The Arts Workshop of Rural America: A Study of the Rural Arts Program of the Agricultural Extension Service 9780231891974

Table of contents :
Foreword
Contents
I. Introducing the Farmers’ Leisure-Time Program
II. How the Program Grew
III. Patterns of Work
IV. The Part That Drama Plays
V. Drama Festivals in Wisconsin
VI. The Little Country Theatre in North Dakota
VII. Informal Drama in Community Planning in Ohio and New York
VIII. The Making of Native Folk Drama in North Carolina
IX. An Integrated Arts Program in the University of Colorado
X. Corn, Hogs, and Opera in Iowa
XI. The Part That Music Plays
XII. A Leadership Training Center at Jackson’s Mill, West Virginia
XIII. An Experiment in Regional Planning at Oglebay Park, Wheeling, West Virginia
XIV. The Little Stringed People Play Their Parts
XV. Farmers Write Their Own Plays
XVI. The Importance of Folk Events
XVII. Hobbies
XVIII. Arts and Crafts
XIX. Art Exhibits in Rural Galleries
XX. Radio Has Its Place in the Program
XXI. Some of the Problems
XXII. Conclusion

Citation preview

The Arts Workshop of Rural America

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A STUDY OF THE R U R A L A R T S PROGRAM OF THE AGRICULTURAL EXTENSION SERVICE

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COPYRIGHT C O L U M B I A

UNIVERSITY

1937 PRESS,

N E W

Foreign agents: OXI ORD UNIVERSITY PRF.&S, Humphrey House, Bombay,

London, India;

Shanghai,

E.C.

England,

AND B. J. Building,

KWANG HSUEH PUBLISHING HOUSE, 140

China;

MARUZEN COMPANY, LTD., 6

Tori-Xichome,

Manufactured

Y O R K

Milford,

Tokyo,

in the United

Nicol

Road,

Peking

Xihonbashi,

Japan

States of

Amen

America

Road,

Foreword A C U L T U R A L revival sincerely and authentically American has been going on in rural America during these last dark years. It has reached significant proportions and has turned largely to the agricultural extension services of our state colleges and somewhat to the state universities for help and suggestion. T h e multiplying activities in drama, art, and music in an ever-growing number of communities have been thus far largely unrecorded. T h e movement is too new and has developed too rapidly for an adequate exchange of experience even among the state leaders, to say nothing of the local counties and communities. It has seemed wise, therefore, to record the experiences of the states that were among the first to feel the quickening touch of this phenomenon. Financed by the General Education Board, the Department of Adult Education, Teachers College, Columbia University undertook to study them on the field, to visit not only the offices of extension service but also the communities where farm men and women were finding release and self-expression by depicting on stage and canvas the beauty, the spirit, the problems, the inwardness of life in rural America. T h e record of these visits is here set forth by Miss Patten in a truly exciting book, which holds promise of the great things that may come from our countryside. E D M U N D DES. B R U N N E R COLUMBIA

UNIVERSITY

A p r i l 5, 1937

Contents Foreword by Edmund deS. Brunner . . . . ν ι. Introducing the Farmers' Leisure-Time Program 3 ii. How the Program Grew 8 HI. Patterns of Work 15 IV. T h e Part That Drama Plays 20 v. Drama Festivals in Wisconsin 24 vi. T h e Little Country Theatre in North Dakota 35 vii. Informal Drama in Community Planning in Ohio and New York 51 vi«. T h e Making of Native Folk Drama in North Carolina 67 ix. An Integrated Arts Program in the University of Colorado 81 x. Corn, Hogs, and Opera in Iowa 92 xi. T h e Part That Music Plays 110 xii. A Leadership Training Center at Jackson's Mill, West Virginia 117 xiii. An Experiment in Regional Planning at Oglebay Park, Wheeling, West Virginia . . 1 2 7 xiv. The Little Stringed People Play Their Parts 136 xv. Farmers Write Their Own Plays 143 xvi. T h e Importance of Folk Events 152 xvii. Hobbies 160 xviii. Arts and Crafts 169 xix. Art Exhibits in Rural Galleries 177 xx. Radio Has Its Place in the Program . . . . 1 8 0 xxi. Some of the Problems 184 xxii. Conclusion 197

The Arts Workshop of Rural America

I

Introducing the Farmers' Leisure-Time Program For those who are about to face the problems of social reconstruction with their many baffling difficulties, beauty, in at least one of its multitudinous forms, will be necessary.1

T H E story of the c u l t u r a l c o n t r i b u t i o n s of the R u r a l Arts P r o g r a m of the A g r i c u l t u r a l Extension Service has never been f u l l y told. It is the story of the rise of a host of homespun leisure-time activities a m o n g f a r m p e o p l e d u r i n g the t r o u b l e d years since the W o r l d W a r . T h e s e activities are deeply r o o t e d in the soil, a n d they already form an important part of the a g r i c u l t u r a l p r o g r a m sponsored by

Fed-

eral and State authorities to i m p r o v e conditions in rural c o m m u n i t i e s . O v e r w i d e areas farmers are interested n o w in o p e r a as well as in c o m and hogs, in d r a m a as well as in cheese a n d cream, a n d in f o l k d a n c i n g as well as in w h e a t a n d cattle. A n Extension Agricultural

Service

Bulletin

issued by the O h i o State

C o l l e g e carries this q u o t a t i o n f r o m

Edman,

" L e i s u r e is an affair of m o o d a n d atmosphere rather than simply of the clock. It is n o t c h r o n o l o g i c a l occurrence, b u t a s p i r i t u a l state. It is u n h u r r i e d , pleasurable l i v i n g a m o n g one's n a t i v e enthusiasms." A m o n g the c u l t u r a l interests f o u n d a m o n g farm folk in ι Paul H. Douglas quoted in We Are Builders Association Press, pp. 112-13.

of a New World,

The

4

Rural Leisure

the communities studied by the author of this book were plays, festivals, operas, choruses, bands, orchestras,

folk

dancing and folk music, choric speech, puppets, marionettes, hobby shows, art exhibits, play writing, crafts, radio hours of music, drama, and art appreciation. T h e y bear witness to the fact that farm people have taken as their own something of the Edman philosophy in their endeavor to see that culture remains in agriculture. T h e y have demanded it in spite of, and in many cases because of, depression conditions. Glenn Frank, formerly president of the University of Wisconsin, says in a foreword to a play called

"Goose

Money," written by a Wisconsin farm woman, "Agriculture is a life as well as a livelihood. T h e r e is poetry as well as production on a farm. Art can help us to preserve the poetry while we are battling with the economics of farming."

W e are accustomed to hearing the voices of the littletheater

groups

in

cities

and

larger

towns;

vacationing

America has long been entertained in excellent fashion by the professional and semi-professional groups of

actors,

dancers, and musicians who move from cities to summer resorts annually. We are not so accustomed to the new voices now making themselves heard from the plains, the prairies, and the mining communities, and from little, remote places in the mountains. T h e y are making themselves heard from the tall corn, from the wheat fields, the sugar-beet

fields-

yes, even from the dust bowl. These voices have nothing in them of the commercial. T h e y are the voices of men and women who have struggled through drought, thaw, drifts, impassable roads, dust and hail storms; who have fought grasshoppers, chinch bugs, and rust.

Rural Leisure

5

When one has listened to a seven-hundred-voice chorus of farm folk in Iowa singing Cadman's "Marching through the Clouds with God"; when one has found that literally hundreds of one-act plays are being produced in isolated little communities in Wisconsin in spite of twenty-two-foot drifts and a temperature of forty degrees below zero; when one has danced the cserebogar in a cold little Grange hall far from any center, to which more than two hundred farmers traveled many miles, the occasion being a Farm Bureau meeting which included music and folk dancing as a matter of course; then one becomes vitally aware that here is something new under the American sun, a program full of romance, adventure, and challenge, something new, but of the same spirit as that which marked the early pioneer days. When one has had the opportunity to witness this farflung program in a region one realizes that it is events like these that are propping up, strengthening, and enriching the economic side of life there. Whole counties, districts, states, and regions have been revitalized because of the newly-developing enthusiasms for home-grown entertainment. It is their own vivid way of interpreting the idea, which is as old as Aristotle, that the whole end and objective of education is training for the right use of leisure time. T h e states selected for the study include Wisconsin, Iowa, North Dakota, Colorado, Ohio, North Carolina, New York, and West Virginia. T h e y were chosen not because of excellence of program primarily but rather because they seemed to have programs representative of what is happening and of what may happen in different types of organizations. Not in all of the states was the Agricultural Extension

6

Rural Leisure

S e r v i c e r e s p o n s i b l e f o r the arts p r o g r a m . In a f e w the state university

was r e s p o n s i b l e .

While

primary

emphasis

was

p l a c e d o n E x t e n s i o n Service, it w a s felt wise by those sponsori n g the s t u d y to l e a r n also f r o m the e x p e r i e n c e of o t h e r taxs u p p o r t e d a g e n c i e s t h a t share h e r e a n d there in d i r e c t i n g t h e s u r g i n g tide of c u l t u r a l r e v i v a l in r u r a l A m e r i c a . S o m e records a n d r e p o r t s f r o m states n o t visited

were

s t u d i e d to m a k e it p o s s i b l e in this v o l u m e to t o u c h the h i g h spots in the c u l t u r a l p r o g r a m of r u r a l folks t h r o u g h o u t the c o u n t r y , a p r o g r a m w h i c h has m a d e necessary d u r i n g the last d e c a d e s w e e p i n g c h a n g e s in t h e s c h e d u l e s of state universities a n d a g r i c u l t u r a l colleges, a n d e s p e c i a l l y in E x t e n sion Service. N o l o n g e r is it sufficient f o r this b r a n c h of

agricultural

p l a n n i n g t o r e n d e r to f a r m p o p u l a t i o n s s e r v i c e s i m p l y o n farm problems. Increasingly

it m u s t face the r e a l i t y

that

w h i l e art c a n n o t take the p l a c e of f o o d , c l o t h e s , a n d shelter, the h u m a n spirit needs c o n s t a n t r e f r e s h m e n t . Artists

and

d r a m a t i s t s are s a y i n g that they b e l i e v e that the renaissance of a r t is c o m i n g f r o m r u r a l A m e r i c a . T h e f a t h e r of A m e r i can folk drama, Frederick

H. Koch,

Kenan

P r o f e s s o r of

D r a m a t i c L i t e r a t u r e , U n i v e r s i t y of N o r t h C a r o l i n a , says: Perhaps our student playmakers of today are pre-shadowing a new dramatic renaissance. Perhaps they will give us a drama as many-sided and as multi-colored as are the peoples of our American states—an American regional drama which will have its roots in every state, which will interpret the interestingness and the rich variety of our American life in a drama worthy of the struggles, the achievement and the common vision of all our people. 2 It is i n t e n d e d in this v o l u m e t o set f o r t h in a sort of success-story f o r m , s o m e of the a c h i e v e m e n t s of t h e r u r a l arts 2 From an address delivered at meeting of American Library Association, New Orleans, April 26, 1932.

Rural Leisure

7

program; and to show in some measure how far beyond prophetic message these voices have already been carried and how deeply the program has affected the areas in which it grew.

II

How the Program Grew In leisure the centre of interest changes from production to consumption. The rules which govern the great game of playing the man —the only game that is ultimately worth playing—apply both to labor and to leisure. The finest sorts of play are hard to distinguish one from another. On their highest level, they become two names for the same thing, and the word "art" indicates the point where they converge.1 T O U N D E R S T A N D how staffs in Agricultural Extension Service and volunteer leaders in local communities carry on their c u l t u r a l program it is necessary first to consider what Agricultural Extension is, how it came to be, and why it has become, in thirty short years, one of the largest single adult education organizations in the U n i t e d States. The

Agricultural E x t e n s i o n Service is a service main-

tained j o i n t l y by the Federal D e p a r t m e n t of Agriculture and by state agricultural colleges under the Smith-Lever law, the broad purpose of which is to help to develop better economic, cultural, social, recreational, and community life a m o n g people living in farming areas in the U n i t e d States. In some states the agricultural colleges have been slow to co-operate fully on certain subjects related to the arts program; sometimes because one department or a n o t h e r falls in wholeheartedly only with phases of the service that can be interpreted readily in terms of dollars and cents. Sometimes 1 L. P. Jacks, The Education of the Whole Man, Harper & Brothers, '93'. P· 7 6 ·

Origins

9

certain departments of the colleges believe they must uphold more professional standards than are possible or practicable in the work among farm folk. T h e Agricultural Extension Service did not originate the arts program. In the very earliest days, as neighborhood life developed in rural America, farmers often met to exchange ideas on cattle, marketing, and crops. Records tell us also of spelling bees accompanying these farmers' discussions; of singing schools, debating, and home-talent performances. Thus, social and agricultural interests grew side by side, and the two date back to our oldest American civilization. Style of program, subject matter, and methods of production have changed; but the patterns remain amazingly like the original and develop from the same human needs. T h e Agricultural Extension Service therefore has its roots in activities such as those which were carried on by the following: agricultural societies organized shortly after the Revolutionary War; agricultural fairs, beginning in 1809; the state departments of agriculture and the United States Department of Agriculture; the land-grant colleges, established after the Morrill Act of 1862; the agricultural experiment stations, made national by the Hatch Act of 1887, which brought the first Federal grant of money for agricultural research, and numerous farmers' institutes, held ever since Civil War days, which in some states are still carried on as the basis for Agricultural Extension programs. From the beginning of the twentieth century rapid history was made in Extension Service. There were leaders, such as Seaman A. Knapp, of the Bureau of Plant Industry of the United States Department of Agriculture, who in order to encourage demonstrations on farms took twentytwo men to the Southwest and showed them how to raise

ίο

Origins

cotton successfully in an area infested w i t h the boll weevil; P. G . H o l d e n , w h o started w h a t he called " S e e d C o r n Gospel T r a i n s " in partment

of

the M i d d l e

Agriculture,

West;

which

the U n i t e d financed

a

States

De-

farmer's

co-

o p e r a t i v e demonstration w o r k in the S o u t h w i t h aid f r o m the G e n e r a l E d u c a t i o n B o a r d . It was here that county extension agents were first e m p l o y e d as staff leaders. In 1 9 1 4 a n a t i o n - w i d e extension p r o g r a m w a s

provided

f o r by the S m i t h - L e v e r A c t , with the purpose of " a i d i n g in d i f f u s i o n a m o n g the p e o p l e of the U n i t e d States, useful a n d practical i n f o r m a t i o n on subjects relative to agriculture a n d h o m e economics, a n d to encourage the a p p l i c a t i o n of the s a m e . " T h e objectives of E x t e n s i o n Service, a c c o r d i n g to a s u m m a r y of literature on the subject, i n c l u d e the following: 2 1. T o increase the net income of the i n d i v i d u a l f a r m e r through more efficient and economical production. 2. T o cultivate a desire f o r a more satisfying h o m e life. 3. T o encourage more comfortable, convenient, healthful and b e a u t i f u l homes a n d surroundings. 4. T o implant an appreciation of, and love for, rural life in farm boys and girls. 5. T o advance the educational and spiritual needs for rural people. 6. T o acquaint the general public with the needs a n d ideals of agriculture and its place in the national structure. 7. T o foster cultural, social, recreational and community life of rural people. 8. T o improve the quality of agricultural products for the purpose of increasing income, meeting competition from abroad more successfully and giving a greater service to the consumer. 9. T o encourage the general participation of f a r m people in agricultural organizations for the purpose of becoming an 2 From Landis, Rural Adult Education, p. 81; Stacy, An Integration of Adult Education, p. 20; and A Study of the Extension Service, by a committee of the Staff of Iowa State College, p. 28.

Origins

11

effective a n d h e l p f u l influence in local, county, state and national affairs. 10. T o d e v e l o p rural leadership.

T h e Agricultural Extension Service was meant for every member of the farm family; and from the beginning it has developed with that program in mind. As early as 1900 efforts were being made to organize the young people, thereby to encourage parents to adopt better methods and at the same time to enable the coming generation to become better informed in agricultural pursuits. This was the beginning of the great 4-H movement which now includes nearly one million young people of the farms. Its objectives are as inclusive as life itself. Its emblem—the four-leaf clover—is a familiar one in almost every rural community in the United States. T h e 4-H movement has served to keep boys and girls interested in rural activities; has helped more than ever can be written to make life among the youth of rural America well rounded and satisfying, to train leadership for community service, and to furnish a happy, wholesome program for the young folk. T h e 4-H Clubs are everywhere building strong foundations for the future farm community. They need no further comment here; but it is worthy of note that the Christian Century Magazine for June 24, 1936, in an article headed "Government Promotes 4-H Clubs," states: T h e 4 - H C l u b s have w o n such a following among the farm youth in all parts of the country, and the character-building work that they accomplish is of such moral a n d religious value, that they stand in the front rank a m o n g the agencies that are promoting those ends that are the avowed objectives of the religious education movement.

High praise this for an organization whose primary purpose is to further economic betterment among rural people.

12

Origins It was in 1921 and the years following that emphasis be-

gan to be placed on recreation in the agricultural program. 4-H C l u b leaders and home economics workers began to secure for recreation and music-appreciation programs the leadership of Fannie R . Buchanan of the Education Department of the Victor T a l k i n g Machine Company. Cooperative arrangements were developed with the National Recreation Association, whose specialists in drama, music, and general recreation have added so much to the development of the arts program through their leadership-training institutes throughout the country, especially in those areas where recreational leadership has been available

perma-

nently on the staff of Agricultural Extension Service to follow u p visits of this efficient traveling staff. In 1935 Miss Ella Gardner, of the Children's Bureau of the United States Department of the Interior, was secured as National Specialist in Extension Recreation. W . H. Stacy, in his book, The Integration

of Adult

Educa-

tion, says in describing the rapid development of the recreational program: O f the first 1000 Farmers' Bulletins, which were published by the U n i t e d States Department of A g r i c u l t u r e previous to the Fall of 1918, only one dealt with the community. N o t one h a d reference to social programs, such as recreation, art, organization, uses of time, leisure, beauty, music or sociology. T h e n e x t 500 published d u r i n g the period 1918 to 1926 included nine community studies and two that were related primarily to recreation. 3

Yet in 1933 county extension agents reported in statements regarding achievements that more than 14,000 communities were developing recreational

activities.

In

the

states included in this study in 1936 some of the most fars W. H. Stacy, Integration of Adult Educationf pp. 40-41.

Origins

13

reaching recreation programs in the United States have been developed; yet only here and there have full-time recreation specialists been employed, and the few that are now working in the field must cover so much territory and their schedules are so crowded that any comprehensive, growing program is next to impossible. T h e rural arts program has developed at a much more rapid rate than the awareness of the need for expert leadership to carry it on. T h e recreation staff members in Extension Service in the areas studied have proved that wherever adequate leadership is available there develops a sound, firmly-rooted program; and also they have pointed out a definite need for more of the same type of leadership and for some permanent plan for such leadership. Rural sociological extension staffs have seen the need arising and have tried to meet it; but often it has been difficult to interpret this need in terms of adequate support for expert help in the arts field, since the values of this type of program cannot in any way be measured in dollars and cents. It is interesting that seem to be among the cause. Something of the by an assistant director

directors of Extension everywhere most interested champions of the prevailing enthusiasm is expressed of co-operative Extension Service:

If we should be forced by economic conditions to abandon Farmers' Week features—the home-talent ones must be the last to go. Corn and clover, and cattle, markets, money, prices—these are but the flesh and blood of agriculture; but music and play and discussion are the very soul of it. 4

T h e range of interest in the field of the cultural arts is almost unlimited. A survey by a committee of the American Country Life Association in 1933 included many different * W. H . Stacy, Integration

of Adult

Education,

p. 42.

14

Origins

k i n d s of program which are being encouraged in rural America: namely, those of music, drama, folklore, games, sports, a n d folk dances, literature, home a n d countryside beautification, photography, h a n d i c r a f t , painting, sculpture a n d allied arts, exhibits, conservation of records and treasures, and the industrial arts. T h e study of the program of the Agricultural Extension Service in even a few states reveals the fact that all twelve types of program are already vigorous; and in some cases it is difficult to find where one leaves off a n d a n o t h e r begins either in a d u l t a n d in young people's groups or in local and in state-wide organizations. It is because of the blending of d r a m a , music, a n d dancing with h a n d i c r a f t a n d with the discussion of farm problems that the rural-arts program differs f r o m all other programs a n d has a u n i q u e patchworkq u i l t effect. If the arts program seems to be over-weighted on the d r a m a side, it is because the general pattern follows the pattern of drama. T h e demonstration idea lies close to the heart of the plan. A stage has been set for fairs, institutes, a n d Achievement Day events, since the beginning, and they naturally determine the background that calls for dramatic effects. T h e excellent jellies and jams at state fairs are displayed not on plain tables but in artistic settings in booths that vie with exquisite stage sets. Demonstration in artistic settings is the rule at fairs, with prize fruits, vegetables, livestock, a n d f u r n i t u r e ; with choruses, choirs, players, dancers, artists, a n d symphony orchestra leaders.

