds should be sent back as missionaries to their own people. We hold the key to the solution of foreign missions in Africa, China and Japan in members of these races in our own country.

A United Annual Meeting.

Several state and local conferences have passed resolutions in favor of one annual meeting for all our six missionary societies. Such a convention would probably occupy a week. Each society would have representation during such a portion of the time as the magnitude of the work represented demanded. The general sentiment seems to be that the Sabbath should be used as a day of missionary and spiritual arousement, for the general interests of the Kingdom of God, as represented through our denomination. This plan met the cordial approval of the Home Missionary Convention in Detroit recently. It is certainly worthy of the careful consideration of all our societies.

The Testimony of Prof. Roark.

Prof. R. M. Roark, of the Kentucky State College, at the commencement of Chandler Normal School, Lexington, Ky., bore the following testimony to the strength and value of the negroes of the South: "Forty years ago the race had nothing; now property in the hands of the negro has an assessed valuation of nearly five hundred million dollars. Not a few individuals are worth seventy-five thousand to one hundred thousand dollars. Forty years ago it was a violation of the law to teach a negro; now there are thousands of children in good schools; and there are two hundred higher institutes of learning for negroes, with an attendance of two hundred thousand or more. There are many successful teachers, editors, lawyers, doctors and ministers who are negroes. All these professions are fully and ably represented here, in conservative and aristocratic Lexington, and as regards