The Chairman: Now there is to be a demonstration of men's class work given on the platform.

      Class sang "Onward, Christian Soldiers" as they marched onto the platform.

      The class yell was given.

      Song by class chorus. [Applause.]

      Class Chairman: When your Centennial Committee sent us the invitation to give a demonstration of class work, we were a little puzzled how to condense a lot of work into forty minutes. We took it for granted that you would be more interested in the way we do our work. During this Convention you have been listening to college professors and preachers. We are just plain, common, ordinary men, who have to work for our living. [Laughter and applause.] So we will ask you to bear with any shortcomings. The class gets up a class paper. We will have some of our Centennial number to distribute at the close of the meeting.

      The first talk will be by Mr. E. S. Norton, chairman of our Membership Committee.

      Mr. Norton: Two years ago we started with a class of twelve members. We now have enrolled two hundred [applause], with an average attendance of nearly one hundred since October 1. We keep track of our members by a system we have brought out here to show you. Each member of the class is numbered, and as the members come in they turn their cards over; at the end of the class the secretary can take the record of all members and in a very few minutes he has the roll.

      We have organized athletic teams and entertainments, and meet every walk in the life of men. At our business [570] meetings we ask each one in the class to volunteer to bring a new, member in three months or fifty cents. The result of this gave us twenty-seven new members and $6.50 for our treasury. [Laughter.] We have the Bellevue, Avalon and Benavon territory, and this is divided into districts and subdivided and handled by members living in those districts. A contest is in force now. We have divided the membership into sections--blues and reds. From this we have reached fourteen new members and thirty-five visitors. We expect by the next Convention to give you a report of three hundred members.

      Class Chairman: That is a pretty good report for a former National League baseball pitcher. [Applause.] The next will be the chairman of our Social Committee, Mr. Schmucker.

      Mr. Schmucker: I can remember the first social event--minnows and doughnuts. The next social was some banqueting business to increase our membership. I believe most of the boys remember the mock trial. The title of it was "Who Left the Gate Open?" By the time we got through we had one gate, a herd of cattle and fifty bushels of corn--I mean 118 gates. [Laughter.]

      The next entertainment was at the time of Mr. Taft's election. We had two wires working. We had a moving-picture entertainment, and at intervals we threw the election returns on the screen just like they do in front of the newspaper offices in the city.

      Class Chairman: Bro. George Grafton, chairman of the Athletic Committee, will now tell you how he runs the athletics.

      Mr. Grafton: One of the many features of our class work last year was the organization of a baseball league composed of Bible classes of the churches of Bellevue and Avalon. Our class was the prime mover in this work, which was brought to a successful termination when we won the pennant of the league. Rules and regulations adopted made it necessary for members to attend Bible class at least twice a month in order to enter a contest. Next year tennis, quoits and field athletics will play an important part in this line of work; this winter we hope to bring about conditions so that we can have a gym and reading-room. [Applause.] Class Chairman: Brother Forney, chairman of the Music Committee.

      Mr. Forney: During the past year the male chorus has contributed much to the music of the church, and also taken part in a missionary convention at Carnegie Hall, a Brotherhood convention at the Presbyterian Church in Bellevue, and also at the Methodist Conference. All the members of the chorus, as well as the pianist and director, are members of the class. We will sing one verse of the "Suwannee River."

      Song. [Applause.]

      A Delegate: Say, let that pianist give us one himself.

      Instrumental solo. [ Applause.]

      Class Chairman: Mr. C. P. McCarthy is chairman of our Finance Committee--Currency Puller McCarthy, we call him. [Applause.]

      Mr. McCarthy: The first year we raised something like $700 for class purposes. We thought we ought to have a new piano, so just after they got at the banquet one evening, I said, "We want a new piano. How many will hold up their hands and give a dollar?" And that is the way we got the piano. [Applause.]