III

Patterns of Work It takes an artist to make us see not the bewildering details of the world around us, but the essences, the great underlying universals that give significance to our human experience.1

T H E R E is nothing stereotyped about the rural-arts program of the Extension Service. Its patterns differ as widely as do their areas of work. History of the Extension Service with regard to the area, location of the agricultural college in relation to the state university, set-up of staff, philosophies and methods used have naturally had a definite bearing on the type of program developed in each locality. In one state, in which the college of agriculture and the state university are on the same campus, it is believed to be more advantageous, as well as more economical, to have no specialists in drama or music on the R u r a l Sociological Extension staff but to meet the needs of the various communities by means of a staff of three rural sociologists and to call upon the speech and music departments of the university for special service when necessary. In other states, in which the two educational institutions are miles apart, there is often little more than a verbal assurance of co-operation between the two, or a general agreement on the basis of allocation of emphases. For example, on a music-festival program, an agricultural college may ι H. A. Overstreet, About Ourselves, W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.,

>9*7> P· '99-

i6

Patterns of W o r k

w o r k chiefly w i t h 4-H groups a n d F a r m B u r e a u clubs; the university, w i t h the h i g h schools; a n d the teachers' colleges, w i t h r u r a l schools. In some cases one institution seemed to be very

little

aware of w h a t the other was d o i n g w i t h regard to an arts p r o g r a m . M o r e than this, at times there seemed to be little r e l a t i o n s h i p b e t w e e n the arts p r o g r a m of a state agricultural college a n d that of the A g r i c u l t u r a l E x t e n s i o n Service, even t h o u g h the two were p r o m o t i n g and d e v e l o p i n g the same subjects u n d e r the roofs of n e i g h b o r i n g

buildings.

T h e m a i n reason f o r this lack of co-operation is that b o t h staffs were w o r k i n g o n a more-than-full schedule, w i t h q u i t e different groups of p e o p l e — w i t h r e g u l a r students on the one h a n d and w i t h different kinds of r u r a l groups o n the other. R e s i d e n t staffs, especially in the

field

of d r a m a ,

were

sometimes rather skeptical of the i n f o r m a l , a n d o f t e n in their o p i n i o n nonprofessional, m a n n e r of p r o d u c i n g plays a m o n g f a r m g r o u p s u n d e r the supervision of the E x t e n s i o n Service. State colleges and universities, n a t u r a l l y , were concerned m o r e w i t h professional standards a n d greater perfection in p r o d u c t i o n than was the E x t e n s i o n Service, w h i c h places m o r e emphasis on the c u l t u r a l , social, a n d educational values derived

from the p r o d u c t i o n of plays

and

w h i c h includes d r a m a only as a m e a n s to an e n d in a wellr o u n d e d , carefully-planned p r o g r a m to meet the needs of whole communities. T h e r e is, h o w e v e r , in a few areas a g r o w i n g awareness of the need for a closer integration of p r o g r a m , especially in states where the state college, university, a n d teachers' colleges are u n d e r o n e state e d u c a t i o n board. It was encouragi n g to find here a n d there the b e g i n n i n g s of p l a n s for state councils of a d u l t education. I n one case the university a n d

Patterns of W o r k

17

the agricultural college, though located in different communities, already share the services of the University Extension drama specialist. T h e r e is as yet no adequate provision in the budget for this service; but if there could be provided ten specialists in drama instead of one, all ten would undoubtedly be in continuous demand in the state. Still another pattern reveals a H o m e Demonstration agentat-large assigned to the project under the name

"com-

munity organization" for the state. T h e r e is a line in the play Disraeli

which describes the

present situation in many states where the Extension staffs still lack the vital leadership of personalities such as those described above. T h e coded message Disraeli sent as a signal for the opening of the Suez C a n a l read, " T h e celery is ripe and ready to cut." Nowhere in America is this so true as in farm areas where even without professional help a vital cultural program is in the making. T h e time is passing when top-notch, trained leadership finds its greatest opportunity in cities. T h e r e is in the open country an uncultivated field, a virgin territory, which deserves the best trained leadership this country can furnish—and soon. For years special attention has been given by agricultural colleges to leadership for the development of the marketing programs, to corn and hogs, and recently to rural electrification, and so forth. T h e practical phases of agriculture have not been neglected. B u t the farmers themselves have been largely responsible for the development of their cultural program. T h e y have ploughed deep. T h e y are learning the need for trained leadership, and in some states they are in the mood to demand support for the best type of leadership that can be secured. If this story can fire the imaginations of even a few stu-

i8

Patterns of

Work

dents p r e p a r i n g for f u t u r e responsibilities of

leadership-

fire them w i t h the romance, the challenge, the a d v e n t u r e that a w a i t the f u t u r e specialists in d r a m a , music, and recreation in r u r a l A m e r i c a — i t w i l l h a v e served its purpose. W e enter here a plea for some means of securing a d e q u a t e support for the c a r r y i n g on of a p r o g r a m already i n a u g u r a t e d , but n e e d i n g direction and h e l p ; a plea to lovers of a d v e n t u r e w h o may discover t h r i l l i n g c a r e e n in the o p e n c o u n t r y if they are not a f r a i d of below-zero weather, of d r i v i n g over r o u g h roads, of t r a v e l i n g l o n g distances, a n d if they can feel at h o m e away f r o m the b r i g h t lights of c r o w d e d places. N o t only are administrative patterns varied, but m e t h o d s also differ in the various states. Sometimes the E x t e n s i o n Service meets calls for h e l p by a p p r o a c h i n g the i n d i v i d u a l g r o u p s asking for that help. T h e s e groups i n c l u d e sort

of

rural

organization:

churches, granges, Farm pools,

threshing

rings,

parent-teacher

every

associations,

Bureaus, Farmers' U n i o n s , lodges,

community

clubs,

milk study

groups, breeders' clubs, H o m e M a k e r s a n d 4-H C l u b s , social centers, w o m e n ' s clubs, y o u n g people's societies, cowtesting associations, co-operative creameries a n d p o u l t r y associations, h i g h schools, c o m m e r c i a l clubs, a n d so forth. Sometimes the Extension Service works definitely t h r o u g h the

Farm

Bureau

and

through

this s t r o n g

organization

reaches all of the groups w h i c h in some other states it reaches i n d e p e n d e n t l y . In some cases c o m m u n i t y study and longtime p l a n n i n g are first u n d e r t a k e n ; and emphasis on

the

arts a n d recreation comes g r a d u a l l y as the c o m m u n i t y itself recognizes the need for them. N a t i o n a l i t y b a c k g r o u n d s , climate, g e o g r a p h y , transportation a n d m a r k e t i n g facilities, distance f r o m large centers, standards of l i v i n g , types of f a r m i n g , social o r g a n i z a t i o n —

Patterns of Work

19

all of these have resulted in the weaving of different patterns of the present arts programs, even though certain fundamental principles and objectives underlie the national plan for rural sociological service. In many cases responsibility for meeting the need for help rests at present with H o m e Demonstration agents and State H o m e Economics specialists, especially with regard to the crafts, music, and recreation. These courageous pioneers have literally been forced to add the latter subjects to their already heavy load because of the dearth of trained leaders. T h o u g h they have not had time or opportunity for special training for these added tasks, they have given invaluable help in coaching plays, teaching folk dancing, and leading the singing. W i t h their understanding, unstinted energy, and enthusiasm they have bridged many a gap caused by the hungry interest in these activities on the part of the groups organized for other projects, such as nutrition, clothing, and home management, with which the Home Demonstration agents are primarily concerned. Attend a nutrition conference, for example, and before the day is over you may learn not only about the values of certain foods and how to prepare them but also a new anthem for Easter to share with your church choir and a new folk dance for the next Farm Bureau meeting in your home community. More power to the Home Demonstration agents and the H o m e Economics specialists! But may they soon be relieved of such a heavy burden by more people of equal enthusiasm, ability, and pioneer spirit; or may their training in the future include at least an acquaintance with subjects akin to recreation if they are to carry this increasing responsibility for work in these fields!

IV

The Part That Drama Plays More and more we are coming to realize that dramatic training evokes a new appreciation of essential human values: freedom of expression, self-control, and a greater enjoyment of the best in literature. It can redeem the drab commonplace of a work-a-day world in a re-creation of life on the plane of imagination.1

V I C T O R H U G O once called the theater "the crucible of civilization." T r a v e l i n g through rural America in 1936 with the farmers' theater in m i n d makes one wish to have been the originator of those words. It will be a new idea to some people that f a r m folk are staging plays as naturally as they attend to their planting. T h e interesting part of it is that they look upon both as seasonal activities. Both generally lead to harvest festivals, and both are legitimate parts of one plan. D r a m a is a part of life and is the undergirding feature of social organization in many rural communities. It is the activity that adds zest to the discussion of local problems, brings folks together by families and groups, furnishes public entertainment, provides a training ground for future community leadership, and supplies an outlet for natural talent, creative energy, and the universal desire to step now and then into a land of make-believe after too long grappling with reality. 1 Frederick H. Koch, Play Bill—Thirtieth Making.

Anniversary

of Folk

Play

T h e Part That Drama Plays Plays

run

the

whole

gamut

of

variety

21 from

that

gloriously-informal community festival of Caroline Valley, New York, held " O n the G a l l a g h e r f a r m on the C a n a a n road," to the nearly-professional state-wide production of The Bohemian

Girl

at the Shrine T e m p l e in Des Moines,

Iowa. One-act plays could be listed by the thousand; f r o m the original scenes produced on Achievement Day programs growing out of the home management, nutrition, and clothing projects of H o m e Demonstration Service to the folk plays written, directed, and produced by the famous Playmakers of the University of North Carolina. It is natural that styles in plays should differ according to backgrounds; yet throughout the country as a whole there is a kindred spirit of achievement through acting whether the plays be presented in the South or in the M i d d l e West; whether in a perfectly-equipped theater or in a pasture, a barn or a crossroads school; and whether the actors are Norwegian farmers, 4-H-Club boys and girls, or Student Playmakers. T h e actors differ in degrees of skill, in experience before the "foots," and in age; but all are acting in the rural theater of America and the applause which meets their efforts increases in volume year by year. Iowa's "Festival of the C o r n , " North Dakota's " L i l a c Festivals" and historical pageants, Ohio's " A l e x a n d r i a D r a m a Festival," North Carolina's folk plays which have grown out of the very life which the southern students know— Shroud

My Body Down, Job's

Kin folks, Peggy (the first play

America ever produced about the farm-tenant problem), The Last of the Louries

(Paul Green's first play, born out of

first-hand knowledge about life in the southern mountains) —these plays and many others are mirrors that show us rural A m e r i c a as it is.

22

The

THE FEDERAL

Part T h a t Drama

Plays

THEATRE

T o further arouse the spirit of achievement in 1935 the Federal T h e a t r e launched in North Carolina a wholly new kind of project. O n e of its chief aims is the re-establishment of theater going and a revival of interest in American drama in the country remote from big cities. T h e hope is that by using native talent the project may become so vital that it will continue after Federal aid is suspended. It includes plans for development of traveling troupes, the establishment of theaters in C. C. C. camps, encouragement of marionette shows, vaudeville sketches, variety, circus events, and little theater groups. W h o l e companies are gradually becoming part of the social and cultural life of various communities and are becoming identified as resident groups. T h e time may come when with a resident theater company, an art gallery, and a civic orchestra, all serving the surrounding countryside, a community may gradually push out roots into areas beyond its own trade areas. In developing the Federal Theatre in North Carolina the idea has been not to train actors for the professional stage but to give people opportunity to participate in wholesome, leisure-time activity and to add to the cultural wealth of their own neighboring communities. By

encouraging

nonprofessional

participation

in

the

theater a new market has been found for the work of the professional theater. Interest in the drama has been extended into new territory. T h e r e are now nonprofessional groups where none existed; there are beginnings of children's theaters in which a new generation may be trained in appreciation of the drama; marionette theaters are on a paying basis;

The

Part T h a t

Drama

Plays

23

a n d negro theaters are b e i n g organized for the p r o d u c t i o n of plays for grown-ups a n d children. In this N o r t h C a r o l i n a e x p e r i m e n t the Federal T h e a t r e is decentralizing, w i t h regard not only to the small cities b u t also to rural communities. Plans have been discussed for p u t t i n g a theater on wheels d u r i n g the summer a n d setting the stage and p r o d u c i n g a play wherever a m o n g rural groups interest was shown. T h e Federal T h e a t r e project is mentioned here because it does reach into the open country, a u n i q u e situation in the annals of Federal T h e a t r e history. In a message to theaters in his region Frederick H . K o c h wrote: Now for the first time in America, and that too in a period of unprecedented economic stress, our Federal Government has recognized the important place the theatre holds in the lives of our people, its potential social significance as a cultural force. T h e idea of such is not new. T h e theatre has always found its most complete expression when it has been fostered and cherished by the state. T h e theatre of the ancient Greeks was the child of the state. Shakespeare flourished under royal patronage, Lope de Vega in the Golden Age of Philip IX, and Moliere in the court of Louis XIV. And more recently in Europe the state-subsidized theatres in Germany, Norway, and Russia have given us distinguished playwrights and directors—Goethe, Ibsen, Stanislavsky. And now for the first time we have conceived an American theatre in terms of our own nationality. 2 2 From bulletin

Backstage.

ν

Drama Festivals in Wisconsin The theatre formed.1

is a laboratory

where

the public

soul

is

I N T H E open country drama has developed with a real purpose, which is usually more than just to " p u t on a play." As the exhibits at county and state fairs and institutes of a century ago added zest to the otherwise thoroughly serious business of developing better economics in farming, so the play festivals of 1936 added increasing vitality to F a r m and H o m e Week, state fairs, and 4-H conventions. B u t also they have become the main, often the only, gala winter-time events in rural areas; and halls are crowded to the doors when

friends, neighbors,

and

folk

from miles

around

come together to witness the performances they themselves have helped to produce. T h e drama movement in Wisconsin exemplifies the saying, "One-act play festivals give zest to dairying." "Wisconsin's D r a m a Groups Challenge B r o a d w a y , " ran the black headlines of the Milwaukee

Journal

on Sunday,

February 23, 1936; and there followed a whole-page story, illustrated with pictures, of eight one-act plays successfully produced as the final event of the F a r m and Home Week program. H o w f a r away Broadway seemed that night in Bascom T h e a t r e on the State University campus—how beautifully f a r awayl Yet the challenge was all there; not so much 1 From a booklet by A l f r e d Arvold.

Drama Festivals in Wisconsin

25

in the plays themselves as in the players and in the significance behind this play festival which has become since 1927 one of the state's most popular annual events. T h e actors were farm men and farm women, rural teachers, villagers, young people of school age and older. There were more than seventy in all, and they ranged in age from six to more than sixty. For this production they had traveled from 85 to 350 miles, from every part of the state, in spite of the worst blizzard of the year and a temperature of 39 degrees below zero. They represented the Luther League, the Grange, two community clubs, a band mothers' organization, the Gross Benefit Association, a parent-teacher group, and a woman's study club. Through all sorts of organizations Wisconsin is drama conscious; and more than a quarter-century of experience has made it so. "Back in 1913," says a survey of dramatic activities in that state, "Percy MacKaye wrote in the first number of The Play Book": T h e Wisconsin idea which is stirring the nation so deeply in governmental science, civics, agriculture, a n d the progress of the people's self rule, is big with promise even greater. D u r i n g the last two years, America has been partially a w a k e n e d to the significance of native dramatic expression by the acted repertory of the Irish Players. T h e Wisconsin idea involves the f u l l scope of p o p u l a r selfgovernment; but popular self-government without indigenous art forms is incapable of civilized expression. A f t e r scientific agriculture, biology and engineering, then the next practical step—indeed the simultaneous step—is p o p u l a r aesthetics; that technical art which shall interpret to the people the h u m a n meanings of their labor, in the receptive hours of their leisure.

This was written more than twenty years ago; but Percy MacKayc's prophecy came true. Drama has been one of the

26

Drama Festivals in Wisconsin

primary interpreters in Wisconsin during the developing of the state's great cream and cheese industry, even though a large share of the plays produced have not been related to the soil. Dramatics have played an important part in breaking down nationality barriers in this veritable melting pot of the nation, where Norwegian, Swedish, Bohemian, Polish, Welsh, Irish, German, and old American stock have made their permanent homes, built their great barns and silos, and vied with one another in the raising of thoroughbred stock. T h e State University and the State College of Agriculture have long recognized the values in dramatics for amateur groups, and have planned carefully for its rich development. Note the present facilities available for a live drama program in Wisconsin! There are nearly one hundred LittleTheater groups in cities and towns; and these are members of the State Drama Guild, which includes church, rural, industrial, woman's club, high-school, and college divisions. T h e Guild's culminating event is the annual State Festival, in April, when players and playwrights come together to measure their progress during the year. DRAMA, IN

MUSIC,

AND AGRICULTURAL

SCIENCE

PROGRAMS

Under the auspices of the Agricultural Extension Service, dramatic projects have been promoted for nine years and have grown more and more popular. Literally hundreds of groups produce plays annually in county festivals that later culminate in a festival held during Farm and Home Week, in February. T h e 4"H Clubs hold a state-wide drama tournament, playing off their finals at their annual Club Congress on the

D r a m a Festivals in W i s c o n s i n

27

campus of the university, the winning group being privileged to produce its play at the state fair. T h e Bureau of Dramatic Activities under the University Extension Service offers the following services to individuals and communities: play directing; the service of a loan library—one of the largest libraries of its kind in the country, including plays, bulletins, and study courses on dramatic subjects; the conducting of drama institutes held in different sections of the state; and an annual ten-day institute which is held during the summer-school session and is sponsored jointly by the Extension Division and the University Department of Speech, its chief aims being to furnish a source of inspiration, to make possible an exchange of ideas, and to help in the training of leaders and directors in community and school dramatic activities. Playwrights, too, have developed in Wisconsin. T w o volumes of Wisconsin plays have been published already, and more are forthcoming. Farm women and rural pastors have made no small contribution to the list of excellent plays. Seven new rural plays were listed in the 1935 contest. Wisconsin groups never tire of producing home-grown plays. T h e study of the drama is included in the Farmers' Short Course of the Agricultural College so that as much help as possible may be given in preparing the three hundred or more boys who attend that session annually for a fifteenweek period to become leaders in program planning as well as in the science of farming when they return to their home communities. F r o m the Agricultural Extension Service, under the able direction of rural sociologists who assign to drama as important a röle as they give to the discussion of agricultural problems, may be had for the asking many play lists, bulle-

28

Drama Festivals in Wisconsin

tins, catalogues,

pageants,

religious

plays,

plays

for

na-

tionality groups, festival m a t e r i a l a n d p a m p h l e t s o n costume, staging, make-up, casting, selection a n d direction of plays. R a d i o talks on the d r a m a have s t i m u l a t e d interest a n d enthusiasm in this ever-growing, state-wide v e n t u r e , w h i c h has been a p i o n e e r in the field for p r o v i d i n g w h o l e s o m e leisure-time activity, an o p p o r t u n i t y for self-expression, the d e v e l o p m e n t of c u l t u r a l a p p r e c i a t i o n , and a c h a n c e for f a r m g r o u p s to w o r k together in a co-operative enterprise. T h e facts that plays are p r o d u c e d in a d d i t i o n to discussions of problems such as dairy m a r k e t i n g , the

financing

of

rural e d u c a t i o n , the question of w h o s h o u l d pay the doctors' bills, social insurance, consumer problems,

taxation,

and so forth, and that these interests are s u p p l e m e n t e d by music festivals a n d f o l k - d a n c i n g events h a v e p r o v e d

that

farmers are t h i n k i n g of the drama n o t as an e n d in itself but as a n o r m a l part of a p r o g r a m that meets the needs of whole communities. FROM T O U R N A M E N T TO

FESTIVAL

N i n e years ago the t o u r n a m e n t idea was strong, a n d a prize was the all-important goal. Slowly, as skill a n d interest in g r o u p a c t i n g grew, ideas c h a n g e d . T h e festival is n o w the thing, a n d only a certificate of a p p r e c i a t i o n is given f o r good w o r k , each g r o u p of players r e c e i v i n g one, since e a c h has succeeded in b r i n g i n g a w i n n i n g play to the festival. It's n o t the prize that is of most i m p o r t a n c e today, n o r even the trip to M a d i s o n . O f greater i m p o r t a n c e n o w are the b o n d s of neighborliness that h a v e d e v e l o p e d a n d the sociability that has been m a d e possible t h r o u g h the f u l f i l l m e n t of a comm o n desire to step o u t of real life i n t o make-believe for a

