Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1918-06-11
HUMAN DERELICTS REMADE
INTO CHRISTIAN WORKERS
Calilee Mission Sends Thirty
three Into Ministry
in Nine Years
Religion at Vine Street Institu.
ton Is Contagious, Says
Its Superintendent

~ EIIGION at Galilee Mission is con-
IN tarious. That is how the Rev. J. J,
n. Hall. who has been its superintendent
almost ten years, explains the remark
able record he has made.
Within nine years Mr.. Hall has placed
thirty-three men in the ministry. Most
of these obtained their start in the mis-
sion. Some are in divinity schools
eighteen or twenty have been ordained.
For results his work In this line is said
to stand alone in this part of the world,
For twenty years Galilee Mission, an
Episcopal institution, has been a house
of hope. on Vine street, for the poor and
forsaken, who have entered its doors.
Nine years ago Mr.. Hall came up from
Alabama. where for seven years he had
worked as state prison chaplain among
the toilers leased by the State convict
department to mines and turpentine
camps. He had been close to human
natur in its crudest and sometimes
most hopeless suise. When he received
a call to come here he and his charges
wept together, but l came" he said.
because felt that the Lord had sent
for me-"
Saturday four of his proteges were or
dained. One was George Boates, a
Philadelphia, former office secretary of
the Y. NJ. c. A. on Arch street. who in
visiting the mission. as many do. became
interested in the work, began assisting
Mr.. Hall and became imbued with the
desire to preach. He has been appointed
assistant chaplain at the Cape May
naval station.
Another was Robert Lewis. who came
to Philadelphia from London four years
ago. He was a member Of the Church
Army of England and was preaching in
Hyde Park.
Becomes Intensely Interested
Mr.. Hall CHANGED to hear Mr.. Lewis.
and after five minutes conversation had
so interested him in the work done in
the old building. among the shops and
street vendors and the people that throng
Vine street at Eighth that he left all
else behind and followed, to become as
sistant director of the mission.
Another was a Syrian who had fled from
persecution by the Turks and had taken
refuge in this country. An ardent Amer
lean in sympathy and an eloquent
preacher. he has been given a charge
down the Chesapeake a few miles from
Baltimore. where he will pass on to
others the simple faith that was taught
him at the mission.
while many 'do~wn-and-outs' come
here and are led into lives that eventu-
ally carry them into the ministry" said
Mr.. Hall. by no means lave all the men
W III Il lIt Ndl at lilf ililSSlpl
been derelicts or down-and-outs. They
often come with the idea of helping some
one else and get helped themselves.
Some have come Just to visit the place
they see the work, they get close to poor.
weak, SHINING. sorrowing humanity and
are shown how much good there is to
do and then they, too. want to help"
Mr.. Hall. gray-bearded. tall and spare,
is a beaming optimist. The frailties of
h,t,,anitN we lic,otrraO ca hin, for 10
has an inexhaustible belief in the innate
goodness of mankind. Out of many an
apparently hopeless human wreck has
arisen before his eyes a veritable
phoenix representing all hat is good
and useful in later life. So he always
hopes.
Come to Galilee M~ission.".he says,
and your heart unconsciously becomes
affected"
Many Classes of Men
He told Of some of the men who have
come. There have been doctors. lawyers,
teachers, newspaper men. detectives,
preachers even, and those of other pro-
LESSONS and many trades who have
sought the help offered to all.
"A little more than two years ago."
he remembered, "on November 80. the
most looking wreck of
7 4NAte ~" L AHo WV s'NAi
staggered into the mission. He is to-
day an ordained minister in an impor-
tant Episcopal mission in the Southeast
and one of the strongest citizens of his
state. His redemption was the most
remarkable case in rescue work.. in my
opinion. in America.
''When this man entered my presence,
reeling with drink, dirty and d~isheveled,
he was a formidable object. He weighed
.oa -,- --l A..Ar,y f-ol 80 hir, ,ra q
angry, bitter and blasphemous, He be
gan reading the riot act to me an6
against all religions and all creeds. HI
refused TO listen to my efforts to tall
to him man to man. heart to heart.
But that night he came back anc
gave himself to God. This man was q
graduate of Tulane University and hae
been a practicing physician. The bishop
soon after his testimony of faith, placed
him in the seminary. where he made .
brilliant record, He was so needed ma
he was sent to a big parish in the south
He is now not only in charge OF that
but is probation officer for the town
buries all the poor, doctors many of the
sick and led a recent cleanup campaign
against the tenderloin and red light dis
trict. Yet such a dynamic p~ersonaiitS
is he, he writes me that when his Quite
are over tinae hangs heavily on nj!
hands!
The bishop of his diocese informed
me recently that he is the most Naluaoi'
Episcopal minister in the diocese.
Mr.. Hall glanced reflectively at tn
photograph which had been newly
placed over his desk.
Ruined by Drink
That is another man who was dowI
and out when he came here was MI
comment. He was a travelling sales
man and had been successful, but TN.
drink habit ruined him. He is a hand
some fellow and well read. Some OF IN
talent of his third cousin, who was TN
greatest statesman America ever pro
duced, is his. and though he Is stil
in his twenties he promises to make
great preacher. He is superintendent q
a large rescue home now in Chicago.
There nave been many learned mel
here. Fifty-one preachers have ha'
shelter in the dormitories since l too
charge,
my dishwasher.. some years ago, a
25 cents a week, had been for sixtee
years a professor in one of the great
est State universities in this countr,
When he cam here he was sixty, tn
wreck of a life i'll used n dried up liz
a bone. He Strengthened up and live
a decent, useful life for several year
then pneumonia snuffed him out like
candle"
d Though women who have taken III
wrong road and are seeking redemptio
are not sheltered at the mission maj
go there and are helped back to rigi
living at the little home not far ava,
On the desk near the hand of the supe