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MAYAK in Istanbul was established to help Russian émigrés. During World War I, the North American YMCA shifted its emphasis to welfare with soldiers, including work with prisoners of war. The Russian word for a lighthouse (watchtower) is mayak (маяк)
An American Physician In Turkey: A Narrative Of Adventures In Peace And War by Clarence D. Ussher[1] refers to the close contact with mission work and MAYAK (Petrograd).
The development of YMCA movements in the Central Power empires (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and the Ottoman Empire) is crucial to understanding the influence of the YMCA at the beginning of World War I and the organization's future role in providing relief services to Allied prisoners of war. These four nations reflected the fundamental challenges facing the North American Association in its global evangelisation mission. Germany was a Protestant nation that developed a strong Association movement during the nineteenth century. As the world's leading Roman Catholic empire, Austria-Hungary was far more resistant to the establishment and growth of the YMCA within its borders. Bulgaria[1] was even more resistant because of its Orthodox composition. The Association's greatest challenge, however, was the Ottoman Empire, because Turkey was the great power of the Muslim world. John R. Mott, future General Secretary of the American YMCA, established personal ties with the German YMCA during the summer of 1894. His goal was to investigate conditions in Europe to determine whether students could be organized in a global evangelisation movement. John R. Mott expressed a major interest in opening the Ottoman Empire to the YMCA as General Secretary of the World's Student Christian Federation (WSCF).
Mott traveled to Constantinople in October 1895 to determine what could be done to expand the Student Volunteer Movement in the Orient wih a six-day visit to Robert College. Mott again returned to Germany in early February 1911. He spent a weekend in Berlin in preparation for the Constantinople Conference[3], which was designed to inaugurate Association services in Muslim countries beginning with the Ottoman Empire. To gain a toehold in the Ottoman Empire, the American YMCA sought to establish an Association in Constantinople. This city was among the most cosmopolitan in the world. It was the capital of Turkey and the home of the Sublime Porte, making it the most important center of Islam. Constantinople was the dominant religious center of the Levant : it served as the residence of Sheikh-ul-Islam (the judicial head of the Muslim world); the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church; the Armenian Patriarch; the heads of the Syrian, Jacobite, and other Eastern churches; the Legate of the Pope; the Grand Rabbi of the Jews of the Emigration; and the headquarters of the Protestant Christians operating in the Near East. The International Committee of the American YMCA first expressed interest in setting up a mission field in the Ottoman Empire in 1884, but the Association did not find Turkish authorities receptive to American overtures. Conservative Muslim officials tended to treat foreign youth organizations as potentially seditious and a threat to the government. Instead, the YMCA movement worked through missionaries and their educational programs. The primary vehicle of Association infiltration was the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, based in Boston.
This organization founded Christian colleges across the Ottoman Empire, including Robert College in Constantinople, the International College in Smyrna, the Syrian Protestant College in Beirut, Anatolia College, and St. Paul's College in Tarsus. Christian Endeavor Societies and YMCAs formed among the student bodies of these schools, and they became the nucleus of the Association movement in Turkey.[4]
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YMCA work in Russia began in 1899, when Clarence J. Hicks, with the financial support of philanthropist and International Committee member James Stokes, traveled there to study the means of introducing welfare activities for the railroad workers of that country. This did not come to pass, but Hicks did succeed in winning the approval of a high Romanoff for a young men's society in St. Petersburg and secured his personal protection for the organization. Called a "mayak," or lighthouse, it was essentially a YMCA. The new organization, directed by Franklin A. Gaylord, had its first home in a building given by Stokes. Stokes went on to found the James Stokes Society to support the work in Russia. Religious activities in the Russian Y were directed by Orthodox priests. The program grew from modest classes in French, German, and bookkeeping through gymnasium work to popular lectures. A library and a drama program were also added. Stokes was insistent that the society should preserve its Russian character. In 1908 an American director for physical education activities was secured and what was said to be the best-equipped gymnasium in Russia was built in the courtyard of the Mayak. An athletic field was constructed and basketball introduced. The success of the operation attracted the interest of the Czar, who after about 1907 contributed five thousand rubles annually. Plans were laid for the expansion of the organization into Moscow, but war and revolution prevented this, despite a promise from John Wanamaker to finance a building. In 1917, a society was founded in Vladivostok., However, the rise of the Bolshevik regime disrupted the growth of YMCA work, forcing American YMCA secretaries to leave and many of the Russian personnel into temporary hiding or prison. YMCA work continued as war relief work, mainly in Siberia, as well as among the Russians of the dispersion in Harbin and in Paris. Russian exiles assisted the North American YMCA with the creation of the YMCA Press (located originally in Prague, then Berlin, and then Paris) and the Chekhov Publishing House (in New York), both dedicated to help with the preservation of Russian Christian culture. These presses worked closely with Russian exiles in Europe and North America for many years post World War I.