Drama Festivals in Wisconsin

29

little while. T o o often Wisconsin farm life does not seem to have in it anything to awaken the dream spirit; it drably proceeds from day to day with stark realism—giving as rewards hard work, heart-breaking discouragements, and little else. Staging plays is not easy in rural Wisconsin. Back of gala events, even in Madison, lies the story of rehearsals in cold halls or in living rooms without a stage; of actors willing to risk frostbitten ears and feet in going through the drifts on bobsleds or on horseback or by walking from one to four miles to and from rehearsals; of almost insurmountable difficulties

overcome in order to secure props, costumes, and

stage effects which even approach adequacy. W h a t would have happened to little theaters in

the

cities—or even to the theater on Broadway—if they had had to face similar difficulties? B u t players in cities do not furnish, as rural players often do, the only outlet for sociability and entertainment in their communities during the long winter months. A visit to some of the communities from which the rural actors come soon makes one aware that the play is not the thing, but that what counts is what the play has done among the country folk. For example, after a festival there appeared in a rural papier this editorial: It is gratifying to see this revival of a cultural aspect that has been all too long lacking in the rural districts. Dramatics of this type have a peculiarly vital function to fulfill among our people. They provide the opportunity for self-expression—they challenge the abilities and resourcefulness of all who take part—whether as actors, directors or stage hands. T h e y bring our people together out of their often snow-bound country homes to places where they can laugh and work and play together. It has meant work for many people—county and home demonstration agents, every last actor and

30

Drama Festivals in Wisconsin

club member. All who have assisted in any way are to be commended for putting this festival across. This county needs such activities. N o t only the editors of local p a p e r s b u t also pastors of churches a n d m e m b e r s of c o m m e r c i a l clubs a n d o t h e r organizations were enthusiastic a b o u t the plays. Players were invited to r e p e a t t h e i r plays in o t h e r c o m m u n i t i e s a n d even in o t h e r counties. T h i s exchange of plays m e a n t a p r o g r a m of h o m e e n t e r t a i n m e n t c o n t i n u e d t h r o u g h o u t the w i n t e r m o n t h s . N e w f r i e n d s h i p s were m a d e , new t a l e n t was developed, fresh energy was p o u r e d i n t o the l a g g i n g p r o g r a m s of m a n y organizations, a new neighborliness was b o r n , a n d a new sense of " I can d o " was established in m a n y a county. T a l k w i t h the player of the m o t h e r ' s p a r t in R a c h e l Field's Patch Work Quilt. If asked how she c o u l d play the p a r t so b e a u t i f u l l y , she will say, " O h , I lived t h a t p a r t ! My g r a n d m o t h e r lived o n just such a f a r m as t h a t in the play. I was m a r r i e d o n the p o r c h of it. A n d that w e d d i n g dress t h a t was worn—that was my own—I wore it over forty years ago." A n d there's a shininess in her eyes such as is too o f t e n missi n g f r o m the eyes of m o r e experienced actresses. W h e n o n e considers that m a n y of the players have never played before on a real stage w i t h footlights a n d that a Norwegian g r o u p f r o m a r u r a l county n o n c h a l a n t l y came f o r t h w i t h a mill play in w h i c h the p r o b l e m s of c a p i t a l a n d labor a r e included, a n d in w h i c h the players—Norwegians a l l h a v e the courage to a t t e m p t to speak in Irish a n d I t a l i a n a n d w i t h u l t r a - u r b a n d r a w i n g - r o o m accents, there is n o d o u b t in one's m i n d t h a t the t h e a t e r is i n d e e d "a laboratory w h e r e the p u b l i c soul is f o r m e d . " N o r does o n e d o u b t this w h e n o n e watches a g r o u p of Polish a n d W e l s h players at a social get-together in a c o m m u n i t y h a l l miles f r o m a

Drama Festivals in Wisconsin

31

county seat or when one is present where men and women, young people of several nationalities, meet together for a rehearsal of plays and a discussion of farm problems. VARIETY OF

LOCAL

LEADERS

Some special attention must be given here to the leaders that have made possible the program in the rural communities. T h e y are county agents, Home

Demonstration

agents, and club leaders; county superintendents of schools and teachers in county seats; farm women, rural teachers, and rural pastors. T h e y care about their communities. O n e farm woman said: Y e a r s a g o w h e n w e w e r e married, we agreed that unless w e c o u l d h a v e as rich a life i n the c o u n t r y as in the city, we w o u l d n o t stay o n the f a r m . W h e n m y c h i l d r e n w e r e b o r n a n d came to school age, I d e c i d e d that a l l m y leisure time s h o u l d b e spent on h e l p i n g to raise the s t a n d a r d of e n t e r t a i n m e n t . I w a n t e d my c h i l d r e n t o h a v e an o p p o r t u n i t y to see the best. I w a n t e d them to grow to discern w h a t was the best. A n d this year, w h e n o n e of o u r plays was postp o n e d a n d a pinch-hit, p o o r e n t e r t a i n m e n t was p u t o n in its place, m y son said, " W e w o n ' t stand for this stuff"—and m y h e a r t sang, f o r I k n e w that all these years of w o r k in the c o m m u n i t y for b e t t e r plays h a d n o t b e e n i n v a i n . W e are still o n the f a r m .

Few of the directors have had any technical training in production other than that secured during a two- or threeday training institute to which prospective drama leaders go once a year in some strategic locality; yet the plays go on w i t h a sincerity, dignity, and restraint often lacking in professional productions. In 1934 a special summary of leadership in Wisconsin was made with C. W . A. help. T h e results showed that by far the larger percentage of drama leaders were leaders also in P. Τ . Α., community clubs, granges, and 4-H groups. T h e s e

32

Drama Festivals in Wisconsin

drama leaders were found to be interested also in other phases of the recreation program: 39.2 percent were interested in public discussions; 32.2 percent in games and athletics; 32.7 percent in music; 35.3 percent in organization problems; and 22.4 percent in 4-H C l u b work. Many leaders maintained an active interest in more than one of the above subjects. Of the 179 dramatic leaders reporting, the largest percentage were housewives; two-thirds of the total number were women; and more than half had formerly been teachers. It is rather interesting that most of them were more than forty years of age. A m o n g the leaders were farmers, housewives, students, pastors, and teachers. T h e majority held offices in various organizations and were responsible in one way or another for the programs. In a radio speech, "Five Years of Rural Dramatics," Professor A . F. Wiledon, of the College of Agriculture, in Wisconsin, said: Are rural people justified in taking part in dramatics at a time when their income has been so decidedly depleted? T h e answer seems quite clear: when are they more justified in providing their own entertainment? A t a time when less hours of work are really needed, leisure is one of the biggest problems. Furthermore, when can the farmer and his family more wisely supply their own entertainment than when they have difficulty in paying for commercialized recreation?

It was out of the need for recreation that Vernon County, Wisconsin, developed the home-talent-play idea in 1925 as an "attendance getter" for farmers' institutes and as a means to satisfy the social side of rural life. From the first county tournament in 1925, grew a statewide tournament in

1928, consisting of dances,

drama,

music, and stunts. In 1929 county events doubled; by 1932

Drama Festivals in Wisconsin

33

forty o f Wisconsin's seventy-one counties had held at least one drama event. D r a m a t i c clubs, little-theater groups, a n d county drama councils developed community, county, and inter-county festivals. Very naturally these events began t o cultivate new talent, which year by year grew more professional. T h o s e groups began to produce plays in earnest, encouraged by one success after another. As counties became drama conscious, the most successful plays developed a demand for larger audiences. T h e s e actors formed demonstration groups which played for large gatherings, and they not only raised their own standards b u t also encouraged less experienced players. H e n c e the enthusiasm for the state festivals at Madison. THE UNIVERSITY FURNISHES JUDGES T w o judges, c o m p e t e n t , understanding members o f the staff of the Speech D e p a r t m e n t o f the University, were secured by the Agricultural E x t e n s i o n Service. T h e y travel to each county event and give constructive criticism, call attention to the o u t s t a n d i n g points of excellence, and select the most representative plays of the state for the festival production. T h e s e judges have become firm friends of rural actors in every part of the state. T h e y know the people as well as the t e c h n i q u e of drama, a n d because of this they have given a strong under-girding support to all acting and directing groups, even though they have been able to spend only a short time in local communities. Leaders are now discussing the need for more careful selection of plays, for more play-reading groups during

the

m o n t h s when plays are n o t in rehearsal, for closer relationship between the rural groups a n d little-theater groups in larger communities, for adequate plans for building a m o r e

34

Drama Festivals in Wisconsin

constant general leadership in the state, and also for a continually-developing acting skill among more of the same players. As the Milwaukee Journal said, "tremendously important things are quietly being done without benefit of press agent, impresario, or any other of the traditional torch bearers. When rural communities reveal such a hunger for plays—it means something—something big." Amy Gessner, rural sociologist on the Extension Service staff, summed up the situation. She has the responsibility of organizing and cultivating the rural drama, as well as the rural music program, in Wisconsin. She said, "People may have the notion that the radio and the movies have brought contentment to farm families. This is not so. Country folk want plays of their own, to act and stage. This movement has sought to meet that need (scantily so far in spots but increasingly well) and no one can estimate the values." Plays are great social stimulants; and from reports of Agricultural Extension programs throughout the United States it seems that there is no lack of effort to take advantage of them, even in isolated communities where only a crossroads gas station, grange hall, rural church, school, or general store makes a center for social life for miles around.

VI

The Little Country Theatre in North Dakota It is not so much what we do when we are busy as how we spend, our free hours. The pastimes of a neighborhood may either make or break the life of the people who live in it.1

T H E R E is one glowing proof of what can happen in a state when the director of the theater on the campus of an agricultural college is also the director of drama on the Agricultural Extension staff for at least part time. T h r e e months of a year is not long, and it would in most cases be entirely inadequate for the launching of a rural extension dramatic program; but in North Dakota, the Little Country T h e a t r e not only sends its founder and director over the state during part of the year but also makes its influence felt throughout the state during the whole year. T o see the picture whole let us go back and trace the beginning of this famous people's theater. A magazine illustration once portrayed a group of tourists standing on the rear platform of an observation car of a train traveling over the prairies of North Dakota. O n e of the women, with raised lorgnette, is saying, " W h a t a country; let's go inside"; but in the clouds of dust may be dimly seen the figures of Indians in ceremonial costume, T h e o d o r e Roosevelt and his Rough Riders, cowboys, plainsmen, homesteaders, pioneers. North Dakota is like that—miles of great level country, modest farms, wheat fields, then, suddenly, ι From a booklet by Alfred Arvold.

36

T h e Little Country Theatre

the Bad Lands, so dramatically beautiful that with Paul Bliss, who has given North Dakota glory in his last volume of poems, Cirrus from

the West, we say the lines from " B a d

Lands Sunrise," " L o , the thing is done." T h e arts of North Dakota are less formally organized, more has been accomplished for them by individuals than by groups, no integrated program has yet developed in this vivid northwest country where unbelievable contrasts appear against the prairie back drop. " W h a t a country; let us go inside!" One of the first surprises in store for the visitor interested in the arts will be the vividness of a program carried on where no special equipment is in sight. First, there is the famous old brick building, on the campus of the agricultural college, which houses a perfect playhouse. Much has been written about the Little Country Theatre, in Fargo, North Dakota. Once a dingy gray chapel on the second floor of the old administration building of the college, it is today one of the best-equipped country-life laboratories in the United States. T h i r t y years of growing under the same director who founded the theater has made it a mecca to which rural and city folk, farmers and students have come from all parts of the Northwest to develop and present all sorts of community programs. In the words of its philosopher director, Mr. Alfred Arvold: T h e aim of the Little Country T h e a t r e is to produce such plays as can be staged easily in a country school, the basement of a rural church, in a farm sitting-room, in a village or town hall, or any place where people gather for sociability. Its real purpose is to use drama and all that goes with drama, as a sociological force in getting people together and acquainted with each other in order that they may find out the hidden life forces in nature itself.

The

Little Country T h e a t r e

37

T h e famous Little Theatre, in Fargo, is not pretentious. Its appearance is simplicity itself. T h e auditorium seats only 350, and it might be any small hall in America; that is, one might believe so if one were just passing through and took no note of what this theater really is. T h e longer one lives along with the routine program carried on in the building, the more one realizes that there is nothing to be found in any nook or cranny that is not there for some special purpose and with some special significance. PLAYERS

PRESENT

PEER

GYN'T

First, let us examine closely the five windows at the back of the theater. T h r e e are of stained glass. T h e first window tells the story of Peer Gynt, the great Ibsen play which was first chosen for production at Fargo in 1927, an occasion which brought messages from distant parts of the world. In presenting this experimental production T h e Players hoped to show that a difficult piece of dramatic literature could be given on a small stage and to make possible the staging of a classic play among rural people. Mr. Arvold said, "Just because folks live in the country is no reason why they should be denied the privilege of seeing great plays. T h e dramatic instinct in civilization is everywhere, regardless of where people live." A l l of the scenery used was painted by young men and women whose homes are on the prairies. T h e costumes were made in the theater workshop. Folks traveled many miles to see Harold Fog, one of the students of the agricultural college, play the part of the ragged, mischievous, lovable rascal who dreamed through life that he was what he actually was not. T h e house was packed for that performance. People still talk about it.

38

T h e Little Country Theatre It is fitting that Peer

Gynt was given a permanent place

in the L i t t l e Country T h e a t r e . T h e Peer Gynt window was unveiled at midnight on February 2, 1934, during the celebration of the theater's twentieth anniversary. T h e Orpheus male chorus sang two G r i e g numbers. T h e president of the Norwegian Singers organization spoke. T h e Ibsen R o o m was dedicated, and an Ibsen C l u b was formed for admirers of the great

Norwegian

dramatist, " T h e

Little Man

from

Skien." T h e second stained-glass window marks a second triumph, the production of As You Like

It. T h e window was made

possible by the five-cent contributions of five thousand 4-H C l u b boys a n d girls of N o r t h Dakota. T h e scene is of Sylvius and Phoebe in the forest, and it stands as symbolic of all youth. T h e third window has just been added. It is the garden scene f r o m Goethe's Faust as it was produced last year. W h a t the others will be, no one knows; but the two windows await new triumphs of production. T h e theater is just the size of an average town hall. T h e stage is only thirty feet wide and twenty feet deep, with a proscenium opening of ten by fifteen feet. T h e hangings are plain dark green, but they are adequate and correctly placed, with a pulley system which would m a k e city theaters envious. T h e switchboard is neatly arranged in a cabinet not more than six inches deep, which takes u p almost no space on the side wall. If one ventures behind the scenes at the right of the stage, one comes upon the u n i q u e tower study, the workshop where Mr. A r v o l d has accumulated rare mementos, old books autographed by great actors, directors, and authors, including George B e r n a r d

Shaw, D a v i d Belasco,

Daniel

T h e Little Country Theatre

39

Frohman, J o h n Drew, Percy MacKaye. On the walls are scenes from great plays, photographs of famous friends of the stage. If you lean too far back in the visitor's chair, your head will brush against the chimes hanging on the wall. Mr. Arvold leaves them there because he knows this will happen and because he enjoys the music they make. On the director's desk is a great book full of names of important people. T u r n the pages at random and you will find signatures of: Walker Whiteside, Charles Lindbergh, Knute Rockne, Carl Sandburg, Lorado T a f t , Ethel Barrymore, DeWolf Hopper, Tony Sarg, Walter Hampden, Harry Lauder, Fritz Kreisler, and many others. At the left of the stage is a staircase leading to one of the most attractive attics ever connected with a theater. It is the Lincoln Log Cabin room. It is here that discussions of plays are held while the plays are in rehearsal; it is here that actors and audience gather after productions; and students come here to cast plays and to memorize lines. On neighborhood days during Farm and Home Week, when farm people throng the building, informal meetings are held and coffee and doughnuts are served in this room. T h e ceiling is low and from it hang Indian corn and red peppers; there is a huge fireplace, over which are the words, "Let us have faith that right makes might"; there are rough benches, curios, lanterns, tables spread with red tablecloths, and little windows curtained with gypsy chintz. A local blacksmith was awarded the degree of Master of Artisans when he made the hinges and chandeliers for the Lincoln Log Cabin. T h e room was dedicated when Fritz Kreisler visited Fargo as an honored guest. T h e story of this room was translated into twenty-six languages and distributed to all delegates at the International Country Life Conference, in Belgium, in 1930.

4o

T h e Little Country Theatre

It is often called the "Soul of the Little Country Theatre." Everything has its place in this orderly playhouse, from the perfect kitchen adjoining the Lincoln Room, to the make-up room, the costume room, and the huge workshop where scenery is painted and where, also, banquets are held on special occasions. A rustic balcony at one end of the room makes a perfect little stage for dinner entertainers or speakers. From the Village Room, dedicated by Sir Harry Lauder, a steep flight of seven steps takes one up to Thor's chamber. On each of the seven steps is printed one of the lines in "the seven ages of man" from As You Like It. Here are the pulley equipment, a lumber room, storage space, and radio equipment for testing voices. T h e whole attic is the theater workshop and corresponds, says Mr. Arvold, "to the basement of a community building or an addition tacked onto a town hall." It is interesting that the seats, scenic effects, properties, costumes, dishes, furniture, and copies of plays (which are lent to people for reading purposes) have been purchased with the proceeds from entertainments and plays. T h e Green Room, across the hall from the library, is lined with cases in which are dozens of miniature stage models made by students. There are models of scenes from plays of many lands, and above each model are rows of books on the theater of the country represented by the model below. Between the Ibsen Room and the theater there is an open court to which the audiences repair between scenes on warm evenings. Ethel Barrymore and Mr. Arvold were discussing the theater in this court one day, when Mr. Arvold remarked, "Some day I believe it would be good to have a glass roof over this court." Ethel Barrymore, with a gesture that swept the heavens, answered, "What's the matter with this

T h e Little Country Theatre

41

roof?" A n d so the court remains open to the stars. I n one corner lies the great Y u l e log used annually as part of the famous Christmas Festival, and in another corner stands the Maypole which has been used many years for colorful dancing, singing, and merrymaking during the Spring Festival. THE

PACKAGE

LIBRARY

BORN

IN

FARGO

T h e theater houses one of the finest libraries of dramatic literature in the country. Indeed, it was here that the "package l i b r a r y " idea was born. In his book Footlights America

Across

Kenneth M a c G o w a n tells how in 1 9 1 0 a school-

teacher wrote to M r . A r v o l d f o r some program material. H e sent her three plays from his own library. T h e teacher told a friend, the friend told her friend, and soon Mr. A r v o l d was receiving requests for plays from many quarters. He saw in this a way to meet a real need, a way to help people w h o were cut off f r o m sources of supply to secure adequate program material and at the same time to develop his dream of a people's theater for the future. T o d a y the loan library is an indispensable feature of many a drama department in university and agricultural college. Mr. A r v o l d calls it the "intellectual rural free delivery service." T h r o u g h it and through demonstrations in rural parts of the state and at the state fair, and during Farm and H o m e Week, with its chief events held at the Little Country T h e a t r e , Mr. Arvold has taught a whole state how to play. O n a spot m a p showing communities from which he has received correspondence during the last year almost n o center is undotted. Letters include requests for help on play material, Indian lore, aviation, industrial education, Mark T w a i n , how to b u i l d a stage, how much it costs to put u p a

42

T h e Little Country Theatre

community hall, how h i g h a proscenium arch needs to be, how to write a pageant on w o r l d peace. Letters are carefully answered whether they go to former students or to county agents, teachers, school superintendents, home women, 4-H C l u b boys and girls, or f a r m hands. A l l of these vocations have at one time or another been represented by actors, students, or audience in the L i t t l e Country T h e a t r e . Sioux Indians are friends of the Little Country T h e a t r e . So are cow-men, homesteaders, P a u l Bliss, the poet, J u d g e Christianson

of

the Superior

Court

at

Bismarck,

Emil

Krawth, the Butterfly M a n w h o has collected over 8,000 butterflies from the ends of the earth, Mr. A l f r e d Welch of the Valley of the C a n n o n B a l l , w h o is the White Chief of the Sioux, the T o r f i n n s o n brothers, now county agents and singers of Icelandic sagas. T h e y have contributed much to the theater's development, as well as to that of the state of North Dakota. From the little stage at F a r g o thousands of persons have participated in festivals, typical community programs, long and short plays, and talks on the drama. Modern and classical drama are both common fare. Prairie folk have traveled many miles to see plays such as Brand, Viki?igs of Helegeland.

Peer Gynt, and

The

T h e y have laughed and wept with

David H a r u m and Miss L u l u Bett. A DEMONSTRATION ON T H E

FAIR

PLAYHOUSE

GROUNDS

In 1922 the North Dakota State Fair Board, at Fargo, turned over the old dairy exhibit building and land adjacent to it to the Little Country T h e a t r e to be converted into a community building and playground, respectively.

T h e Little Country T h e a t r e

43

T h e object was to stimulate an interest in the characteristic activities of the rural community: athletics, exhibits, vocal and instrumental music, public programs including plays, festivals, pageants, addresses, demonstrations, illustrated lectures, readings and talks, and social functions, such as picnics, parties, receptions, and indoor socials. T h i s typical community center serves as a medium through which people will be able to present their home-talent programs during the week of the fair. T h e talent comes from all parts of the state. T h e hall, which accommodates four hundred persons and has a forty-by-fifty-foot stage, is always crowded to capacity. T h e neat white forty-by-sixty-foot building is enclosed by a neat picket fence. One side of the lawn is for horseshoe tournaments, and the other is set with tables and benches for picnics. It is a place that almost speaks the words, "Any community could have this kind of play center." And this is not all. Down by the river in a deep hollow there were once the beginnings of a rubbish heap. Mr. Arvold, always on the alert for open spaces available for pageants, urged the Masonic order of the Shrine to purchase the lot. Now it is a perfect amphitheater, which seats thousands of people. When the old post office was torn down to be replaced by a new one, Mr. Arvold negotiated with those in charge for the marble pillars. These, placed as tall columns on each side of the wide stage and banked with lilac bushes, make possible the production of all sorts of programs. Here was staged the famous Pageant of North Dakota, in which there were a thousand or more participants, including homesteaders, cowboys, Indians, and persons from city and country. It was in this amphitheater, also, that Charles Lindbergh spoke to the thousands who came from all parts of the great Northwest to pay him tribute.

