The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1912-09-12
MILLIONS CELEBRATE TO-DAY THE BIRTHDAY
 OF "FATHER'' CLARKE.

l A native of the Province of Quebec, 1 left orphan at eight at thirty the i pastor of a little church, and now a 1 leader and teacher with four millions of loyal folIowers-such,s in brief, is 1 the life history Of the Rev Dr. Francis Edward Clark, founder and president l of the United States Society of Chris 1 tian Endeavor. Father Clarke, as 1 his great army of youthful admirers call him, will celebrate his sixty-firs l birthday to-day, and will be@the recip- l tent of congratulations, at least in spirit. from the members of all the eighty thousand Christian Endeavor
 societies scattered over the earth. The vast organization which has for it's motto, For Christ and the Church. . now has local branches in practically all of the cities, towns and hamlets of the United States and Canada, and has extended it's influence to Great Brit ain, Australia, China, India, Japan and nearly all missionary countries. It is affiliated with all the great evan
 ge4ica1 denominations, and these have Christian Endeavor principles to the uttermost corners of the globe. Since
 Father Clarke founded the society, not less than fifteen millions of peo-
 pie have worn it's badge Proba bly, no
 other religious leader of modern times,
 with the exception of the Popes, has had so many followers during his life
 time as the Christian Endeavor lead
 Aylmer, Quebec, was the place and Sept 12 1851 the date of the birth of
 Francis Edward Clark. His name
 originally was Symmes, but his pa rents died when he was still a lad and
 he was adopted by his uncle, the Rev.
 B. W. Clark, and assumed his name.
 He was educated at Dartmouth Col lege and Andover Theological Semin- ary and became pastor of Wiliston Church at Portland, Me This was struggling missionary church con- ducted by the Congrega ationalists. The young pastor labored in vain to build it up and make it real force, but failure repeatedly followed his best ef- forts. A less determined man would have given up in despair, but Dr. failure. He decided that the only hope for the church was in enlisting the interest and enthusiasm of the young people With this end in view he established in the Maine metrop- olis the pioneer Christian Endeavor society. Within 3, few weeks the plan second society was formed at New buTyport Mass. Scituate, R. l.. ganized third branch, and in 1882, when the first Christian Endeavor six societies were represented
 In 1883 pr. Clark went to Boston to gregational Church, and there he con tinued the work Of organizing new Christian Endeavor bodies. In 1887, a quarter of century ago. he resign ed the pastorate to devote his entire time to the society he had brought in to being, and ever since he has mained it's president
 England began to manifest an in terest in the movement in 1888 and pr. Clark made tour of John Bulls island. with the result that a number of societies were formed. In 1893 he made his first tour of the world, travelling nearly 10000 miles and hold ing meetings in dozen different countries. Since then he has girdled the globe four times. and has Iectur- ed in nearly every important country. Probably no other living man, not ev- en excepting President Taft, has tarv eled so extensively and come into in innate contact with so many differ ent peoples