Las Vegas free press. (East Las Vegas, N.M.) 1891-1???, 1892-05-07
The NEED OF SPECIAL WORK FOB
YOUNG MEN.

need for anything but ordinary
watchfulness and care.
When the fire has got into the
walls of the house, has broken out Oh
the roof, work out of the ordinary
line is needed.
The Sanitary and Christian Com
missions, with their organized force
of nurses, their supplies of lint ard
bandages for wounded men and of
medicines for the sick, are out of
business now. But when armies
were in the field thirty years ago,
there was most urgent call for their
work.
If all the young men of our land
were provided with good houses,
pure society, and were under the
guardianship of the church, the
reasons which created the Y. NJ. G. A.,
and justify its continued and vigorous
life, would not exist
Special conditions of life, and
special needs call for special work to
meet them. Is it fact, then, that
many, or any, young men have their
lives environed by special conditions,
dangerous or unfavorable to their
walfare? Let us see
l. Vast numbers of young men are
without the advantages and whole
some restraints of home. Gods plan
for the development OF character,
and for the happiness of man, includes
the home and its influences as a
mighty factor. The good home
furnishes shelter, care, society, cul-
ture, instruction, restraint; everything
good; nothing evil.
Whether it is, or not, one of the
necessities of our civilization, it GER
tainly is fact that a large proper
ton of our young men are without
or perhaps had better say-away
from home, and deprived of its hal
lowed, helpful and formative infu-
ences. Look at few facts familiar
to all:
Our great cities are full of young
men. They are pouring into the
centers of business just like the
waters from brooks, rivulets and
rivers pour into the great ocean. Go
into the stores, offices, shops-who
form the majority at work there?
Young men. They have come from
village and country life, attracted by
the magnetism of the great city;
drawn there by the openings for
money-making. Where do these
young men live? They eat in res
taurant, or perhaps in a private
boarding house; they have rooms
somewhere, to sleep in-but with
rare exceptions that is all.
Go out on any line of railroad any
day and anywhere in this land from
Maine to Texas, from sea to sea;
you are certain to see on your train
the commercial traveller, with his
grip and samples There are prob
ably 100000 of them on the road
now and four out Of five are young
men.
Go through the railroad shops and
central offices and note the men who
send the ne WIS and move the trains;
look at the brakemen and trainmen
in charge of these enormous trans
portation enterprises. There are
100000 railroad men in our country.
When off duty they are congregated,
necessarily, in the larger cities and
towns. They are almost as migra-
tory as seamen. Home is a word
which brings up to most of them
only dim memories of childhood, or
something yet future. OF this vast
arme of men / think l am safe in
saying that half are young men, i. e.,
unmarried.
Another division of this army, So
900 strong, is gathered in our col
leges and professional schools, with
better surroundings usually than
those in business life, yet they too are
away from home and are beset by
peculiar temptations and have their
own peculiar wants.
2. These young men are largely
without the range of religious inhu-