YMCA Truck

Item Information

Title:
YMCA Truck
Description:
This lantern slide shows a YMCA Traveling Army truck driving through the Big Bend district of Texas. In the background, a person lounges in a window while another stands on a balcony.
Creator:
Smith's Studio (San Antonio, TX)
Date:
[1916?–1918?]
Format:
Photographs
Location:
Springfield College Archives and Special Collections
Collection (local):
College Archives Digital Collections
Series:
Lantern Slide Collection
Subjects:
Young Men's Christian Association of North America
World War, 1914-1918
YMCA
Lantern slides
Trucks
Extent:
3.25x3.25 in
Link to Item:
http://cdm16122.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p15370coll2/id/3577
Terms of Use:
Text and images are owned, held, or licensed by Springfield College and are available for personal, non-commercial, and educational use, provided that ownership is properly cited. A credit line is required and should read: Courtesy of Springfield College, Babson Library, Archives and Special Collections. Any commercial use without written permission from Springfield College is strictly prohibited. Other individuals or entities other than, and in addition to, Springfield College may also own copyrights and other propriety rights. The publishing, exhibiting, or broadcasting party assumes all responsibility for clearing reproduction rights and for any infringement of United States copyright law.
Contact host institution for more information.
Publisher:
Springfield College
Language:
English
Notes:
According to “Service with Fighting Men” by Taft and Harris, these ford trucks were staffed by two secretaries and equipped with reading materials, games, motion picture equipment, and a dynamo to run the equipment. These vehicles allowed the YMCA to access people and outputs otherwise out of range. In the late 19th and early 20th century, mineral deposits attracted settlers who worked in the mines, farmed, or logged. Settlements sprang up around the mines, although these were often no more than clusters of families. During World War I, the Association assumed military responsibilities on a scale that had never been attempted by a nonprofit, community-based organization. At the end of World War I, William Howard Taft wrote: “The American Young Men's Christian Association in its welfare work served between four and five millions of American soldiers and sailors, at home and overseas. As General Pershing has said, it conducted nine-tenths of the welfare work among the American forces in Europe. Moreover, alone among American welfare societies, this organization, first and last, ministered to not less than nineteen millions of the soldiers of the Allied Armies and extended its helpful activities to over five millions of prisoners of war. Its operations were conducted on western, southern, and eastern fronts in Europe; in northern and eastern Africa; in western, southern, and eastern Asia; in North and South America; and in different parts of the island world.”
Slight degredation around edges; Text on border reads, "YMCA Army Truck; Big Bend District; 27: Outposts."
Identifier:
LS-02-29