44

The

Little C o u n t r y

Theatre

T h u s in one way or another people in this section of the country have come to know the theater as a result of M r . Arvold's u n t i r i n g efforts t h r o u g h drama " t o make h a p p y neighborhoods and contented communities." TWENTIETH

BIRTHDAY

CELEBRATION

W h e n the theater reached its twentieth birthday the celebration, which occurred d u r i n g Farm and H o m e

Week,

lasted nearly three days. First, o n the stage of the L i t t l e T h e a t r e , on Saturday morning, jack and the Bean Stalk was played for four h u n d r e d youngsters. T h a t e v e n i n g A sian Honeymoon

Rus-

was presented, since this had been the first

play ever produced in the theater. T h e leading part was played by the same person w h o had played it twenty years before. Between the acts Russian music was played. T h e r e followed other scenes from more recent successes: The Cherry Orchard,

David Harum,

Raindrops,

an original

play which had been written a n d produced by students, in 1916. H j a l t i T o r f i n n s o n , the Icelandic county agent whose chants of the Vikings have m a d e h i m famous in N o r t h Dakota, sang Icelandic sagas. A t m i d n i g h t came the u n v e i l i n g of the Peer G y n t w i n d o w already described. O n

Sunday,

The Servaiit in the House was presented by the E d w i n B o o t h Dramatic C l u b . T h e final evening's performance brought many kinds of talent before the footlights. T w o Hidasta chiefs, Drags W o l f and Bear's A r m together with Elk, a Sioux warrior in ceremonial garb, showed a bit of the colorful Indian life which had taken place before the w h i t e man came to the prairies. T h e y spoke in their native tongue and Elk, aged seventynine, danced and told Indian stories. T h e n there was a banquet for the two h u n d r e d visitors and students w h o had

T h e Little Country Theatre

45

helped in staging the production. A three-piece orchestra played "Oh Susannah" and other pioneer songs of the covered wagon days. There were cowboy ballads, roping, and stories depicting ranch life when western ranges were stocked with cattle and horses. T h e farming era was interpreted by three events: a play, A Head of Wheat; the Dance of the Chanticleers; and the Dance of the Golden Grain. Four-Η boys and girls from Stutsman County presented a marionette show as the final event, and a social hour in the Lincoln Log Cabin closed the program. Anniversaries are great days on the campus at Fargo. On such occasions the best productions of the year are brought together in celebration. T h e celebration of the fifteenth anniversary of the Little Country Theatre is typical of dramatic events in the Dakota country. From Bergen Township, North Dakota, came the Farmers' Club to repeat a play, Back to the Farm, which had scored a success five years before. It was given by the same cast, all farmers, which gave the first production. David Harum, played by the Moorhead Alumni for the benefit of the Grain Dealers' Convention in Fargo, was repeated. A local citizen of Fargo spoke on "An Ideal in the Land of the Dakotas." Judge A. M. Christianson, associate justice of the Superior Court, Bismarck, spoke on " T h e Theatre as a Social Factor in the State." A student member of the Edwin Booth Dramatic Club took for his subject " T h e Ideals of the Little Country Theatre and the Life of Edwin Booth." Mr. Arvold made a speech of acknowledgment. T h e Congregational pastor read the Lord's Prayer as Edwin Booth used to read it; and the program closed with the sing-

46

The

Little Country

Theatre

ing of "America the Beautiful." Following this event came a reception, inspection of the theater, and a sacred concert with tableaux depicting scenes from great dramas. T h e next evening the Edwin Booth C l u b presented

The

Servant in the House, by Charles R a n n Kennedy, w h o is an honorary member of the club. Monday evening, students presented Ibsen's Brand. On the final day, in front of the building which houses the Little Theatre, was presented the unique and dramatic Book of the Past. T h e r e stepped from the doors of " O l d M a i n " well-beloved characters from famous plays which had been presented in the Little Theatre during its fifteen-year history. After a prologue, the lights in the first-floor windows of the Little T h e a t r e were lighted, and before them stepped a procession of players from

The

Doll's House, Peer Gynt, The Vikings, Brand, As You

Like

It, Much Ado about Nothing, School

for Scandal,

Daddy Long Legs, The

and Leonardo.

Rivals,

T h e s e lights were ex-

tinguished, and lights appeared in the windows on the second floor. Before them passed actors from The Servant in the House, The Bonny Briar Bush, Romeo Women,

Uncle Tom's Cabin, Hunky

and Juliet,

Dory, Beau

Little

Brummel,

and Back to the Farm. T h e third episode took place in the windows on the third floor, when actors passed who had presented Rip Van Winkle, Frietchie,

Cappy Ricks, Grumpy,

Barbara

Sun Up, and The Rise of Silas Lapham.

As a cli-

max a searchlight was thrown on a platform built on the roof, and there were Sitting Bull, Custer, and two Indian maidens w h o sang Indian songs. T h e whole program is listed here because it gives some idea of the plays which North Dakotans have enjoyed, and of the genius of the founder who devised new ways of portraying old scenes for occasions, and because it reveals the

T h e Little Country Theatre

47

ingenious use made of outdoor, as well as indoor, equipment, thereby adding much to the unusual flavor of the production. A THEATER

DIRECTOR ON T H E E X T E N S I O N

STAFF

T h e influence of the Little Country Theatre is strong throughout the state. Each year Mr. Arvold spends onefourth of his time on the staff of the Agricultural Extension Service, traveling to various districts holding training schools for potential drama directors and actors. Mr. Arvold carries with him numerous plays, bulletins, program helps, and pictures, and one of the most perfect little-theater models ever built. Men, women, boys, and girls sit by the hour fascinated by its magic in demonstrations. With the turn of a hand Mr. Arvold can change his scenery and absolutely transform the little stage from an outdoor to an indoor setting, from a period scene to an ultra-modern scene, from a farm kitchen to a city drawing room. Groups have an opportunity to talk over plays, discuss all sorts of problems, for example, the possibility for new playhouses, organization for festivals, and hundreds of subjects akin to the theater. T h u s , Mr. Arvold's genius not only carries drama into the prairie country but also draws people to Fargo to witness it. T h i s is a two-way project, and it has been since the beginning. Newspaper clippings tell what has happened in little places in every part of the state as a result of this thirty-year project. One community six miles from a railroad has built a community hall costing 12,500. Residents divided the cost, the hall was duly dedicated by the local pastor, and it has been used continually ever since. Annual "Play Days" are held in some forty counties. T h e r e are harvest and lilac festivals. Mr. Arvold says, "Lilacs thrive

48

T h e Little Country Theatre

in N o r t h D a k o t a . W e w a n t p e o p l e to p l a n t more a n d more of them a l o n g the roadsides." So every y e a r the lilac festival, w o r k e d out differently each time by the students, stands as a great state come-together day. C o m m u n i t y halls h a v e developed in lofts over post offices, in barns (after the hay has been removed), in vacant stores, a b a n d o n e d churches, a n d in r u r a l schools. Play contests have been held in m a n y sections of the state. T y p i c a l r u r a l n e w s p a p e r clippings f o r o n e week on the subject of d r a m a show nine county, three district, one township, and thirteen school contests, seven declamation contests, seven oratorical contests, a n d one f a c u l t y tournament, besides many one-act plays presented by lodges, d r a m a societies, W . P. A . a n d club g r o u p s . COUNTY ONE-ACT P L A Y

PROJECT

T h i s is w h a t h a p p e n e d in one typical county, R i c h l a n d C o u n t y , u n d e r the supervision of the C o u n t y Superintendent of Schools, w h o l a u n c h e d a one-act p l a y project in 1 9 3 5 . T h e idea struck fire, a n d sixty-five plays were presented during the year. M r . A r v o l d served in an advisory capacity a n d as j u d g e at the finals held in W a h p u t a n , the county seat. M o n e y earned f r o m pay p e r f o r m a n c e s has been used f o r extra e q u i p m e n t in schools. Better stages h a v e been built, new curtains have been purchased, a n d parent-teacher organizations in that county h a v e g a i n e d a vitality they had not k n o w n in years. In the county stories are told a b o u t a f a r m e r w h o allowed his beard to g r o w f o r ten days so that he m i g h t play with conviction the part of a f a r m h a n d in Sons of the Soil; about a farmer's son whose portrayal of the son in the same play caused h i m to decide that f a r m l i f e was w o r t h living after

T h e Little Country Theatre

49

all; about the members of a family who, with a rural teacher, were snowed in for several days and found great fun in rehearsing for the play Suppressed Desires during the long evenings. Drifts having made trips to town impossible the owner of a 1,180 acre farm, his wife, his eight-year-old son (who served as prompter), his ten-year-old daughter (who was an understudy), and the marooned school-teacher became so expert in the acting o£ their play that they won first place in the 1936 contest. In some communities the stage is often the barn floor with lanterns for footlights; and the burlap cover over the binder has been known to serve as a curtain. In one village there is a theater seating 175 above a country store. Because more than half the population is foreign born or of foreign parentage there is special interest in nationality plays, folk songs, and folk music. In one community in North Dakota one may listen to a purely Icelandic program with the chants of the Vikings echoing across the prairie country; and this, in spite of the fact that drought has killed the crops these last few years, that scarcely a tree is alive, and that cattle have had to be sold because of the lack of an adequate supply of feed, and that many of the farmers are on relief. What a stanchness this means! Poverty, discouragement, and want cannot triumph over this community. It sings in the very face of death. T h e Little Country Theatre has proved a social force by bringing out different forms of social recreation in the national life of foreign groups. On one occasion twenty men and women, Icelanders living in rural North Dakota, staged a scene showing the home life of fifty years ago in their native land. T h e scene so interested young people of other nationalities in the audience that they developed the same

5o

The Little Country Theatre

k i n d o f p r o g r a m in t h e i r o w n g r o u p s , a n d a g a i n history was m a d e at the L i t t l e T h e a t r e . A N o r w e g i a n

farmer,

having

a t t e n d e d several p r o d u c t i o n s , w e n t h o m e a n d staged a play in a n e m p t y h a y l o f t w i t h f a r m l a n t e r n s for lights, b r a n c h e s o f trees for scenery, p l a n k s o r b o x e s for seats, a n d a p h o n o g r a p h for o r c h e s t r a . O n e h u n d r e d a n d fifty p e o p l e saw t h e play. H e r e a n o t h e r A r v o l d i s m seems p e r t i n e n t : It is not until country people can be made aware of their surroundings and to realize there are "tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones" that we shall have a healthy civilization in America. T h e drama is a medium through which America must inevitably express its highest form of democracy. I t must be considered more in a sociological sense than in a literary and art sense. W h e n people awaken to the infinite possibilities which lie hidden in themselves through the impulse of a vitalized drama, they will be less eager to move to cities, and the moral tone of the country will be improved. W h a t country people want is life. T h e y must work out their own civilization. Individuals and groups throughout just that.

the state a r e

doing

VII

Informal Drama in Community Planning in Ohio and New York Every rural community has untapped human resources and raw materials which need organisation for pleasures and profits to the individual members of that community.1

T H E idea from which the Little Country Theatre developed and which grew so abundantly in North Dakota has spread over the country during the last fifteen years. Professor A . M. Drummond, of Cornell University, introduced it to state-fair visitors, in Syracuse, in 1919; and during the next four years the Cornell Dramatic C l u b produced plays before large, enthusiastic audiences. Some of the best-known state drama leaders have received their training under Professor Drummond, at Cornell. Meanwhile the germ has spread to many other states which began to see at county fairs plays produced by their own local little-theater groups. In 1921 it reached Ohio, where a rural Red Cross secretary suggested that Butler County organize a County R u r a l Community Theatre. T h e first performance was held in competition with midway gasoline engines, tractors, and race horses. T h e Fair Board, however, became interested immediately and leased to the theater group an old dining hall on the grounds. T h i s has now been equipped with stage, scenery, and chairs, but plans are under way for a new building. Enthusiasm spread from county to county until the demand 1 Paul Hanna, Youth

P· 23.

Serves the Community,

D. Appleton Company,

52

Drama in Community Planning

for assistance reached the college of agriculture, and in 1925 a full-time specialist was employed. A survey conducted that year for the purpose of determining needs emphasized the following: a desire for better types of plays and for h e l p in costuming and make-up, in stage and scenery construction, and in the organizing and conducting of play tournaments. T h e r e was held a series of training meetings at which the whole subject was discussed and demonstrated. A m o n g the matters considered were: the value of home-talent plays; the choosing and casting of a play; coaching, directing, and acting; scenery, lighting, and stage equipment; costume and make-up; organizing for home-talent lyceum courses and rural community theaters. REVIVAL

OF

FARMERS'

INSTITUTES

T h e story of the arts in the Extension Service program in Ohio is today similar to that in many other states, revealing a glowing example of success because of long-time community planning, meeting people half way, furnishing material when needed, and making use of the best leadership and talent available for developing a whole region normally. In 1930 J . P. Schmidt, formerly a county agent, came to the staff of the Extension Service as assistant professor in research in the field of community organization. H e decided that farmers' institutes, those original farmers' activities which years ago started the ball rolling toward the development of Extension Service, should not die but should be made over to meet the needs of the day. According to his plan for reorganization he determined that these events should not be concerned with production alone but should include those other topics which go to make up valuable community conferences. Gradually the old-time type of in-

Drama in Community Planning

53

stitute was dropped; new interest was aroused in local communities, and local institutes were organized. T h e main interest was ever in community organization, and work was begun in those centers which were eager to develop new ways of working out their local problems. Speakers were rounded up. Information was secured on trends and conditions. Experiments in self-study and group-planning were launched. T h e Alexandria experiment, begun in 1930, is noted here because so far it has resulted in one of the most outstanding rural programs in the state and also because it led to a threeday drama festival of the type which might well be duplicated in more communities in the country. T h e partial account is given by Mrs. Foster T y l e r , a leading spirit in the Alexandria community. At the Fanners' Institute held in the Alexandria High School Auditorium in January 1930, Dr. Cash appeared on the program and told of a talk with Mr. Devilbiss. T h e latter had come to Alexandria hunting the grave of his grandfather who had been the founder of the town. When he arrived in Alexandria, the grandson was horrified to find the tombstone torn down and serving as a part of the foundation of a near-by garage. Dr. Cash suggested that the year 1930 was the centennial of the founding of the town and would provide an opportunity to make proper restitution to the founder for the neglect of his grave. While Dr. Cash was speaking, the Licking County Home Demonstration Agent, suggested to the woman seated next to her, "What an opportune time to institute a movement for definite community betterment." After some discussion of the subject, these two women went to Mr. J . P. Schmidt, the state supervisor of farmers' institutes, and asked him if his department would be willing to assist with such a community betterment program. He gladly gave his consent. Accordingly, a few weeks later, the officers of the next year's institute met with Mr. Schmidt, the county agent, and home agent, in the southeast room on the first floor of the high school building.

54

Drama in Community

Planning

At this meeting it was decided to invite each organization of the community which had to do with the welfare of Alexandria to send one or two representatives to a future meeting to study the community. It was decided to appoint five people to represent the community at large. Later a second meeting was attended by about twenty representatives of the different organizations. Much discussion was given to the subject "What does our community comprise?" It was decided that "our community" could not be precisely defined, but that it was composed of persons who had some interest (either educational, social, religious or economic) centering in Alexandria. Considerable discussion followed as to the needs of the community; and a list of eleven of these were placed on the board. They included: ι. Church problem a. Need for better church attendance b. Need for church unity 2. Recreational problem a. Wholesome recreational program for young people b. Recreation for adults c. Better playground equipment and more playground space 3. Rural electrification a. Many people of community desiring high-tension service 4. Beautification a. Removal of foundation of Old Baptist Church b. Landscaping of public buildings c. Landscaping of homes in community d. Removal of sign boards 5. Proper celebration of Memorial Day 6. A local industry A few weeks later, the group again met at the high school. Mr. Schmidt brought with him from Columbus, C. E. Lively, rural sociologist, and W. H. Thompson, field secretary of the Ohio Council of Churches. T h e evening was spent in discussion of the community church problems. About a month later, Mr. Schmidt brought to the community Mr. Blauser of the Ohio State University Engineering Extension Department. T o this meeting the whole community was invited. A good-sized crowd listened to a discussion of ways and means of securing electric current. Some representatives of electric companies were present also and spoke briefly.

Drama in Community Planning

55

Finally, a community Council was duly organized, and during the next five years many projects were sponsored, guided or aided by this planning group. FESTIVAL

M A R K S SUCCESS OF

PROGRAM

In 1935 was h e l d the A l e x a n d r i a F e s t i v a l — " A R u r a l Dramatics F e s t i v a l a n d H o m e C o m i n g " w h i c h c a m e a b o u t as j u s t o n e of the n a t u r a l e v e n t s in a d a y t i m e c o m m u n i t y prog r a m . P e o p l e h a d b e e n p r o u d to w o r k t o g e t h e r in A l e x a n dria. D u r i n g the five years m u c h h a d b e e n 1 lie first u n d e r t a k i n g

accomplished.

w a s to secure electricity

for

many

tarms. T h e C o u n c i l s p o n s o r e d a mass m e e t i n g of representatives of the p o w e r c o m p a n i e s , the u n i v e r s i t y , a n d the farmers; a n d as a result h i g h - t e n s i o n lines were to be c o n s t r u c t e d within a month. A beautification project was undertaken: u n s i g h t l y b i l l b o a r d s w e r e r e m o v e d , the p a r k w a s b e a u t i f i e d , h o m e s t e a d s w e r e l a n d s c a p e d . A fine a t h l e t i c field a n d playg r o u n d s p a c e at t h e s c h o o l w a s s e c u r e d at a cost of

five

d o l l a r s . A C o m m u n i t y P l a y D a y w a s h e l d in 1934, a n d the n e x t y e a r the C o u n c i l s p o n s o r e d e l e v e n a d u l t classes a t t e n d e d by a b o u t t h r e e h u n d r e d persons. " T h e F e s t i v a l " w a s a m e a n s of m a r k i n g progress a n d of e n c o u r a g i n g the a c c o m p l i s h m e n t of m a n y m o r e p r o j e c t s i n the f u t u r e . It b e g a n o n L a b o r D a y , 1935, a n d it was t h e first e v e n t of the k i n d e v e r h e l d in O h i o . D u r i n g the five years u n d e r the l e a d e r s h i p of R .