NOTES
[1] As an Orthodox country, Bulgaria was an important mission ground for both the World's Alliance of YMCAs and the International Committee of the American YMCA. American interest in Bulgaria began before the creation of the modern nation. In 1840, American missionary Elias Riggs helped the Orthodox monk Neophytos translate the Bible into Bulgarian. This translation became part of a nationalist cultural movement that eventually challenged and overthrew Ottoman rule. The first American missionaries arrived in Bulgaria in 1858, and James F. Clarke founded the Samokov Seminary three years later. Religious revivalism in Bulgaria accelerated among the Orthodox Christians at this time. With the permission of the Turkish Sultan, the Greek Orthodox Church reestablished the Bulgarian Exarchate in 1870. This body received jurisdiction over large sections of Macedonia and Thrace, as well as Bulgaria.
[2] He sailed to Constantinople from Boston on S.S.Armenia arriving on May 12, 1898.
[3] In September 1910, the International Committee dispatched its first Traveling Secretary for the Levant, Ernst O. Jacob. The International Committee defined the Levant as the Eastern Mediterranean region, from Greece to Egypt, which was primarily Turkish territory. Shortly thereafter, the International Committee appointed Darius A. Davis to serve as the Secretary for Constantinople. Mott ordered Davis to study the situation in the capital in preparation for the establishment of an Association. Both Davis and Jacob prepared for the WSCF Convention held in Constantinople in April 1911. Mott planned and supervised this meeting as the best means for the Association to enter the Islamic world. By developing contacts with Muslim intellectuals, the American General Secretary hoped to open doors in the Ottoman Empire. He planned to set up secretaries in Constantinople, the political center of the empire, and in Cairo, the intellectual center. In many ways, the Constantinople Conference was an ecumenical experiment, whereby the Association could expand the movement to include Orthodox and even Muslim members.
[4] Mott also visited the White House early in January 1915 to report to the president on the results of his European tour. Although Mott and Wilson may have crossed paths in 1886 at Cornell University (Mott was president of the Student Association and Wilson was a visiting lecturer from Bryn Mawr College), they formally met at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut in October 1889. Mott was touring Student Associations across the country in support of the Student Volunteer Movement, while Wilson was a professor at Wesleyan.
click the image to read in full sizeMAYAK in Istanbul was established to help Russian émigrés. During World War I, the North American YMCA shifted its emphasis to welfare with soldiers, including work with prisoners of war. The Russian word for a lighthouse (watchtower) is mayak (маяк)
An American Physician In Turkey: A Narrative Of Adventures In Peace And War by Clarence D. Ussher[1] refers to the close contact with mission work and MAYAK (Petrograd).
The development of YMCA movements in the Central Power empires (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and the Ottoman Empire) is crucial to understanding the influence of the YMCA at the beginning of World War I and the organization's future role in providing relief services to Allied prisoners of war. These four nations reflected the fundamental challenges facing the North American Association in its global evangelisation mission. Germany was a Protestant nation that developed a strong Association movement during the nineteenth century. As the world's leading Roman Catholic empire, Austria-Hungary was far more resistant to the establishment and growth of the YMCA within its borders. Bulgaria[1] was even more resistant because of its Orthodox composition. The Association's greatest challenge, however, was the Ottoman Empire, because Turkey was the great power of the Muslim world. John R. Mott, future General Secretary of the American YMCA, established personal ties with the German YMCA during the summer of 1894. His goal was to investigate conditions in Europe to determine whether students could be organized in a global evangelisation movement. John R. Mott expressed a major interest in opening the Ottoman Empire to the YMCA as General Secretary of the World's Student Christian Federation (WSCF).
Mott traveled to Constantinople in October 1895 to determine what could be done to expand the Student Volunteer Movement in the Orient wih a six-day visit to Robert College. Mott again returned to Germany in early February 1911. He spent a weekend in Berlin in preparation for the Constantinople Conference[3], which was designed to inaugurate Association services in Muslim countries beginning with the Ottoman Empire. To gain a toehold in the Ottoman Empire, the American YMCA sought to establish an Association in Constantinople. This city was among the most cosmopolitan in the world. It was the capital of Turkey and the home of the Sublime Porte, making it the most important center of Islam. Constantinople was the dominant religious center of the Levant : it served as the residence of Sheikh-ul-Islam (the judicial head of the Muslim world); the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church; the Armenian Patriarch; the heads of the Syrian, Jacobite, and other Eastern churches; the Legate of the Pope; the Grand Rabbi of the Jews of the Emigration; and the headquarters of the Protestant Christians operating in the Near East. The International Committee of the American YMCA first expressed interest in setting up a mission field in the Ottoman Empire in 1884, but the Association did not find Turkish authorities receptive to American overtures. Conservative Muslim officials tended to treat foreign youth organizations as potentially seditious and a threat to the government. Instead, the YMCA movement worked through missionaries and their educational programs. The primary vehicle of Association infiltration was the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, based in Boston.
