PICKLE AT PENN STATE

Back home again, Buchman paid a four-day visit to his old college, Muhlenberg, and asked the YMCA President there, Paul Krauss, to make arrangements for another 'everyman campaign'. The preparations apparently did not fully match his expectations because, when he got back to Penn State, he wrote Krauss a letter 'so you can gain some idea how largely we plan here'.

He had, he said, arrived back at State College late on Saturday. There followed a thumb-nail sketch of his programme. 'Got in touch at once with Flagg, one of our athletics managers, who was seriously hurt in the Gymnasium during the week. Went to our entertainment course. Had interviews with four men. Got to bed a little after twelve. Had more than two hundred at my Freshman Bible Class on Sunday morning. Had interviews both before and after the meeting. Took dinner with the Gilliland family …. Came back to meet the Hugh McAllister Beaver Club.*

(* This was a boys' club which he had started in the town. In a letter to Mrs Andrew Carnegie, who had sent 100 dollars to the Club and to whom he sent, on their behalf, a trailing arbutus in a tin, he wrote: 'They are the sons of the working people, and up until two years ago they were rather shiftless. I organised them into the Hugh McAllister Beaver Club, and started a baseball team, and in the fall a football team. They are holding together nicely, and instead of the Saturday night carousing, they have just lately organised themselves into a town YMCA.' (Buchman to Mrs Carnegie, 29 April 1912. Buchman first met Andrew Carnegie on 8 May 1907 at Princeton.)

'Had appointment with our Athletics Director, who was leading our meeting in the evening. Students' communion at two o'clock. Meeting with student representative. Called on football coach and several athletes. Didn't have a chance to eat supper. Taught a Fraternity Bible Class, came back in time for a meeting of a thousand students ... It lasted for an hour and thirty-five minutes. Coach Reed and "Pop" Golden, our athletic director, Professors Agee and Torrey spoke. It was a splendid meeting and the aim of it was to prepare the men for the Pittsburgh game. Had a meeting for conference and prayer afterwards. Arranged to help financially the man who was hurt in the Gymnasium. Went out to talk over some plans with our Chaplain. Got to bed at twelve. Am leaving for Pittsburgh to be gone until Saturday. I neglected to tell you that we had a special meeting for the Freshmen of the entire class and had a talk on the evils of drink and the problems of social purity.

'I know', concluded Buchman, 'that you men will push the work at Muhlenberg.'19' This letter is a good illustration of how, all his life, Buchman unconsciously expected his colleagues to work at the same pace as he did, and often to use the same approach.

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