Bruce

T o m , a t h o r o u g h l y t r a i n e d , c o m m u n i t y - m i n d e d , s k i l l f u l recr e a t i o n e x p e r t , plays of the better sort h a d b e e n a p a r t of A l e x a n d r i a ' s life. H e r e was a n o p p o r t u n i t y 10 d e m o n s t r a t e to r u r a l O h i o the m a n y w h o l e s o m e uses of g o o d d r a m a . It was d e t e r m i n e d t h a t t h e r e s h o u l d

"be no Unclc

Reuben

s t u f f " in t h e festival. " R u r a l A c t i v i t i e s D a y " b e g a n the c e l e b r a t i o n , w i t h spe-

56

Drama in C o m m u n i t y

Planning

cial attention to the work of farm organization, 4-H Club work for boys and girls. In the afternoon plays were given by Camp Fire Girls and the Grange; and at the close there was an address by the Master of the National Grange. On Sunday, a colorful outdoor pageant was presented, illustrating the values of drama in the country-church program. On Home Coming Day there was a parade in which the recreations of the community were represented and five neighborhood plays were given. In the evening, the Gilbert and Sullivan opera, Trial by Jury, was presented. Costumes for the play cost only $8.00. Lodges loaned robes. T h e opera was given twice in one evening to accommodate the crowds, and was repeated by request at the Country Life Conference in connection with Dr. Galpin's talk on " M y Philosophy of Country Life." Added to these events were marionette shows, exhibits of agricultural products, band concerts and other musical events, a flower show, and an art exhibit. An entire community worked to make this festival a success; and many other counties and communities have held the same kind of entertainment during the last five years. For eight years Miami County, Ohio, has sponsored hometalent lyceum courses, with 3,300 people on the subscription list. Plans are arranged by leaders from eleven communities, who have headquarters in the County Extension agent's office. At the close a gathering of all the participants is held for an evening of fun, group singing, one-act plays, quadrilles, social dancing, and refreshments. This plan for providing a county with wholesome entertainment is resulting in the discovery of new talent, in the demonstration of new ways to develop leisure-time activities of interest to young and old, in encouragement to community co-operation, in

Drama in C o m m u n i t y

Planning

57

the development and maintenance of an appreciation for clean entertainment at low cost, in the promotion of good music and the awakening of a new sense of satisfaction in accomplishment on the part of all who participate. In Washington C o u n t y each community instead of putting on a separate program last year joined in a county event beginning with a picnic, which nine hundred attended, followed by a pageant, Whicfi

Way Agriculture?,

which con-

sisted of twenty-two episodes depicting the development of farming since 1795. It was staged in front of a grandstand on

the fair grounds. Actors included representatives

of

Grange, farmers' clubs, Farm Bureau, fair boards, and others. T w o hundred adults and four hundred 4-H C l u b members were in the cast. T h e pageant was built around farm, home, and community, with citizenship as the keynote. T w o readers told the story with the aid of two microphones and loud speakers. Statistics on drama for 1935 in the co-operative extension work in agriculture and home economics in the State of O h i o show the following: county leadership-training meetings in sixty-eight counties; home-talent lyceum courses, rural community theater or play exchange in all eighty-eight counties

(forty-two counties have organized

home-talent

courses), at least one stage remodeled or built with scenery and lights in every county where training courses were held, courses in dramatics at summer youth conferences in camps, play-loan service (4,040 copies loaned in 1935), planned rural-talent programs for Farmers' Week, bulletins on directing, acting, and stage and scenery construction. In O h i o changes have come about slowly, but on a sound basis. T h e camp movement which started spontaneously fifteen years ago has grown to the point where there is now

58

D r a m a in C o m m u n i t y

Planning

a c a m p w i t h i n easy reach of every c o u n t y ; and these c a m p s are used by g r o u p s of boys a n d girls, m e n and w o m e n , a n d m e m b e r s of m a n y k i n d s of organizations. 4-H

CLUB

ON

A

COLLEGE

CAMPUS

It is significant that o n the college c a m p u s there is a U n i versity 4-H C l u b w h i c h i n c l u d e s any student w h o has been a 4-H m e m b e r . T h e g r o u p is affiliated with the A m e r i c a n C o u n t r y L i f e A s s o c i a t i o n . T h i s year six m e m b e r s of this c l u b were g i v e n j o b s in c o u n t i e s as assistant extension agents, a n d consequently they secured t r a i n i n g for f u t u r e positions. Sixteen were g r o u p leaders at the State 4-H Congress.

I'hey

remained t h r o u g h the C o u n t r y L i f e m e e t i n g and served as Professor L i v e l y ' s assistants in c a r r y i n g the responsibility for that c o n f e r e n c e . There

are p l a n n e d

study p r o g r a m s

for county

agents.

C o u n t y school s u p e r i n t e n d e n t s and representatives of

the

State C o u n c i l of C h u r c h e s c o m e together to discuss the imp r o v i n g of p r o g r a m s in c h u r c h and school and the relationship of one to the other. Ohio

sees

the

program

whole

and

is d e v e l o p i n g

an

all-round social-recreational p r o g r a m to its fullest extent. Attention sources,

is b e i n g g i v e n people,

to w h o l e c o m m u n i t i e s ; a n d re-

equipment,

tudes, o r g a n i z a t i o n , a n d

historical

background,

atti-

present p r o g r a m are taken

into

consideration. A g a i n it is difficult to separate the different phases of the projects. T h e p l a n includes emphasis o n the i m p o r t a n c e of r u r a l meetings, on dramatics,

recreational

leadership a n d c o m m u n i t y p l a n n i n g , a n d in and

through

all a l i n k i n g of the e c o n o m i c w i t h the arts. D u r i n g the last three years, the d r a m a p r o g r a m has g a i n e d the m o m e n t u m to carry itself along. R e q u e s t s are n o w com-

Drama in Community Planning

59

ing thick and fast for further leadership training. Camps, conferences, institutes and g r o u p meetings are settings for training in creative leisure-activity, program-planning, community analysis, and they extend their influence as wide as the state is wide.

THE

CAROLINE

VALLEY

FESTIVAL

T h e long-time community-planning idea is, of course, not u n i q u e in Ohio. New York and many other states work on much the same basis; and stories of their joyous home-made programs bear witness to their virility and success. Mary Eva Duthie, for several years responsible for organizing rural drama and recreation in New York State, says: O u r emphasis is always u p o n firm f o u n d a t i o n s locally, on b u i l d i n g permanent f o u n d a t i o n s so that the p r o g r a m grows normally from its own strong roots. It is not so m u c h what happens in the " b i g t e n t " on a huge state-wide scale, that matters as much as it is in co-operative work with folks in local communities in h e l p i n g them to build their o w n satisfactory p r o g r a m .

Extension

Service works quietly in N e w York

State-

quietly, sincerely, and vividly. T h e strength of its program lies in solid, firm foundations for creation of a satisfactory community life. T h e Caroline Valley Festival, to which reference has already been made, is an e x a m p l e of informal dramatic enterprise which sends a whole area toward higher ground, and marks the speeding-up of neighborhood spirit and a new friendliness along " M a i n Street" and along the by-ways. It happened one afternoon near Salterville Springs, New York. T h e Tompkins

County

Rural

News

of Wednesday,

M a y 13, 1936, tells of the beginnings of the project:

6o

Drama in Community Planning

C a r o l i n e V a l l e y is p l a n n i n g a festival. T h e groups represented are: the choir of the C a r o l i n e Federated C h u r c h , the Caroline 4 - H C l u b , the Y o u n g People's G r o u p of the Federated Church, the Y o u n g A d u l t group, C a r o l i n e G r a n g e N o . 2 3 1 , the Speedsville School, W . C . T . U., the Slaterville School, C o d d i n g t o n R o a d School, Eastern Star and M a s o n i c organizations.

It was decided that each g r o u p would prepare its own program and offer the best f r o m that program as its contribution to the festival. T h u s , the "headaches of tedious group rehearsals in busy days" were avoided. Each scene would be a surprise to every g r o u p except the one in action. W h e n not on the stage the actors could sit in the audience, and instead of using a new-fangled revolving stage, a revolving audience was to be an interesting experiment. A week later, the News

announced:

Plans are g o i n g ahead nicely. Several more groups have signified a desire to join in the festivities. T h e festival is being planned on a non-competitive basis. T h e r e will be no attempt at a finished dramatic production. T h e keynote will be enjoyment of folkgames, folk-songs, a n d group-singing for sheer pleasure of participating in such activity. It is the hope of all those interested that the C a r o l i n e Valley Festival will come to be an annual event to be looked f o r w a r d to with eagerness a n d to be enjoyed as a means of increasing friendliness a n d community well-being.

T h e n came the appointed day. T h e place chosen for the festival was a natural amphitheater at the foot of a wooded glade. T h e 4-H boys took the responsibility for marking the route. Spectators were advised to bring cushions or blankets, for there were no seats on the daisy-covered hillside. T h e spectators were urged to come in costume, and a vivid, picturesque audience they made. Nearly three hundred persons made their way to the Gallagher F a r m on the C a n a a n R o a d that afternoon of J u n e

Drama in Community Planning

61

20. R o l a n d Mulhauser, of Brooktondale, T r a v e l i n g Librarian f o r T o m p k i n s County, was master of ceremonies and " m a d e the welkin ring with old-time airs f r o m his accordion." T h e program included a Z u n i I n d i a n corn dance; a pageant, " T h e Early Days of Speedville"; the W. C. T . U. fashion parade, showing early American dresses; a trombone solo; play party games; 4-H C l u b songs; negro spirituals; French-horn and oboe solos; folk dances; and finally songs of covered-wagon days. T o the " c a l l i n g " of R a y Griffin the g r o u p swung into two sets of square dances. Refreshments were served, and the festival was proclaimed a success. It was spontaneous, enthusiastic, colorful, good f u n ; it was a production of, for, and by the folks w h o live in Caroline Valley; it has already proved valuable in planning f o r next year's community development. It is this kind of material—the best each group has to offer—that often finds its way into pure folk drama; and as such material is only too scarce, it should be nourished and cherished. T h e r e were no Barrymores in the cast. T h e staging was crude in many ways, and no attempt was made to hide the mechanics. Something happened, however, during the production of this festival, the v a l u e of which cannot be estimated, f o r it is hidden in the spirit of the actors and the audience; it can be told only as time goes on and this festival is followed by other events. T h e origin of this festival lay in the visit of a leading resident of Caroline Valley to M a r y E v a Duthie, of the staff of Agricultural Extension Service. " W h a t can we do about all these contests?" was the question of the visitor, w h o added, " M y small son simply hates the songs that have to be sung in contests." Miss Duthie (for years a specialist in recreation) and her caller discussed at length the possibilities f o r events that might take the place of the contests. A f t e r

62

Drama in C o m m u n i t y Planning

her return to Caroline Valley this leader talked with other leaders. Interest grew, plans developed, and a committee composed of representatives of every interested organization was formed. T h e Caroline Festival was the result; a n d in five short weeks the valley h a d outgrown the adolescentcontest age. A DRAMA

GUILD IS

PLANNED

O t h e r counties are beginning to discuss plans for raising dramatic standards, for producing plays on a noncompetitive basis more in line with better educational methods used in other phases of the agricultural program. T h e r e is talk of a state-wide d r a m a guild. At Pulaski the plan was discussed by a group including committee members, a H o m e Demonstration agent, members of acting groups in the neighborhood, a n d Miss Duthie. In spite of the fact that a change from the old contest idea would undoubtedly slow u p production for the present and lessen the interest of some of the d r a m a groups heretofore active in tournaments chiefly because of the money value, this group agreed that the noncompetitive idea has special compensatory values. E x p a n d i n g the project and relying u p o n wholehearted interest in producing good plays well seemed to all present to be the only healthy way to develop the guild idea. Emphasis was added to this plan by the young president of the Pulaski D r a m a Guild, who described the growth of comm u n i t y interest in d r a m a within a group representing all the churches in Pulaski. Baptist, Presbyterian, Episcopal, Methodist, Congregational a n d R o m a n Catholic churches are all represented in an acting group, and some of the pastors are playing leading parts in their plays. These play-

Drama in Community Planning

63

ers have nursed their p r o j e c t t h r o u g h three years of slow d e v e l o p m e n t , u n t i l n o w there are so many w h o wish to take part that a j u n i o r g r o u p has been organized for the production of plays in w h i c h n e w recruits may try their wings. M e m b e r s of the G u i l d are ever on the alert to find n e w talent and to devise ways of raising sufficient funds to pay royalties. They have p l a y e d before many kinds of audience, and o f t e n their plays are presented in place of a Sundaye v e n i n g c h u r c h service. T h e y have f r o m the first co-operated w i t h m a n y o t h e r agencies in Pulaski. T h e firemen's organization, C h a m b e r of C o m m e r c e , and A m e r i c a n L e g i o n k n o w that w h e n the G u i l d is in charge of their social p r o g r a m there is n o need to worry a b o u t s u p p o r t or success in prod u c t i o n . T h e y o u n g , talented president wrote and staged an A r m i s t i c e D a y pageant for the L e g i o n , and the w h o l e comm u n i t y t u r n e d out to participate in, or to witness, the production.

E x c h a n g e p r o g r a m s have stimulated

interest

in

g r o u p s in other c o m m u n i t i e s . By means of demonstrations a n d visits of the m e m b e r s of the G u i l d it is p l a n n e d to greatly increase the enthusiasm for this type of d r a m a in the northern N e w Y o r k area. T h e s e players are p l a y i n g for the love of it. T h e y

have

their o w n budget, pay their o w n bills, and have a tidy sum tucked a w a y for emergencies. Players take turns in p l a y i n g , staging, a n d directing. T h e y avoid any idea of c o m p e t i t i o n , and therefore they are able to avoid

the dangers of

the

t o u r n a m e n t idea, a c c o r d i n g to w h i c h players too o f t e n enter the contest u n p r e p a r e d and bent only u p o n w i n n i n g a m o n e y prize. T h e president's story has given impetus to the plans for f u t u r e d r a m a events sponsored by the A g r i c u l t u r a l Extension Service, f t is believed that m a n y new g r o u p s will b e eager to f o l l o w the g u i l d idea because it has in it s o u n d

64

Drama

in C o m m u n i t y

Planning

philosophy of service as well as the promise of satisfaction to whole areas, professional a p p r o a c h to a great subject, a n d wide a p p e a l f o r co-operative e n d e a v o r in the interest of m o r e satisfactory h o m e c o m m u n i t y entertainment. T h e tri-county tournament held in N o v e m b e r , 1936, at Pulaski included three excellent plays f o r w h i c h n o prizes were offered; but ratings were given on the basis of selection, acting, direction, staging, a n d interpretation. A l l three plays showed the results of the c a r e f u l training of local leadership w h i c h is at the core of the w o r k with d r a m a in the state. COMMUNITY PLANNING THROUGH

COUNCILS

Dotted all over N e w Y o r k State are communities w h i c h through the co-operative efforts of local residents a n d the department of R u r a l Social Organization of the State College of A g r i c u l t u r e have organized c o m m u n i t y councils, recreation councils, a n d councils of social a n d

educational

agencies f o r the development of better living. T h e efficient council in V i r g i l has sponsored m o v i n g pictures, socials, plays, a n d pageants, and has been i n s t r u m e n t a l also in securing an electric-power line through the v i l l a g e and in b r i n g i n g a b o u t other long-needed c o m m u n i t y improvements. T h e members of this council wrote a n d produced a pageant f o r the one-hundredth anniversary celebration of the c o m m u n i t y , f o u n d e d a community f o r u m , a n d sponsored clean-up campaigns. West H i l l has b u i l t and p a i d f o r a c o m m u n i t y

cabin,

w h i c h serves as a general meeting place f o r m a n y organizations. It was soon too small f o r the activities c l a m o r i n g to be housed, a n d an addition has recently been built. T h e J a c k s o n v i l l e C o m m u n i t y C o u n c i l , co-operating w i t h

Drama in Community Planning

65

the T o m p k i n s County Development Association, is busy developing a program in the Jacksonville area. At a community welcome party a craft and hobby exhibit aroused so much interest that the committee voted to repeat the event as a regular part of an annual program. "Everything from footstools to puzzles were on display." In the Community Organization news bulletins, compiled by Robert A. Poison, sociologist on the Extension Service staff, are to be found headlines such as these: "Delaware County Historical Pageant"; "Healthier and Happier Babies in Chemung County"; "Genesee Community Meal Project"; " A Church-sponsored Community Playground";

"Webster

Young People Study Community Needs"; and " M a k i n g Use of Abandoned School Houses." T h e T o m p k i n s County Conference of Public and Welfare Agencies is typical of the organizations in the state which are working toward closer co-operation and co-ordination of agencies. Representatives of the agencies meet four times a year to discuss the possibilities for new developments in the fields of health, education, recreation, music, drama, family and child welfare, county planning, and so forth, and to become acquainted with one anothers' programs. Note the variety of organizations and leaders among its members: County Chapter American Red Cross County Board of Child Welfare County Council of Churches County Council of Boy Scouts of America County Council of Girl Scouts of America Farm Bureau H o m e Bureau J u n i o r Extension County Health Committee Ithaca Chamber of Commerce Ithaca Community Chest

66

D r a m a in C o m m u n i t y

Planning

J u n i o r R e d Cross C o u n t y L i b r a r y Commission C o u n t y Medical Society Pomona Grange Ithaca T u b e r c u l o s i s Association B o a r d of M a n a g e r s of T o m p k i n s C o u n t y L a b o r a t o r y B o a r d of M a n a g e r s of T o m p k i n s C o u n t y S a n a t o r i u m T o m p k i n s C o u n t y W . C. T . U . Tompkins C o u n t y R u r a l Music Festival C o m m i t t e e M e m b e r s of the C o u n t y B o a r d of Supervisors T o m p k i n s C o u n t y C o m m i s s i o n e r of P u b l i c W e l f a r e T h e three district school s u p e r i n t e n d e n t s J u d g e of the C h i l d r e n ' s C o u r t C o u n t y P r o b a t i o n officer Citizens at large interested in the d e v e l o p m e n t of T o m p k i n s County

It is not to be wondered at that from this kind of p l a n n i n g is growing intense interest in the development of a statewide program and a new appreciation of the value o f working together toward c o m m o n goals. In its effort to meet the growing needs in a c h a n g i n g econ o m i c order the Agricultural E x t e n s i o n Service endeavors to develop a m o n g its m e m b e r s "social e n g i n e e r s " m i n d f u l of the needs of the whole m a n . Councils are slowly b u t surely serving in the development of a new k i n d of social structure; and their i m p o r t a n c e is shown strikingly wherever projects are under way. W h e r e local leadership is articulate, virile, self-respecting, and adequate, there are the strong social centers that influence great areas. Sound p l a n n i n g locally means sound p l a n n i n g regionally and nationally. T h e

beginnings

of co-operative endeavor on a grand scale existed that day in the informal g a t h e r i n g at " t h e G a l l a g h e r farm on the Canaan road."

VIII

T h e Making of Native Folk Drama in North Carolina The theatre is irresistible. The people will have it. W'e need a theatre in which the people will have an ACTIVE part—a people's theatre! Such a theatre, rightly organized and directed, will contribute not a little in the formation of a real American culture.1 IN

NORTH

CAROLINA

a successful

state-wide

drama

m o v e m e n t has s p r e a d f r o m the S m o k y M o u n t a i n s to

the

islands in t h e sea. B e h i n d the m o v e m e n t is t h e spirit o f F r e d erick H . K o c h , w h o has g i v e n thirty years to the d e v e l o p ment of American culture through drama. T o him Charles R a n n K e n n e d y w r o t e in a t h i r t i e t h - a n n i v e r s a r y l e t t e r : Your distinction as a scholar, an artist, a citizen, with a deep appreciation of what that much misused term really means, added to a wide knowledge of human life and affairs have combined to make you one of the foremost ornaments of our national creative endeavor. T h e m a p s h o w i n g the e x t e n t to w h i c h the d r a m a

pro-

g r a m covers the S t a t e of N o r t h C a r o l i n a presents a v e r i t a b l e n e t w o r k . T o C h a p e l H i l l c o m e p e o p l e f r o m little places a n d big

places,

bringing

plays

to

the

annual

festival.

From

C h a p e l H i l l go the P l a y m a k e r s on a n a n n u a l t o u r , c r o s s i n g a n d r e c r o s s i n g t h e state a n d in t h e i r t u r n b l a z i n g n e w trails for f u t u r e d r a m a t i c i n t e r e s t . ι Frederick H. Koch, Play Bill.

68

Folk Drama

Dr. Koch and his splendid technical staff work with students in play making; while the University Extension Service sends John Parker throughout the state to help groups of leaders and amateur players, even in remote little communities in the mountains, and to share his time with various farm groups under Agricultural Extension Service. From the Chapel Hill campus lines also go out to the W. P. A. headquarters in Raleigh, to other colleges, to the State Board of Education, and to the State Board of Health. The North Carolina folk plays represent the first real native drama coming out of any American state; and today these plays are acted all over the United States, in the British Isles, and in Hawaii. HOW T H E P L A Y M A K E R S ' T H E A T E R

STARTED

Dr. Koch became a member of the University of North Carolina faculty in 1918. He found that up to that time plays had been produced in old Gerrard Hall, which had a platform only eight inches high. For special occasions a stage was built over the front rows of seats. The actors dressed in the Υ. M. C. A. building across the road and entered the stage through a side window. The hall was used for daily chapel exercises, consequently props and furniture had to be put away after each rehearsal. Fortunately the use of the new Chapel Hill School auditorium was offered in 1918. Its equipment had certain advantages over that of Gerrard Hall, and it was decided that a proscenium arch might be designed and a curtain rigged up. On this makeshift stage appeared the first play under the "Proff's" regime. (Those who know and love him call him "Proff") It was Peggy, a tragedy of tenant farm life, with its setting in a drab cabin; a gripping drama of hard-

Folk Drama

69

won existence on the southern hill farm. Here, too, was produced Paul Green's first play, The Last of the Louries, a story of the neighborhood this student of Harnett County knew so well, which was to become the forerunner of plays that have "extended the borders of American dramatic literature." With the formation of the Carolina Playmakers, a new era was begun. For seven years plays were rehearsed here and there and produced in the auditorium of the village school. T h e n came the dedication of the beautiful theater building on the campus, remodeled from an old library building, which as " T h e Playmakers' Theatre," was the first building in America to be dedicated to its own native drama. Here in this colonial, pillared, romantic building, real American folk drama has come of age. Dr. Koch defines folk drama as "the work of a single artist dealing consciously with the folk-ways of our less sophisticated and more elemental people who live simple lives apart from the responsibilities of a highly organized social order. T h e term applies to that form of drama which is earthrooted in the lives of struggling humanity." He also says: In order to be considered as art, play-writing must be intensely local. T h e only art that has become universal has been intensely local. Everybody is potentially an artist and everybody should be an artist in his own tongue. In the making of an American drama we need to cherish the locality; if it be faithfully interpreted, it will show us the way to the universal. If we can see the lives of those about us with understanding imagination, why may we not interpret them in significant images for all?