This organization founded Christian colleges across the Ottoman Empire, including Robert College in Constantinople, the International College in Smyrna, the Syrian Protestant College in Beirut, Anatolia College, and St. Paul's College in Tarsus. Christian Endeavor Societies and YMCAs formed among the student bodies of these schools, and they became the nucleus of the Association movement in Turkey.[4]
SOURCE
click the image to read in full size
YMCA work in Russia began in 1899, when Clarence J. Hicks, with the financial support of philanthropist and International Committee member James Stokes, traveled there to study the means of introducing welfare activities for the railroad workers of that country. This did not come to pass, but Hicks did succeed in winning the approval of a high Romanoff for a young men's society in St. Petersburg and secured his personal protection for the organization. Called a "mayak," or lighthouse, it was essentially a YMCA. The new organization, directed by Franklin A. Gaylord, had its first home in a building given by Stokes. Stokes went on to found the James Stokes Society to support the work in Russia. Religious activities in the Russian Y were directed by Orthodox priests. The program grew from modest classes in French, German, and bookkeeping through gymnasium work to popular lectures. A library and a drama program were also added. Stokes was insistent that the society should preserve its Russian character. In 1908 an American director for physical education activities was secured and what was said to be the best-equipped gymnasium in Russia was built in the courtyard of the Mayak. An athletic field was constructed and basketball introduced. The success of the operation attracted the interest of the Czar, who after about 1907 contributed five thousand rubles annually. Plans were laid for the expansion of the organization into Moscow, but war and revolution prevented this, despite a promise from John Wanamaker to finance a building. In 1917, a society was founded in Vladivostok., However, the rise of the Bolshevik regime disrupted the growth of YMCA work, forcing American YMCA secretaries to leave and many of the Russian personnel into temporary hiding or prison. YMCA work continued as war relief work, mainly in Siberia, as well as among the Russians of the dispersion in Harbin and in Paris. Russian exiles assisted the North American YMCA with the creation of the YMCA Press (located originally in Prague, then Berlin, and then Paris) and the Chekhov Publishing House (in New York), both dedicated to help with the preservation of Russian Christian culture. These presses worked closely with Russian exiles in Europe and North America for many years post World War I. NOTES
[1] As an Orthodox country, Bulgaria was an important mission ground for both the World's Alliance of YMCAs and the International Committee of the American YMCA. American interest in Bulgaria began before the creation of the modern nation. In 1840, American missionary Elias Riggs helped the Orthodox monk Neophytos translate the Bible into Bulgarian. This translation became part of a nationalist cultural movement that eventually challenged and overthrew Ottoman rule. The first American missionaries arrived in Bulgaria in 1858, and James F. Clarke founded the Samokov Seminary three years later. Religious revivalism in Bulgaria accelerated among the Orthodox Christians at this time. With the permission of the Turkish Sultan, the Greek Orthodox Church reestablished the Bulgarian Exarchate in 1870. This body received jurisdiction over large sections of Macedonia and Thrace, as well as Bulgaria.
[2] He sailed to Constantinople from Boston on S.S.Armenia arriving on May 12, 1898.
[3] In September 1910, the International Committee dispatched its first Traveling Secretary for the Levant, Ernst O. Jacob. The International Committee defined the Levant as the Eastern Mediterranean region, from Greece to Egypt, which was primarily Turkish territory. Shortly thereafter, the International Committee appointed Darius A. Davis to serve as the Secretary for Constantinople. Mott ordered Davis to study the situation in the capital in preparation for the establishment of an Association. Both Davis and Jacob prepared for the WSCF Convention held in Constantinople in April 1911. Mott planned and supervised this meeting as the best means for the Association to enter the Islamic world. By developing contacts with Muslim intellectuals, the American General Secretary hoped to open doors in the Ottoman Empire. He planned to set up secretaries in Constantinople, the political center of the empire, and in Cairo, the intellectual center. In many ways, the Constantinople Conference was an ecumenical experiment, whereby the Association could expand the movement to include Orthodox and even Muslim members.
[4] Mott also visited the White House early in January 1915 to report to the president on the results of his European tour. Although Mott and Wilson may have crossed paths in 1886 at Cornell University (Mott was president of the Student Association and Wilson was a visiting lecturer from Bryn Mawr College), they formally met at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut in October 1889. Mott was touring Student Associations across the country in support of the Student Volunteer Movement, while Wilson was a professor at Wesleyan.