This poster advertises three emergency courses offered by the International YMCA College, now called Springfield College, during World War I: the army work course, the boys’ work course, and the county work course. These courses, which took place between January and July 1918, were meant to prepare men for work that aided the nation’s war effort. Geared toward secretaries, physical directors, and educational directors, the army work course prepared students for Normal Work among troops. The boys’ work course was meant for secretaries, boy scouts, and playground leaders, and it prepared them to work with boys forced into industry (the Fair Labor Standards Act did not pass until after World War I) and those suffering in warring countries. The final course prepared men for county work, which involved food conservation and the supervision of boys and farm workers. Springfield College first began offering these courses in 1917. The poster’s text is printed across an inverted red triangle, the school’s emblem. Along the top of the poster is a photograph of the students who completed the first army work course, which lasted from June to July 1917. In the lower right is a picture of the first county work course, which took place from July to August 1917. The final image, placed along the lower left side of the poster, shows an illustration of a boy crying next to a portrait of Carl B. Kern (class of 1907), an alumnus who was killed on June 3, 1917 “while engaged in an act of service.” Above the boy is the caption, “Every kid in town wuz friends to C.B.” After Kern's death, an endowment was established in his name at The Dayton Foundation.
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