T h u s in North Carolina a new people's theater is in the making; a theater of the people, of fresh dramatic forms, and in terms of their own life; a theater of a new social order, and of a thousand American scenes.

7o

Folk Drama

Beginning in September, 1936, with the opening of the new drama department, a theater-minded student may work toward either a Bachelor's or a Master's degree in Dramatic Art at the University of North Carolina.

CHAPEL

HILL'S

Productions

I-OREST T H E A T E R

in

the

Playmakers'

Theatre

have

drawn

thrilled audiences; but there is also a lovely outdoor Forest T h e a t e r where thunderous applause was given in May, to the Playmakers' production of Lysistrata.

193(3,

Here on this

beautiful tree-shaded campus drama runs the whole gamut from original, one-act American folk plays to the classics of Aristophanes. T h i s bowl-shaped amphitheater is fragrant with honeysuckle; mockingbirds sing in the great trees that f o r m a limitless cyclorama and serve as a perfect sounding board. Great plays have been produced in this natural theater: A Midsummer-Night's Tauris,

Dream,

Hamlet,

Iphigeneia

in

and now, in the true spirit in which it was written,

the Playmakers have produced Lysistrata,

one of the great-

est peace plays ever written. Herbert Meadow, one of the f o u r professional playwrights resident in C h a p e l H i l l as a worker on the Federal T h e a t r e project, writes in a review of the production: It is a clear cool evening, tingling with the romance of the First Night. W e peer at o u r program: " D i r e c t e d by Frederick K o c h , Settings by Samuel Seiden, Music composed by G l e n Hayd e n . " T h e music comes through the trees now, as the lights slowly f a d e and utter darkness rushes in. It is a muted, weird, q u i v e r i n g cadence—somehow exactly what we expected. T h e setting begins to glow and a moment later we are roused to a p p l a u s e by a sight of indescribable beauty. Deep, broad, p r o u d , white steps m o u n t stiffly, and suddenly form a right angle, d r i v i n g straight at the great bronze gates of the Acropolis. T h e square-stone towers of

Folk Drama

7»

the latter are set with plaques, depicting the goddess Pallas Athena. Over all, the steps, the towers, the rocks upon which they stand, are the delicate pastel shades of the Athenian dawn.

Here we have the height of beautiful setting; and it is described here because it points to a perfection possible only where skillful leadership is available. People on the campus say, "Proff lights the torch; Sam Seiden trims the wicks." It is to the co-operative, patient working-out of creative ideas by Playmakers and skilled staff that such productions are possible. T h e method used in laboratory play writing must be described here also; for it is unique and extremely interesting as an educational process. Attend an evening of experimental plays written, directed, staged, and produced by students. T h e r e is a most informal atmosphere. "Proff" and his dog Patsy arrive, the former with his pipe well filled and lighted. T h e first two rows of seats are filled with children who silently leave their places after the second play, because they are to be the actors in the next-to-the-last play of the evening. In the audience are professors and their wives, guests from the hotel and the village, and students. T h e author of the first play rises and tells why he has written the play, where he secured his material, how he has treated it. T h e n the play is given, after which the whole audience is encouraged to discuss it with the author. Weak and strong points are brought out, and other interpretations are suggested. All these criticisms and suggestions are taken into consideration the following morning when Dr. Koch and Mr. Seiden meet the play-writing group in a regular class. T h i s same procedure is repeated for all of the plays and brings about a friendly, informal, sympathetic working atmosphere that is the very soul of the Playmakers' efforts.

Folk Drama

72

THE WORKSHOP IDEA T h e r e is something a b o u t working together in classes, in workshop, and in rehearsals, as well as in p l a n n i n g the work to be done, that makes for complete confidence, which is the foundation for this world-famous theater. T h e r e is a brimming-over spirit of freedom for creative endeavor in the theater, the workshop, the green room, the office of " P r o f f , " and in the museum, which is new and the pride and joy of this amazing director who can play Hamlet as well as Mercutio and who says, " I never intended to start a folk movement but I found myself in the great stream of it and have spent my life trying to keep up with i t . " In his About

Ourselves,

Harry Overstreet describes Pro-

fessor Koch as " a great teacher, who believes in the dreams that lie hidden beneath the m i n d of the c o m m o n p l a c e in his students." Dr. Koch's method of work is based on inspiration. Something of his philosophy of work is revealed by the following incident. In the middle of a business interview he suddenly stopped, swung around in his chair, and said, " T h e longer I live, the more I realize that the best thing I can do is to lay my hand on someone's shoulder and encourage him to go as far as he can. N o one can actually teach a creative subject but I can pass on the torch to those who can carry i t . " T h e n he went on with his interview. It is not often that university players are known throughout the state and far beyond its borders. T h e North Carolina Playmakers take to the road once a year in their own bus, which carries the cast, the director, and the stage equipment. T h e y have made thirty-six tours in all, traveling up and down and across North Carolina,

into

neighboring

states, and once to St. Louis, New York, Washington, and

Folk Drama

73

Boston. In 1936 they were invited to appear on the program during the Texas celebration. These players have added a rich and splendid encouragement to our native drama. T h a t they are playing true to life makes the project more than merely interesting. They carry their audiences into negro cabins, into the cotton mill, to a village on a branch line in the mountains, down to the sea, into T i n Pan Alley, into a great university, through the tobacco fields, into the drawing rooms of great houses of the long ago in the old South. It is not to be wondered at that the influence of the Playmakers' Theatre has spread throughout the state. T h e best of it is that in North Carolina there is a unified approach. In the same year that the Carolina Playmakers came into existence the Bureau of Community Drama was organized in the Extension Division of the university to encourage the producing of plays in the schools and little places in the state. From the first, encouragement has been given to the writing of original plays drawn from the native folk life of the region. Each year a drama festival and state tournament bring together more and more people. In 1936, 314 players and directors produced 31 plays, 11 of them original. Participants traveled hundreds of miles, bringing their own scenery and props. One group from northeast North Carolina brought a whole load of colonial furniture with its owner to oversee it, in order that a play with a typical colonial setting should not fall short in any detail. Thirty-five hundred people were in the festival audiences. T R A V E L I N G INSTRUCTOR ADDED T O EXTENSION S T A F F

In 1935, through the generosity of the Rockefeller Foundation, the Extension Division of the University of North Carolina was able to add to its staff a traveling instructor

74

Folk

Drama

in dramatic art, J o h n Parker, Playmaker alumnus. W i t h the state for his campus, he set out to meet the increasing demands for help in play making among potential leaders and amateur actors behind the mountains. He has traveled more than 30,000 miles, holding training schools in play production in more than sixty communities. T h e students, most of them teachers, received regular university credits applicable toward a degree or toward renewing teachers' certificates. Meanwhile, a secretary for the Bureau of Drama was busy answering requests for help on play selection, design in scenery, organization of drama clubs, make-up, lighting, and a hundred and one other subjects related to the staging of plays in schools, little theatres, and drama clubs. Books of plays were loaned to more than two hundred individuals, and thousands of letters were answered. Sixty-one groups are members of the Drama Association and are entitled to bring their plays to the Festival and to receive copies of The Carolina

Stage, a news bulletin grow-

ing out of the Play Book, which is the regular magazine published by the Carolina Playmakers. T h i s serves as a clearinghouse for new ideas and suggestions and regularly reviews the dramatic news of the state. Ever since the organization of the Carolina

Dramatic

Association, in 1923, the A n n u a l Festival has been a vital part of the cultural life of the state. It has grown from a small competitive institute to a festival reaching from the f a r corners of North Carolina. Variety makes the event exciting. In 1936 was included a contest for the best fulllength play. A negro group, winners in a negro high school tournament, gave a guest performance. T a l k s were given by a well-known negro director, Mrs. J . M. Crawford, of the

Folk Drama

75

Dumas Players, Akron, Ohio, and by Charles Winterwood, successor to Richard B. Harrison as "De L a w d " in Green

The

Pastures.

Original plays from high-school groups, a play by the Federal T h e a t r e workers from Asheville, and plays from little theaters were also included. A n open forum was conducted by representatives of various phases of dramatic work. "Dramatics as T h e r a p y " was the subject of a talk by W . R. Wunsch, of Black Mountain Experimental College—a subject about which so much has been written this last year. " T h e Unemployed T h e a t r e " was discussed by Mary Dirnberger, state supervisor of the Federal Theatre Project for North Carolina, a playwright, and an ex-Playmaker. She is working closely with the regional director, Frederick

H.

Koch. "Drama in C. C. C. Camps" was the topic of another Playmaker alumnus, George Pearson, who is also now with the Federal T h e a t r e Project. T h e festival included a puppet show by a high-school group that had built both puppets and stage. Dr. Koch spoke on the " T h e a t r e Renascent." Phoebe Barr and a group of dancers gave a demonstration for actors. T h e r e was place on the program for county, as well as city, high schools, and for junior and senior colleges. T h e r e were English dances and country dances by children and by students from Black Mountain. T h e r e were exhibits of stage models, posters and programs, costume plates, and scrapbooks in the great Memorial Building, where tea was served. T h e author of each original play that was selected for presentation at the Festival received a copy of Carolina Comedies.

Folk

T h e author of the best original play was pre-

sented with the four volumes of Carolina Folk Plays and a volume of Paul Green's one-act plays. T h e winner of the

76

Folk Drama

best long play received the four volumes of Carolina Folk Plays, Paul Green's Long Plays, and the three-act version of Job's Kinsfolks, by Loretto Carroll Bailey, associate director of the Shaw University players and one of the most skilled and interested directors among negro groups. Planners for state-wide contests in other states take notice! Here is a living example of healthy competition; a way to raise standards and keep them high, with all the smallness of the money-prize system left out, but with added investment made possible for individual, group, community, and region in greater development of culture and increased interest in the reading and production of the best plays of the day, as well as for new enthusiasm to work toward perfection in the ever-progressing drama movement. THE NEGRO THEATER IN NORTH CAROLINA

Negroes have taken a very real place among the groups interested in dramatics in North Carolina, with the interest concentrating at Shaw College. Most of the directors are Shaw alumni; many of them have no special dramatic training, but all are interested in further study and experiment. T o Mrs. Loretto Carroll Bailey is due much credit for the fine quality of dramatic work with negro groups. Mrs. Bailey came originally from Winston-Salem. She says that until she went to junior high school she had never seen a play. When Mr. Bailey came to that city to teach in the high school, he developed a great following for the plays that he, as a Playmaker, brought from Chapel Hill. When a Spring Festival was announced, Mrs. Bailey entered her first play in the tournament. It won the Belasco Cup and went to New York City. She says rather apologetically, " I t was 'Roads in Rain'—I have burned it since." After high school she

Folk Drama

77

attended the Woman's College, as Greensboro, and in her freshman year married Mr. Bailey and came to Chapel Hill, where for two years, as a Playmaker, she acted in and wrote plays, and worked with an Industrial Group in dramatics at the Durham Y. W. C. A. She became greatly interested in the possibility of working with negro drama groups while working on a Rockefeller fellowship in play writing. She tells thrilling stories of how a negro group made history on a tour with a play called The Man Who Died at Twelve O'clock. T h e group traveled in a Shaw College bus, played in schools and churches, and once on a platform over the baptistry in a little Baptist church. She says there is no better audience in the country than the negro audience. " T h e y are cruel in their criticism of what is poor, but equally generous in their applause for the good production." T h i s is as it should be. An annual festival is held at Shaw, and the best play produced there goes to the state-wide festival at Chapel Hill. Some of the best work is being done at Charlotte in a Second Ward high school. T h e r e a group made enough money to buy $365 worth of equipment. They were so successful in the preliminaries that they easily won the state prize—the Paul Green Cup. T h i s group gave one of the two best original plays in the whole festival at Chapel Hill. In this school, the students write their own commencement plays under the able direction of their teacher; and they use drama for educational purposes all through the year. Mrs. Bailey said, "Negroes like farce, broad comedy, tragedy and fantasy. T h e i r charm lies in their naturalness. As long as they act naturally they have a good chance to achieve greatness." T h e negro folk theater is progressing in North Carolina. Surplus funds from plays are going into fellow-

78

Folk Drama

s h i p s for f u r t h e r study in c o l l e g e d r a m a t i c associations. Dir e c t o r s a r e c o n t i n u a l l y w r i t i n g to S h a w C o l l e g e for h e l p in p l a y s e l e c t i o n . T h e r e is h e r e a small l o a n l i b r a r y . S h a w has as yet n o a d e q u a t e b u i l d i n g f o r its

theater,

t h o u g h it secures u n u s u a l stage effects. I t has a black cyclor a m a for its m a k e s h i f t stage. C h a p e l H i l l lends some e q u i p m e n t . F o r p r o d u c t i o n t h e g r o u p uses t h e old c o l l e g e c h a p e l ; a n d since this is u s e d e a c h day for classes a n d m e e t i n g s , it is necessary, even as it was in the early days o f the Playm a k e r s , to p u t a w a y a l l p r o p s a f t e r r e h e a r s a l s . T h e

chapel

is k n o w n to b e r a t h e r a fire trap, a n d t h e r e is n o a d e q u a t e w o r k s h o p o r p l a c e t o s t o r e scenery. B u t the s p i r i t is alive. T h e r e a r e p l a n s f o r t h e f u t u r e . T h e i n f l u e n c e o f things acc o m p l i s h e d in h i g h - s c h o o l d r a m a t i c s is b e g i n n i n g to show definitely in c o l l e g e g r o u p s . H o p e s a r e h i g h f o r r e m o d e l i n g t h e old m e d i c a l

b u i l d i n g into an adequate

little

theater

w h e n m o n e y is a v a i l a b l e . M e a n w h i l e n e g r o g r o u p s are acti n g a n d e n j o y i n g plays such as The Dave,

The

Curtain,

The

Two

Man

Pete,

Savings,

Reaction—some

New

Window,

Gifts, Dust

Ti

Yetta,

of the Road,

Ole

o r i g i n a l a n d some n o t

o r i g i n a l , b u t all p l a y e d w i t h a seriousness a n d a vitality that i n s u r e a successful f u t u r e . HUNDREDTH

ANNIVERSARY

OF PUBLIC

EDUCATION

T h e C a r o l i n a P l a y m a k e r s , the d r a m a g r o u p s i n c l u d e d in the m e m b e r s h i p o f t h e S t a t e D r a m a A s s o c i a t i o n , a n d B u r e a u o f C o m m u n i t y D r a m a of the U n i v e r s i t y

the

Extension

D e p a r t m e n t o f t h e U n i v e r s i t y a r e all closely r e l a t e d to the e d u c a t i o n a l d e v e l o p m e n t in the state. S o close, indeed, has b e e n the r e l a t i o n s h i p t h a t this year m a r k s the b e g i n n i n g o f s o m e t h i n g n e w a n d u n i q u e in h i g h - s c h o o l E n g l i s h courses f o r city a n d c o u n t r y . A two-year course in d r a m a t i c s a n d the

Folk Drama

79

special one-year elective course have been included in the new course of study. It is hoped that these courses will provide a means of revitalizing teaching of high-school English by means of the dramatic approach. T h i s means that pupils will have the same English course for the first and fourth years and that they may select alternative courses using basic material in English and drama in the second and third years, for which they may receive one unit of credit in addition to that required in English. Another course is provided in d r a m a for those desiring to elect dramatics in addition to the regular four-year high-school English course; and for it one elective unit may be earned after the first high-school year. "Assistance will be available f r o m time to time from the State Department of Public Instruction, and the B u r e a u of C o m m u n i t y D r a m a , University of North Carolina." A n interesting experiment this, which proves the value of an integrated regional program of the arts. T h e year 1937 marks the hundredth anniversary of the beginning of public education in North Carolina; and since numerous requests have come to the B u r e a u of C o m m u n ity Drama for help in pageant material for the celebration of this event, the pageant-producing committee of the centennial celebration has sent out suggestive material to encourage research, interviews with older residents, and the study of records, histories, and old newspapers. Bibliographies have been prepared, and suggested episodes have been included. Groups in local communities have been urged to write their own pageants and will receive help from the Extension office. Contests have been launched through this office also for original episodes for the pageant; the best of each is to

8o

Folk Drama

be included in a final production. A second contest has been held in design f o r stage settings, a n d a third in costume designs. T h u s , in the spring of 1937 all North Carolina celebrates an event which has meant much to all concerned; and the celebration has been built out of the very stuff of which the state has been made. T h e r e will be local celebrations, regional celebrations, and finally a climaxing statewide celebration bringing together the best from each scene and locality in accordance with the governor's proclamation calling upon all w h o are engaged in directing educational activities and upon the people generally to make observance of this important centennial a n d " t o dedicate themselves and their efforts d u r i n g the year in steadfast and intelligent activity toward the promotion of a sounder and more intelligent educational enterprise and the enlargement of educational opportunity f o r our children of North C a r o l i n a . " It was natural that the N a t i o n a l Federal T h e a t r e director should have selected North C a r o l i n a as a proving ground for the Federal Theatre's experiments in recreational fields. It was

fitting

that Frederick H . Koch should have been

chosen as regional director and that Mary Dirnberger, a Playmaker alumna, should have become the state supervisor for the project, which has only extended a well-integrated drama program and strengthened every community group concerned.

and

IX

An Integrated Arts Program in the University of Colorado The charm of amateur performances taneity, and intelligenceΛ THE

is simplicity,

spon-

University of C o l o r a d o furnishes a p a r a m o u n t ex-

ample of accomplishment of great things in art through a thoroughly-integrated arts program w i t h i n the educational institution itself. I n the first place, d r a m a does not stand alone in the c u r r i c u l u m b u t is an integral p a r t of the English L i t e r a t u r e D e p a r t m e n t . A t n o time is the subject set apart f r o m the rest of the program. T h e theater is the workshop where plays growing out of English L i t e r a t u r e courses are molded, rehearsed, and produced, not as amusement, but as part of an educational process. It is i m p o r t a n t also that on the m o u n t a i n campus of the University of Colorado, at the foot of F l a g Staff M o u n t a i n , the staffs working with drama, music, a n d the fine arts are tremendously interested in working together, in dovetailing their special skills, and in sharing creative ideas and building toward perfection in each p r o j e c t u n d e r t a k e n . F o r example, it is not often that the director of a fine arts departm e n t is vitally interested a n d skilled in theater, design, stage effects, costume, and all the details that m e a n so much in artistic production as is the director in the University of ι G. F. Reynolds, University of Colorado, from a play program.

82

A n Integrated Arts Program

Colorado. In Boulder, the work of the three gToups is so filtered through all of the arts program that it takes some time for a visitor to learn which people are responsible for teaching the subjects of drama, music, or painting. On play programs appear stunning designs created by the fine-arts department. Over the stage proscenium and in the theater lobby are very beautiful murals, painted by a member of the fine-arts staff. As soon as an idea for a play begins to be discussed, a group in the arts department is sure to begin dreaming and thinking in terms of the suitable setting and the kind of costumes needed; and throughout the program runs the workshop spirit. A n article which appeared in the Theatre

Arts

Monthly

in J u l y , 1 9 3 1 , explains how co-operative projects develop in this university. It tells of the musical comedy given every year until recently, 2 in which many students and members of the faculty took part. Francis Wolle, associate professor of English Literature, was responsible for these events from the beginning; and for fourteen years he was the author, as well as the director, of the plays. Regardless of the departments in which they were registered, students were given an opportunity to build "the show of the year." T h e best athletes became dancers. Students from the School of J o u r n a l i s m helped on the dialogue; students of history, sociology, and art went in for research and were helpful in bringing out the special significance of authentic folk ways for special backgrounds. Students in the School of Music arranged the musical settings and composed many of the songs. A pit orchestra, a university band, and a glee club all played their parts. T h e Art Department 2

N o funds are now available for continuance of this event.

An Integrated Arts Program

83

was responsible for scenery, costumes, and posters. Make-up was handled by the class in Play Presentation. T h e manager and his assistants were students in the School of Business Administration. T h e electrical engineers played the floodlights on the backdrop painted by art students; and costumes were made by seamstresses in home economics courses. T h e show culminated in a variegated kaleidoscope which completely united the show's purposes in color and motion.

