Pullman herald. [volume] (Pullman, W.T. [Wash.]) 1888-1989, 1916-01-21

financial, intellectual. spiritual; are
finding life fuller and happier
thing than they had known il to be
before. 10 college girls life what
it would have been without the Stu
dent Young Women Christian AS
ISOLATION. Whether the girl happens
to be a member or not, all her activ-
tiles are influenced by what it has
brought.
The needs of the college girls of
long ago--needs not so different,
after all, from those of modern stu
dents-has come one of the big fac
tors that operate ON the campus
this student Young Women's Chris
ton Association.
In the long ago days when it had
It's beginning in the co-educatlonal
colleges of the middle west, student
life was just as thrilling as it is to-
day Glasses, to be sure, did go
along in solid blocks of fives":
there were few electives, Latin not
yet having become less essential than
meat and drink the resources of the
library and laboratory were meager
and the list of faculty was short. But
societies were absorbing; college ac-
tivlty was conducted on partisan
lines: Knowing each other, appre-
ciating each other, cooperating in
anything at home or abroad was not
dreamed of"
From the midst of such conditions
as these came the initial movement
which has resulted in the present
powerful Student Young Women's
Christian Association with its corps
Of trained secretaries at headquart-
ers in New York city, its II summer
conferences with an attendance of
zoos, its special publications. its
widespread influence through a
membership of $4,000 in 721 col
leges and universities.
On November IL. 1872, at the Hi
nois State Normal University OF Nor
NAL, H., Ida Brown, and three 9TH
err students with two friends, met for
bible study. Christian conversation
and prayer" Evidently the little
group found what it sought for the
meetings continued, outgrew the stu
dents room and were held in the
yestibule of the church In January
constitution Borrowed at the last
moment from the Y. NJ. G. A., since
nothing better offered was adopted,
and the little group become known
as the Young Ladies' Christian Asso-
citation.
Four other wOmens student asso-
Citations, one at. Northwestern Uni
versity, one at Oliyet Michigan, one
at Carbondale, Illinois, and one at
LenoX College, HOpkinton, Iowa.
sprang up in the decade 1870-1S80
before any outside suggestion to-
ward organization came. The psy-
chOlogy of such an occurance brings
added assurance as to the need of
women's student Christian associa-
tions-even to one already con-
yinced.
But it is a mistake to think that
only in these five institutions were
women taking an active part in the
Christian work. In some colleges
the Y. NJ. c. A. feeling itself to be
i'll reality a Students Christian AS
ISOLATION, admitted women as mem
bers and officers. 1t throws much
light on the attitude of the time to
know that on the records of these
associations the women's initials
were printed instead of sex-betray-
ing Christian names. Imagine a
college girl OF today consenting to
have her name printed "A Wilson, -
that the world at large might think
her man, Like the Samaritan
woman these students seem to have
been grateful for the crumbs that
| fell from the childrens table.