      There is something in my heart that I would rather talk about than finance. All our class would say they are better men than they were two years ago. Their families have been made better by their belonging to the class. That is the chief note of my heart. [Applause.] Out of about two hundred men in the class, a hundred of them belong to the church now. When you get good church influences and the influence of good men it is easy enough to raise the money.

      Class Chairman: We want to hear from our beloved instructor, Bro. Geo. W. Gerwig, who has been with us something like two years.

      Mr. Gerwig: I am very sure that I need not say to you any one could succeed with a class like that. Success lay in the fact that whenever we wanted a particular piece of work done of any kind one was found who could do it. There were a great many men in the city who had opportunities to go places that they should not go, and we concluded the best thing to do was to tell [571] them they needn't go, but come with us, and we have been doing that day and night. A young friend of mine came home sometime ago on his twenty-first birthday. The rest of the family were asleep. "Get up, get up, there's a man in the house." And then he sat back and enjoyed the commotion until they discovered the newly fledged man. It makes a lot of difference whether there is a man there or not. It makes a difference to the good wife if she knows that there is a real man in the house, not one who merely does a grandstand play for a few minutes, but one who is staunch and steady and true through all the years. [Applause.] And it makes a difference to that little boy in the house if he knows that his father is a man, and it makes a difference to the little girl in the house if she knows that there is a man in the house. We believe in the house of God as the highest of all houses. In the old days there was a comic song that went around--"Everybody Works but Father." That was nearly the case in the churches--everybody worked but father. [Applause.] We have the idea that there is a place in the life of the man for the church and that there is a place in the church for the man. [Applause.] And we are trying to find that place. A short time ago we had one of the greatest events that was ever celebrated right here in Forbes Field. I was glad to see last Sunday that among those thousands there were many, many good strong men. I am glad to believe that man has come into his place in the church. I am glad to believe that he is taking up his work and that there is to be found for him opportunity to help. We believe that Jesus Christ was the best sample of the divine that has ever come to earth, and we are glad to enroll ourselves under his banner and make our class a class for him. [Applause.]

      The Chairman: Now we are every one of us sorry from the heart that the special car to take these men away back to Avalon is outside now. I believe I speak for fully a thousand hearts when I say that our thanksgiving goes up to God for these men, even though some of us have made a protest against their talking about our working for a living. [Laughter.] Judging by the sweat rolling down their face, they find it is working for a living to get up and talk. [Laughter and applause.] I am profoundly convinced that every heart of us to-night has thrilled with great response. I know how you yearn to do what these men are doing. You are saying, "We can do it." You can do it. You can't do it all, but you can all do it. Men, we thank you in God's name. [Applause.]

      Class song.

      The class retired.

      The Chairman: I don't believe another audience in the whole Convention would hold together as you have done in the face of this interruption. [Applause.] It speaks tremendously for the dead-in-earnestness of the men of our brotherhood, and for your good nature. [Applause.]

      There is meeting to-night, in the next to the last session, the Laymen's Missionary Conference in the city of Buffalo. It is a wonderful gathering of men who work for their living. It has been suggested as eminently wise that this body of men shall send to them a telegram such as this: "To the Laymen's Missionary Convention assembled in Buffalo, N. Y. The men of the Centennial Convention of the Disciples of Christ, in session, Pittsburg, Pa., bid you Godspeed in your campaign in behalf of the speedy evangelization of the world."

      What do you want done with it?

      The Chairman: It is unanimous. Brother Chapman will send it in your name.

      Mr. Chapman: I covet the honor of introducing the next speaker. I do wish, however, that this great auditorium might be filled with men who love the work in which he is interested. We have in this country developed some wonderful Sunday-school men; none are greater, however, than those within our church. [Applause.] We are leading America in adult Bible-study work. [Applause.] We have more members in our adult Bible classes than any other church of all the great denominations. I take unbounded pleasure in introducing W. C. Pearce, International superintendent of the adult Bible-study work. [Applause.] [572]

[CCR 570-572]