FACULTY

AND STUDENTS

IN C L O S E

RELATIONSHIP

B e h i n d this co-operative venture is the genius of Francis Wolle, an artist in every sense of the word, a born leader, a human dynamo who moves about the campus as professor and friend, on the track, at the games, in the " f r a t " houses, and throughout the community. His congenial comradeship puts a premium upon the popularity of production. Competition is keen among students who wish to try out for "leads," to construct scenery, to make costumes, to take any part in the performance. Mr. W o l l e has had first-hand experience with college shows since his own college days, and his inimitable skill in using the stuff of campus life and his keen sense of audience values and dramatic climaxes have resulted in refreshing and stimulating university operettas and plays. It is interesting that the professors do not only teach at the University of Colorado; they live there, and the students live and work along with them. T h e y count 011 each other as friends. All are interested in projects that matter to the whole group. In such a sharing process people are bound to find themselves. A sort of camaraderie is established in a

84

An Integrated Arts Program

g r o u p of artists w h o are e x p e r i m e n t i n g , t h i n k i n g creatively, l i v i n g a normal, h o m e y sort of c a m p u s life, a n d in a workshop atmosphere grow splendid p r o d u c t i o n s f r o m integrated g r o u p experience. T h i s same spirit of the w o r k s h o p carries over i n t o hikes in the mountains, "beefsteak fries" over c a m p fires in the ravine, and into various hobbies. D r . R e y n o l d s , the director of the English L i t e r a t u r e D e p a r t m e n t , has a yen for gardens and studies " a u d i e n c e response." I n a d d i t i o n to his interest in all outdoors a n d in the theater, Professor W o l l e digs d e e p into archeology. M u r i e l Sibell, h e a d of the A r t D e p a r t m e n t , has a f a m o u s collection of Katchenas. T w o books of beautif u l lithographs already to her credit tell m o r e v i v i d l y t h a n words the history of the C o l o r a d o c o u n t r y . Students a n d professors k n o w each other, are interested in one another's hobbies, a n d are

finding

special e n j o y m e n t in life o n a n d

off the c a m p u s t h r o u g h o u t the year. T h o u g h the arts prog r a m is d e v e l o p e d here as in most universities in a sort of glorified bowl, there is no sense of i n g r o w i n g . T h e w o r k s h o p idea persists after g r a d u a t i o n , a n d the e x p e r i e n c e

gained

here makes its influence felt all t h r o u g h the state. T h e attitude of the staff, too, is not i n g r o w i n g . E a c h m e m b e r is busy f u r t h e r i n g his skill, w h a t e v e r it m a y be; h e is rooted here, b u t his ideals permeate the state and the country. F o r exa m p l e , Professor W o l l e spent some time last w i n t e r at the University of W i s c o n s i n l e c t u r i n g on " A m e r i c a n Ideas in L i t e r a t u r e " in the Farmer's S h o r t Course. It is because the arts e x p e r i e n c e here is n o t l i m i t e d to the University w i t h o u t an outlet b u t spreads its influence into little places that the story is i n c l u d e d in this study. T h e University of C o l o r a d o was selected w i t h the i d e a of m e a s u r i n g h o w far an arts experience carries b e y o n d the c a m p u s w h e n

A n Integrated Arts Program

85

no Extension Service staff member in the arts subjects is as yet employed. PRODUCTION

ON A LABORATORY BASIS

Unusual plays and extraordinarily skillful production are the rule in the University Theatre. Excellence in acting, subtlety in lighting and staging, and artistry in costume designing are all apparent in every performance. At dress rehearsals not only the director for the play is present but also students interested in drama and all those professors who are in any way responsible for drama. A first-night performance has all the electric atmosphere of first-night performances in the professional theater. A typical laboratory performance presented in April, 1936, included an original play by a graduate student interested especially in foreign settings, Tomorrow in Vienna. The theme was the death of the great Beethoven, sensitively handled, with lines running along to the accompaniment of a driving rain and strains from Beethoven's loveliest music. Jean Stafford, the young author, said: I got my first inspiration for writing plays one summer w h e n Dr. K o c h was teaching here at the University. I knew very little about technique but I was encouraged to write a play. T h e n e x t year I wrote another, a failure, and the next year, a third, w h i c h was still worse. T h e n I took Professor W o l l e ' s course on T h e History of D r a m a . A t first I thought it was going to be purely academic, but M r . W o l l e uses the discussion method and before we knew it we were all interested in the study of Greek, Medieval, Elizabethan drama, plays of the Restoration period, eighteenthcentury comcdy, Ibsen, contemporary drama. Little by little I learned that techniques were necessary to know if I were to be a successful playwright. T h e inspiration and the technical training suddenly met, a n d I saw for the first time the practical application of all I had learned.

86

An Integrated Arts Program

T h i s is a laboratory theater. Students are required to write reports on the plays presented, describing their reaction to the play itself, to the staging, and to the response of the audience. There are play readings from time to time by members of the staff, and these presentations are discussed in class. Staff and students are part of a workshop group. T h e second play included on the April program was Gordon Bottomley's Culbin Sands, which took the audience to the Scottish dunes in 1698, when a whole village was submerged in a sand storm. T h e players were the verse-reading group of students; and the play was produced with overwhelming beauty and sincerity. So subtle was the light and shade in costume, settings, and voice that the lines whirled the audience through all the winds and swishing sands of all the lonely waste spaces of the world. These two plays were repeated in part over the radio on the following Sunday; consequently audiences in all parts of the state were given an unusual experience, for plays like these are scarce, and choric speech is just beginning to arouse interest among rural people. After a production comes the aftermath tea before a friendly fire in Dr. Reynolds's home, where actors, other members of the drama group, interested professors, and friends of the studio theater gather to discuss the plays. Criticisms of the performance, written by students and redpenciled by Professor Wolle, are read to the group at this tea. Good points and bad points alike in production are taken by the cast in a spirit of good sportsmanship. T h i s tea is one of the popular events of the play season, and it brings professors and students together in a friendly, informal meeting which no one wishes to miss.

An Integrated Arts Program

87

GRADUATES CARRY THE RESULTS OF WORKSHOP EXPERIENCE THROUGH

STATE

In many parts of the state graduates of the University of Colorado are now teaching; and whatever the subject, there is almost always an emphasis on dramatics, music, or some branch of the fine arts. Teachers coach plays in schools, churches, service clubs, a n d P. T . A.'s. D e m a n d s are m a d e on them for play readings and book reviews. T h e y m a k e speeches before all sorts of clubs. W h e n e v e r a superintendent is seeking a music teacher h e wants to k n o w what kind of solo work the teacher can do. O f t e n teachers are called u p o n to entertain, as well as to teach, a n d sometimes they give private lessons in the community. O f t e n there are calls for teachers of music, p a r t of whose income is guaranteed by the school board, the rest to come f r o m private lessons. In many communities the teachers conduct the local band, chorus, or orchestra a n d work t h r o u g h o u t the summer m o n t h s with community programs. Usually the teacher of art co-operates with the teachers of music a n d d r a m a in making posters, building stage sets, p a i n t i n g scenery, and working on costumes for all sorts of c o m m u n i t y entertainments. State money is now available to pay teachers of art a n d music, a n d this is going to change conditions in many small towns where heretofore n o art or music has been included in the c u r r i c u l u m . It is interesting to visit some of the different types of communities in which these graduates are at work and to observe the different kinds of interests they are developing in the arts field. A good example is Brush, a clean, wind-swept, spicand-span trade center in the northeastern part of the state.

88

An Integrated Arts Program

T h i s community with a population of 2,300 is in the heart of the sugar-beet country. Its people are largely Danish and German, and one senses at once the conservative, strict, orderly Lutheran influence. Here a graduate of the University of Colorado has been at work in the high school for seven years, living as well as teaching, and she is interested in everything about the community. Slowly she has built up a school library of some 2,800 books; and some of them are worn to a frazzle. Magazines and newspapers are read ravenously. Boys meet her at the door early each morning to be first to read the day's news. W h e n unusual entertainments come to Denver, fifty miles away, she fills her car with students, and off they go to attend a performance of the Russian Ballet, or A Midsummer

Night's

Dream, or an un-

usual art exhibit at the museum. For these children such trips are often first experiences of the kind; but Miss Lyder wants them to have a chance at the best. She has built a stage set in the school, with the help of her pupils, and arranged a very practical lighting system. A cyclorama graces the school stage. T h e Christmas play, put on by seniors as a gift to the community, has become an annual event. Nativity scenes combine drama and music and use the audience as well as the actors in production. A l l through the year, drama is being brought into all sorts of programs in this air-cooled consolidated school, where the auditorium seats more than six hundred persons. In one of the high-mountain communities of northwest Colorado another teacher has become so absorbed in working with a community music group that when vacation time came she just stayed on and continued the music project throughout the summer.

An Integrated Arts Program

8g

In one of yesterday's mining villages a school principal was found working on the writing of original plays with pupils of the seventh and eighth grades. T h e plan for the play was on the blackboard—idea, characters, scene, and action. Drama experience at the University of Colorado had carried over to this drab, poor, dilapidated village where the only auditorium available was an abandoned church whose still-active Ladies' Aid charged for its use, thus closing the doors to most groups. Money is scarce in this neighborhood; initiative is sluggish; spirit is negative; and the main social center is the saloon. It is typical of communities which have seen their best days and been too willing to give up the struggle for any cultural existence. FROM UNIVERSITY WORKSHOP TO MUCKERS'

PLAYHOUSE

T h e r e are, however, old, picturesque mining communities, where outside artistic influences have chased ghosts away and have brought in a new kind of civilization. There are communities, too, which have been able to overcome their own drabness and build their own arts program. For example, in Idaho Springs, at the foot of Virginia Canyon, the people of the community have developed what is known as " T h e Muckers' Club." Its playhouse is made from an old laundry on Main Street and is shared with American Legion headquarters. T h e members are miners, lawyers, stenographers, waitresses in restaurants, business men, and housewives. Not to belong to " T h e Muckers" is a sure way to miss the most popular events of the year. T h e little booklet which explains the year's program carries on its first page the words, "Clear Creek County's Little T h e a t r e Group—devoted to the Education, Entertainment

go

An Integrated Arts Program

a n d C u l t u r a l A d v a n c e m e n t of the C o m m u n i t y . " T h e g r o u p was organized in 1934, a n d since that time I d a h o Springs p e o p l e have e n j o y e d plays such as Sun Husband, Pigeon. The

Major

Jones,

Up,

and, if y o u please,

N e x t year's p r o g r a m is to include, The

Taming

of the Shrew,

Young

Woodley,

The

Queen's

Galsworthy's Ghost

Train,

a n d The

Bad

Man. T h i s is a project in w h i c h a w h o l e c o m m u n i t y is interested. T h e o w n e r of a restaurant c a u g h t the vision of w h a t this little theater m i g h t become a n d s u p p l i e d the little audit o r i u m w i t h raised seats. A high-school art teacher, formerly a student at the University of C o l o r a d o , and her senior g r o u p in p a i n t i n g , have s u p p l i e d stage-sets and painted scenery for m a n y productions. T h e Shakespeare C l u b has g i v e n help in research for the staging of plays. T h e director is an actor a n d former director of several little theaters in different parts of the country. H e is n o w the editorial reporter o n the local p a p e r and a l e a d i n g c o m m u n i t y spirit of I d a h o Springs. In spite of the virility of the p r o j e c t and its far-reaching influence, in spite of the fact that " T h e M u c k e r s " are the l e a d i n g social u n i t in the region, not one w o r d of publicity appears in the papers. M e m b e r s c o u n t on c o m m u n i t y leaders to s u p p o r t the project and they feel n o need for publicity. " T h e M u c k e r s ' " playhouse is the c o m m u n i t y ' s playhouse. It provides a satisfactory social p r o g r a m a n d develops real talent; a n d because the best plays are considered not too g o o d I d a h o Springs has a d r a m a p r o g r a m w h i c h many large cities m i g h t envy. T h e stated purpose of the g r o u p explains s o m e t h i n g of its success: T h e playhouse is not designed to be "high hat" in any respect, but we do desire to produce good and well-written plays which

An

Integrated

Arts

Program

91

will give the production and acting staff meat on which to chew in their presentation. W e are not doing plays just to be doing them. W e are doing them for the knowledge we gain, the educational and cultural development which we get, and the pleasure we hope is provided for our patrons. H o m e - m a d e , h o m e - d e v e l o p e d , a n d h o m e - s u p p o r t e d is this p r o j e c t . T h e r e a r e f e w p l a y h o u s e s t h a t c a n a f f o r d to be as p r a c t i c a l a n d as f r a n k a b o u t t h e i r o r g a n i z a t i o n s . i n g the Pigeon

Concern-

the p r o g r a m a n n o u n c e m e n t stated:

W e do not think you will particularly enjoy this play, for few audiences do enjoy it. While we realize that our success depends upon pleasing our audiences, we are just as confident that such productions are necessary for our own development as good actors. It would have been quite simple to have selected a farce of no consequence, but we are sure that you, as a broad-minded audience, will understand that to feed you cake all of the time would be to ruin your theatrical digestion, and to limit our acting experience. W i t h this f r a n k , m o d e r n , i n t e l l i g e n t a t t i t u d e t o w a r d t h e b u i l d i n g of a p e r m a n e n t c o m m u n i t y - d r a m a

program

has

c o m e a c o n f i d e n c e in p r o d u c t i o n that has b r o u g h t f u l l subs c r i p t i o n m e m b e r s h i p a n d p a c k e d houses. T h e

"Muckers"

k e e p n o t h i n g u p t h e i r sleeves. T h e y are w h a t they seem to be, a n d t h e c o m m u n i t y k n o w s it.

χ

Corn, Hogs, and Opera in Iowa Music

liberates

us from

the specific

. . ,1

I T IS in Iowa that the arts meet and become evenly-selected parts of one great cultural development. Integration is the central idea behind it all. Organization, leadership, seeing the program whole, long-time planning, the experience of a homogeneous group working and playing together have helped to determine the kind of program that includes operas, pageants, festivals, and concerts in the same category as corn, hogs, and grass programs and rural electrification. A t the center and in and through the whole Iowa Agricultural Extension program runs a golden thread of music. Its importance in the comprehensive scheme is shown clearly in all the material that goes into the state from the Extension Service offices. " A nation is as civilized as its music. A man no better than the songs he loves." T h i s quotation from William Allen W h i t e heads the pamphlet used among Iowa farm women in a project of "Musical Moments with American Composers." Quotations concerning music are found among the pages of play programs, in materials used by Homemakers' groups in home economics, in Farm Bureau magazines, and in 4-H C l u b program helps. For years Iowa has been growing u p with a song on its lips. Each year has brought more farm people, old and young, to create, to listen, and to appreciate good music. 1 H . A. Overstrect, About

Ourselves,

p. 182.

Opera in Iowa

93

PHONOGRAPH HAS T A U G H T IOWA TO SING

Iowa believes in beginning to sing early in life. Thousands of farm boys and farm girls are today taking music lessons in schools from nationally-known musicians and are gaining ability to sing well and to appreciate the finest music of the race. T h e plan that is making this possible is a simple one—teaching by phonograph. Charles Fullerton, head of the music department of the Iowa State Teachers College, has been perfecting the idea for more than thirty years. Muscatine and Emmet counties were the first to adopt the Fullerton plan, which has now spread into all parts of the state and is known from coast to coast. T h e idea came to Mr. Fullerton years ago, when he was sitting one day in a little one-room school in Blackhawk County, where a teacher was having difficulty in teaching music. His trained ear detected that the children had good voices but knew little about singing together. He has discovered through thirty years of experience in teaching that only about 5 percent of all children are unable to sing. He proceeded to find the best songs, and he compiled a book of them for use especially in rural schools. He chose songs that are favorites, including folk songs of many nations, all of which have lasting beauty. He arranged with a phonograph company to have many of these songs put on records which could be purchased for little money. T h e children listen to these records several times, and then they are sure to sing correctly from the beginning, because they have heard great artists sing or play the tunes. T h e listening is the keynote to the whole plan. One of the most interesting features concerns the ruralschool choirs. Each pupil takes a test after the third grade

94

Opera in Iowa

is passed; a n d w h e n he sings the ten selected songs correctly, he becomes a m e m b e r of the choir. H e competes only against himself. C h i l d r e n in I o w a h a v e k n o w n a n d loved g o o d music since they were old e n o u g h to learn their A , B , C's. It is n o w o n d e r that the tall-corn c o u n t r y is singing. T h r o u g h out the state, county choruses of teachers and groups of f a r m men a n d w o m e n are u s i n g p h o n o g r a p h records in l e a d i n g their o w n singing. STATE FARM BUREAU AND EXTENSION BACK MUSIC

SERVICE

PROGRAM

B e g i n n i n g in 1 9 3 0 t o w n s h i p , county, and state choruses have been e n c o u r a g e d by a state adult-chorus plan u n d e r the j o i n t l e a d e r s h i p of the State F a r m W o m e n ' s C o m m i t t e e of the I o w a F a r m B u r e a u F e d e r a t i o n a n d the A g r i c u l t u r a l Extension Service at A m e s . A t the 4 - H C l u b c o n v e n t i o n each year the head of the music d e p a r t m e n t at the I o w a State College conducts r e g u l a r singing periods f o r the entire g r o u p ; and a special girls' chorus is trained by the director of the college glee clubs. M u s i c is h e l p i n g to u n d e r g i r d the interest in home economics t r a i n i n g schools, t o w n s h i p F a r m B u r e a u meetings, picnics, a n d 4-H C l u b meetings. N o t only does I o w a sing, but it knows w h a t it sings, w h o composed the songs, where the composers lived, a n d w h y they wrote the songs. T h e y w h o sing k n o w s o m e t h i n g of the setting and m e a n i n g of their music. 4-H C l u b girls are b e c o m i n g m u s i c critics of no little ability. E a c h year these clubs t h r o u g h o u t the state take a special music theme f o r study. I n h o m e , c l u b , c o m m u n i t y ,

and

county the c l u b m e m b e r s b e c o m e a c q u a i n t e d with all the richness of that theme, a n d w h e n the day comes f o r the an-

Opera in Iowa

95

nual State 4-H Congress they are able to bring together a trained chorus in a professional production based upon their year's study. It requires pounds of mimeographed material, genius in the preparation of it, and endless detail in organizing for final productions; but the Extension Service, from director down through the entire staff, believes in the project. There is rare ability in the leadership. Fannie Buchanan, formerly the educational executive of the Victor T a l k i n g Machine Company, is now a member of the Extension Service staff. She has inspired children in forty states to become acquainted with the best music of the world through listening to it as played or sung by its greatest artists. She is a native Iowan and knows the soul, mind, and spirit of the state. Visiting a training school with Miss Buchanan in charge is an experience to be remembered; to sing under the leadership of Professor Tolbert MacRae gives even the shyest singer confidence to sing as he never sang before. Iowa is rich in people who love and appreciate the arts. It is ingenious, creative, afire with new enthusiasms for coming events. One evening before the production of The Bohemian Girl, but during the year when gypsy dances and songs that went to make up The Bohemian Girl were adding color to all kinds of meetings in little placcs all over the state, a program was being presented in a Farm Bureau gathering. Naturally, part of the program included a scene from The Bohemian Girl. It was cold in the hall. Only a pot-bellied stove was in use for warmth. As the curtain went down on a gypsy dance, the famous cserebogar, an old gentleman in the audience remarked to his neighbor, " I wish we could all do that dance; it would warm us up." T h e neighbor spoke to the usher, the usher relayed the message to the stage

96

Opera in Iowa

folk, the curtain went up, the actors came down from the stage, the audience pushed their chairs back, and everybody learned that gypsy dance then and there. T h e n the actors withdrew to dress for the next act, and the chairs were set back in place. Everybody was warm and glowing with the satisfaction of having been a part of the performance, and the show went on. E v e n Broadway could not offer so unusual an evening's program. In this sort of surprise element that accompanies the informal freedom and joyousness in achievement through drama, music, and the dance lies the strength of this M i d d l e West adventure in cultural development. W i t h a music-loving people, with lovers of music behind the baton, and with a genius for harmonizing all elements of drama, color, light, and motion with the greatest music of the world as a means for bringing more of the life abundant to a rural state, miracles may be achieved; but these miracles are the result of more than fifteen years of study. ORIGIN

OF

MUSIC

MEMORY

TEST

In 1921 Mrs. Edith Barker, now 4-H C l u b executive for the state, came to Scott County, Iowa, to live. A musician, a graduate of a conservatory of music in Chicago, and the director of her own orchestra at the age of seventeen, she was disappointed to find in Iowa audiences little enthusiasm and almost no applause. Over all the programs seemed to lie a thick crust of cold, gray conservatism. Mrs. Barker soon became interested in work with girls in Scott County, and she made u p her m i n d to accomplish two things: to get the back porches cleaned up, and to get the girls not only to sing but also to clap when they heard songs they liked. T h i s was the origin of the music-memory-test idea. T h e

Opera in Iowa

97

first program brought the Tri-City Orchestra and soloists to the Parish House of the Episcopal cathedral in Davenport. T h e 1921 contest included the appalling number of fifty selections. It was the only contest, in all probability, that has ever included so great a number. From this event, however, grew the plan for future state-wide music-memory contests, a music project for which interest and enthusiasm are still mounting. In 1926 4-H Girls' Clubs of Iowa held their first statewide music-memory contests after five years of consistent work in inspiring clubs to foster orchestras, quartets, and choruses. It is notable that the first award was a portable victrola; the second, a complete set of records of the selections used in the music contest; the third and fourth, also rccords; and the fifth, six sheets of good music. In 1930 4-H Clubs were introduced to opera, since the year's theme was Martha. T h e next two years were spent on the study of types of music. It was in 1932 that the state 4-H chorus was added and emphasis was placed upon good group singing. T h e next adventure was the study of American music: Indian and pioneer music, negro spirituals, Foster, Sousa, Nevin, MacDowell, music for symphony orchestras, and carillon music. In 1933 a true-false test took the place of the usual contest, with great success; and the next year brought in a study of musical patterns, the rondo, dance, symphony, and so forth, while 1935 found 4-H Clubs producing opera— The Bohemian Girl. In the meantime Iowa farm women had included music appreciation in their program, and the 1936 project provided for every member of the farm family. T h e music project has had the co-operation of the Farm

98

Opera in Iowa

B u r e a u a n d of the E x t e n s i o n Service. It has h a d the gene r o u s c o - o p e r a t i o n of the r e s i d e n t staff of I o w a State C o l l e g e , 4"H C l u b s a n d h o m e e c o n o m i c s g r o u p s . It has h a d the sincere g r o w i n g interest of r u r a l g r o u p s a n d

individuals

in

h e l p i n g a w h o l e state to find its v o i c e . T h e p r o d u c t i o n of The

Bohemian

Girl

a n d the present p r o g r a m w e r e

made

p o s s i b l e o n l y by the u n i t e d e f f o r t of all m u s i c lovers p l u s the k i n d of o r g a n i z a t i o n w i t h w h i c h I o w a is blessed.

The

m u s i c p r o g r a m has b e e n successful b e c a u s e of the d e v o t i o n of state, c o u n t y , a n d i n d i v i d u a l c l u b leaders a n d g r o u p m e m bers to a fine p r o j e c t ; a n d because of the c o n t i n u e d g e n u i n e l e a d e r s h i p w h i c h is I o w a - c o n s c i o u s a n d in t u n e w i t h

the

n e e d s a n d desires of a m u s i c a l p e o p l e .

FARM

WOMEN

IN THE

MUSIC

PROJECT

I o w a h a s d e v e l o p e d its p r o g r a m o n a s t a t e s m a n - l i k e basis. N o t e the stated purpose on

the state-wide m u s i c

project

among farm women: ι. T o broaden the musical experience of the home maker. 2. T o furnish her with material which she can use to help her family, her club, and her community. 3. T o develop acquaintance with, and appreciation of music of our own country. 4. T o learn, and sing, song-favorites of America. 5. T o join in happy, wholesome play. 6. T o receive greater pleasure from the hearing of all worthy music. T h r o u g h its E x t e n s i o n D i v i s i o n the U n i v e r s i t y o f also r e a c h e s t o t h e b o u n d a r i e s of the state b y

Iowa

intercollegi-

ate t o u r n a m e n t s , p l a y p r o d u c t i o n , a n d m u s i c festivals f o r community

groups and for high-school a n d

junior-college

g r o u p s . A b e a u t i f u l n e w t h e a t e r e q u i p p e d w i t h the latest-

Opera in Iowa

gg

model revolving stage adds promise of still greater achievem e n t in the field of d r a m a and places I o w a a m o n g the leading states in the cultivation of the arts. " I t is not strange that the prairies should sing," says an article in Successful duction of The

Farming,

Bohemian

describing the colorful proGirl

on the c a m p u s at A m e s ,

I o w a , in J u n e , 1 9 3 5 . T h e reverberations of that production have been felt in m a n y other states. T h e story of it needs to be told in full. B e l o w is F a n n i e B u c h a n a n ' s o w n story of it as it was repeated at the request of the State F a r m B u r e a u Federation last winter.

I O W A ' s STORY

OF T H E

BOHEMIAN

GIRL

Seven-forty-five—the evening of J a n u a r y 16, 1936. W h a t a breathtaking moment for the one hundred and fifty colorful characters assembled on the vast stage of the Shrine T e m p l e Auditorium in Des Moines, Iowa. All were ready—waiting f o r the cue that would draw the curtain on that repeat-performance of The Bohemian Girl. W h o would suspect that these happy, carefree, sun-tanned gypsies, regal ladies with stately lords in attendance, apple-cheeked peasant girls and women with sturdy peasant men were all farm girls, boys, men and women from fifty Iowa counties! What interesting stories lay back of the colorful costumes! W h o would suspect that the gorgeous flame and gold costumes worn by the gypsy dancers (twenty 4-H girls) were made from chick-feed sacks and cheese cloth carefully dyed, then shot with gold-dust, that their smart black necklaces and long earrings were humble chicken leg markers linked together, that their tambourines had once been layer-cake pans? Many a long-forgotten plume graced the hats of the lords; while lace curtains long since discarded made sweeping trains for court costumes, after they, too, had visited the dye pot. C a r e f u l planning of the color scheme for each chorus and general suggestions prepared by the production staff, plus the ingenuity of each member of the chorus, resulted in truly lovely costuming. T h e last pleasantly discordant sounds of the orchestra's final

loo

Opera in Iowa

tuning-up faded away—the house darkened—Regina Steele, a 4-H girl dressed in the blue uniform of her organization, stepped onto the stage and in a clear voice which carried to the last person in an audience of 4,000, read the lines of the prologue which presented the principal characters and brought the story of the opera to the second act. From the moment the beautiful child, Arline. played by six-year-old Madelon Rowe of Story County, dressed in the quaint costume of two hundred years ago, waved a kiss to the audience, until the last curtain dropped—the performance was a success. It was more than a triumphant climax to the long-time music appreciation program, the dream come true of leaders who fifteen years before had visioned such musical achievements of Iowa farm people. In planning for the study of The Bohemian Girl, another advance was made; for this time all were to learn to sing two of the choruses. More than that, the bulletin prepared by Miss Fannie Buchanan, extension specialist for the year's study, included a prologue and two dramatic episodes. These, with two gypsy dances, "Cserebogar" and " T u r n Around Me," and the songs learned, gave the entire story and feeling of the opera. So the entire State of Iowa went gypsying last year with The Bohemian Girl. In every county of the state, at 4-H girls' rally days, women's achievement days and township Farm Bureau meetings, and as special evening features for county fairs, The Bohemian Girl was given. O n summer evenings, many merry bands of gypsies danced the "Cserebogar'' and " T u r n Around Me," around open camp fires. All of this created interest in, and formed a real background for, the state production in June.

A G R I C U L T U R A L COLLEGE SPECIALISTS S U P P O R T

OPERA

B e h i n d e v e r y b i g success lies the v i s i o n a n d f a i t h of individuals, a n d this r u r a l o p e r a production

was n o

excep-

t i o n . It j u s t c o u l d n o t h a v e s u c c e e d e d w i t h o u t the s t a n c h s u p p o r t o f R . K . Bliss, d i r e c t o r of E x t e n s i o n , w h o all t h r o u g h the y e a r s h a s b e l i e v e d in a n d h e l p e d to e s t a b l i s h t h e cultural program. R a y m o n d H u g h e s , p r e s i d e n t of I o w a S t a t e C o l l e g e , w a s

Opera in Iowa

101

enthusiastically interested and promised his support if it could be proved that rural people would attend rehearsals. His challenge was for choruses of not fewer than seventyfive members. T h e number that finally responded was 206. Tolbert Mac Rae, head of the Music Department at Iowa State College, agreed to direct the opera. His was the greatest responsibility. T o direct a large chorus made up of people who had never sung together before, to train those who were to sing the leading roles, and to attempt a finished performance with a minimum of preliminary rehearsals and just one stage rehearsal is a pretty big order. Mr. Mac R a e has the musical genius to do it, plus a real understanding of people. Working hard under his direction proved to be a pleasurable and profitable experience for all members of the cast. Mr. Mac Rae said many times, "It is not surprising that rural people have the talent to do a lovely thing. T h e surprising fact is that they are sufficiently interested to drive so far and to work so hard." Each rehearsal was marked by absolute promptness. T h e June performance, given out of doors at the time of the 4"H Girls' State Convention at Iowa State College, with an audience of 8,000, was such a great success that the Iowa State Farm Bureau Federation decided to have the performance repeated for the Federation's annual meeting in January. Because of changing to an indoor performance many new problems arose. T h e stage at the Shrine Temple is very large; the opera was originally given in a sylvan setting. Would it be possible to provide ample stage settings? Again, what of the budget? Most important of all, would members of the chorus and those who had taken leading roles come again? If they came,

i02

Opera in Iowa

how could they be housed, where could meals be provided, and who w o u l d bear the expense? W o u l d it be possible for members of the Extension Service staff who had helped in the first performance to help again despite their already crowded schedules? Director Bliss said " Y e s " to this last question, " p r o v i d e d the performance was even better than the one in J u n e . " C o u l d Mr. Mac R a e find time to direct the opera again? H e could. T h a t left many other problems unsolved; but Mrs. Ellsworth Richardson, chairman of the Women's Committee of the F a r m B u r e a u Federation, Mrs. R a y m o n d Sayre, member of the State Committee of the Federation, and V. B . Hamilton, secretary of the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation, thrive on problems. Finally all hurdles were taken, and plans were under way for the repeat performance. A g a i n a m i n i m u m of rehearsals were held, just two at Iowa State College for the chorus and two more for the leads. T h i s meant much intelligent study and hard work at home for everyone. H o w they worked at the all-day rehearsal in Des Moines on J a n u a r y 15! Rehearsal began at nine in the morning; lunch for the cast was at half-past eleven; rehearsal for all was from one to four, and dinner was at half-past four. T h e r e was a tour of the stage at five o'clock so that all could find their dressing rooms (a mystic maze of twenty-one rooms on five floors), their make-up nooks, and the stage entrance. T h e r e followed a w a l k i n g rehearsal at seven and a dress rehearsal with the orchestra at eight. Strenuous? Yes, but not all work! Many a good laugh punctuated the rehearsals; many friendships formed in J u n e were renewed. W h a t f u n to answer the call " A l l on stagel" at 10:30 P. M. in order to enjoy the supper provided by the

Opera in Iowa

103

Federation! It is no small thrill in being registered as a member of an opera company, in enjoying the privilege of theatrical rates at the best hotel in the city, and in occupying the same dressing room used by Katharine Cornell just two weeks earlier. T h e Des Moines production of The Bohemian Girl was a significant demonstration of what can be done through cooperation. T h e State Federation and the Extension Service of Iowa State College worked together through various committees on general plans and management; the County Farm Bureaus paid the expenses of those who took part, the families of all members of the cast made adjustments so that father, mother, sister, and brother might all attend. Yes, the opera was a success! T h e performance was far from amateurish, and the chorus work merited much praise because of the fine singing. N o wonder the total effect was beautiful, for of the fifty-five people who tried out for leading roles, nearly all who were rejected remained to sing in the chorus. Anyone who has had experience with amateur musical shows knows that one of the big problems is to keep the chorus animated and living "in character," not just a petrified forest of humanity. T h i s chorus distinguished itself by truly convincing action and beautiful groupings. T h e leading roles were so well done that one musical friend in the audience thought they were sung by paid artists, and yet every person who took part lived on an Iowa farm. T h e role of Arline, who as a child was stolen from her father's home by the chief of a gypsy band and who becomes the favored member of the tribe until the time of her arrest and consequent reunion with her father, Count Arnheim, was sung by Virginia Broom Mullane. Some in the

ic>4

Opera in Iowa

audience doubted that this carefree gypsy girl with her rich colorful soprano was in truth the wife of a f a r m e r living on an eighty-acre dairy f a r m in Polk County. Mrs. Mullane, the mother of two lovely children, is a township chairman in women's F a r m B u r e a u work. She has been a member of the Polk County chorus ever since its organization, but she had never learned lines before, and she found the task dilficult. Hers was a difficult role—but it was beautifully done. W i l m a Parker Nissen, whose mezzo soprano voice and dramatic presence combined to make her interpretation of the queen of the gypsy tribe a memorable one, lives on a 240acre crop and stock f a r m in Shelby County, 120 miles from Ames, where rehearsals were held. She has three charming little girls and says all three and her husband combined their energies to make it easy for her to attend rehearsals—and further, that she feels sure her whole family knows every number of the opera and could put on a production of their own. Mrs. Nissen was formerly a supervisor of music and has had training in piano and violin as well as in voice. She is very active in the musical activities of her township and county. T h e role of T h a d d e u s , the young Polish soldier whose lot also was cast with the gypsy band and whose love for A r l i n e is the central interest in the opera, was sung by Evan Davies. E v a n , who has an unusual tenor voice of much promise, farms with his father a 160-acre stock and crop farm, 140 miles f r o m Ames. His training has been mostly under the direction of his father, who is a graduate of a Chicago college of music. T h e courtly Count Arnheim, with the rich baritone voice, is in real life Floyd George, formerly president of the Black H a w k County F a r m Bureau. His talented wife, who was one

Opera in Iowa

105

of the chorus leaders, and two children live on a 160-acre farm. Each rehearsal meant a two-hundred-mile drive f o r the Georges. F. R . Mitchell, who gave a masterly performance as Devilshoof, chief of the gypsies, is a master farmer and operates a 240-acre stock farm in H a r d i n County. His wife, also an accomplished singer, and his son, Frederick, both had leading chorus parts. Mr. Mitchell's hobbies are music, community plays, and Hereford cattle. Carl Ringgenberg, a Story County farmer who has real talent for comedy roles and a fine tenor voice, took the part of Florestein. T h e stage settings, too, came in for a share of praise. T h e fair woven textiles, fortune-telling booth, push carts laden with vegetables, flower girls vending fresh blossoms, won applause in their own right. N o t all the laurels, however, belong to those who performed on the stage, for there was an army of unsung heroes back stage, working harmoniously to make things go. T h e r e were untiring efforts in the property room; there was the hard task of collecting just the right props and then the harder one of returning them. Marvelous organization in the make-up room made it possible to distribute many pounds of grease paint evenly on 1 5 5 faces. It is the sum of all such efforts that makes a successful production. W h o can measure the rewards of such an event? Perhaps the greatest value lies in the rich experience of each person w h o took part in it, the growth through good training, the joy of having had a part in producing a lovely thing, and the freeing of some craving for expression. As a postscript to a long letter telling of what the opera had meant to her one f a r m woman said, " W e have no new linoleum on the kitchen floor, but we have sung in opera."

Opera in Iowa

ιο6 OPERA

L E A D S TO F A M I L Y

The Bohemian

FESTIVAL

Girl was a real peak; but just as in moun-

tain climbing the scaling of one peak does not mean reaching the heights, but rather just catching a vision of new peaks to climb, so this successful event points the way to finer things to be done. On A p r i l 27, 1936, the Cedar Rapids

Gazette said: " R u r a l

Iowa practises for out-door Music Festival to be staged at Ames, J u n e 28; twenty-five hundred farm men and women, boys and girls, to present Folk Songs and Games of Europe." So The Bohemian

Girl was not the end. Iowa sings

on! A lovelier production than ever was part of the 4-H Convention when Music for Family

Festivals

was presented. It

was voted an evening of joy expressed in music, movement, color, and light. T h e cast included thirteen hundred 4-H girls from the one hundred counties, w h o sang the songs that have been enjoyed by more than fifteen thousand Iowa 4-H members all through the year. Seven hundred men and women from seventy counties traveled many miles to sing together in a great adult chorus. Four-Η groups of boys and girls from nine counties presented dances of different periods and different countries in costume on the outdoor stage, which was lighted by

flares

that gave dramatic silhouette effects. T h a t the great gathering could be successful with but one general rehearsal demonstrates the values in a long-time music-appreciation program, and in the training and working together of many persons in organized groups. T h e gala event brought to a close the year's study, in which the whole

Opera in Iowa

107

family h a d p a r t i c i p a t e d . W h a t next year's p r o g r a m will b e is the q u e s t i o n this musical state was asking w h e n this rep o r t was w r i t t e n . " H o m e - m a d e H a p p i n e s s Lasts L o n g e r — C o s t s Less." I o w a has f o u n d this to be more

than true. I n d e e d

its

whole

b e a u t i f u l l y - o r g a n i z e d p r o g r a m is b u i l t u p o n the idea. Its state F a r m B u r e a u , organized in the most orderly, systematic fashion, is o n a f a m i l y basis, w i t h district, county, township, a n d c o m m u n i t y organization a n d leadership; its fine roads lead straight across the state f r o m n o r t h to south a n d f r o m east to west; its strong radio set-up is on a p u r e l y educational basis; its specialists in h o m e economics, its H o m e D e m o n s t r a t i o n agents, county agents, a n d c l u b agents reach every c o u n t y ;

a n d it has part-time

specialists

in

music,

d r a m a , a n d recreation. I o w a is therefore able to p r o d u c e o n a state-wide basis in an increasingly skillful m a n n e r a n d has d e v e l o p e d an articulate, constantly-growing leadership f o r its endeavors. T h e r e is no lost m o t i o n ; the p r o g r a m that is p l a n n e d for a local F a r m B u r e a u m e e t i n g naturally becomes an i m p o r t a n t part of a county get-together. L a t e r it may b e used in a district meeting; and the story of the opera at Des M o i n e s shows h o w a successful bit in a district m e e t i n g became part of a state-wide event that echoed f r o m N e w Y o r k to San Francisco. P r o g r a m s are p l a n n e d so that parts may b e used f r o m time to time in many kinds of gathering. F a r m p e o p l e are urged to use their kitchens, barns, pastures, a n d picnic g r o u n d s as stage-sets. T h e y use them to such g o o d a d v a n t a g e that g r o u p s f r o m every section of I o w a seem q u i t e at h o m e w h e n called to the I o w a C o l l e g e of A g r i c u l ture or to the Shrine T e m p l e at Des M o i n e s for a g a l a production.

ιο8

Opera in Iowa

A BOOK REVIEW BECOMES A PLAY

Iowa goes off at few tangents. One event grows out of another. T h e progressive-education method, though not called by that name, is used in d r a m a as well as in music by even the most isolated groups in the state. For example, there is the story of The White Bird Flying. In Butler County a g r o u p of Homemakers were studying home management, learning ways of organizing their home duties so that more time might be left free for reading, a n d so forth. O n a book list compiled by the state project specialist was The White Bird Flying, a book written by Bess Streeter Aldrich, an Iowa author, about the kind of people Butler County knew well. T h e g r o u p became interested at once, a n d they decided to dramatize the book for their Achievement Day program. T h e postmistress at Pigeon, Iowa, very skillfully helped to cut the story into three scenes, and the g r o u p selected the cast. T h e actors played their parts so well on Achievement Day that they were invited to repeat their performance at Ames, for the agricultural college. Later they repeated it many times for other organizations. T h e part "Uncle Daniel" was played by a woman over seventy, a farm woman who had not left her poultry farm for years. R i d i n g a r o u n d with a traveling troupe in a jolty school bus was a new experience for her and for the others in the company; and anyone who talked with them after a production could have no d o u b t as to the sheer sense of new life that had resulted from their experience with The White Bird Flying. At its most thrilling moments in r u r a l Iowa d r a m a has included music a n d the play which have grown out of a practical project in the field of h o m e economics. A clothing

Opera in Iowa

109

project has resulted in an e x h i b i t of period dolls s h o w i n g origins of present-day fashions, called " P a r i s to M a i n Street." A f u r n i s h i n g p r o j e c t has b r o u g h t forth a play based o n special c o m b i n a t i o n s of color. F o o d projects h a v e e n d e d w i t h skits such as Deans and Bottles

and The Romance

of

Bread.

A H o m e m a k e r s ' p r o j e c t in dress furnished a p a g e a n t showi n g differences in costumes o v e r a l o n g period of Iowa's history. So there is e d u c a t i o n a l , social, and inspirational v a l u e in the w h o l e p r o g r a m . It is b u i l t u p o n firm f o u n d a t i o n s , is splendidly u n d e i g i r d e d , and is n o w ready for the superstructure. T h e two greatest needs at the present m o m e n t are for full-time specialists to carry on a n d f o r an b u d g e t to m a k e a d e q u a t e leadership possible.

adequate

XI

The Part That Music Plays Sing for the wide, wide field; Sing for the wide, wide sky. Sing for the good, glad earth, For the sun on hilltop high. Sing for the comrade true, Sing for the friendship sweet, Sing as together we swing along, With the turf beneath our feet.1 " T H E R E ' S something a b o u t good music and a b o u t singing with your neighbors that inspires you to keep on singing,'' said a farmer's wife. " S o m e h o w I can get back to work after a good sing with a new courage, and things d o n ' t seem to worry me as they did b e f o r e . " N o t h i n g more needs to be said to justify the fact that A m e r i c a is singing. G o forty miles out from a center in the sugar-beet section of Colorado, sit in a little parlor, and listen for an evening to a t r i o ^ f a t h e r , mother, a n d neighbor —as they sing classical music, " p e r m a n e n t m u s i c , " to the accompaniment

of an

old-fashioned

organ. T r a v e l

to a

drought-parched section of N o r t h D a k o t a and listen to a Russian chorus while they sing old Russian folk tunes like organ music; or to M o u n t a i n , N o r t h Dakota, and listen to pure Icelandic music in which the chants of Vikings may be heard. Visit even one of the poorer counties in New York ι 4 - H Field Song, by F a n n i e B u c h a n a n .

T h e Part T h a t Music Plays

111

State and hear a chorus of school-children singing a capella. Stop awhile in a f a r m kitchen in Iowa a n d listen to the owner as she sings selections f r o m Martha

while drying the dishes.

Step into a club hall in Shawano County, Wisconsin, and hear the W i t t e n b u r g m i x e d chorus of forty voices sing under the direction of a former member of St. O l a f s choir. Casually

ask the man beside you on a bus

traveling

through the drifts of northern Wisconsin about music in his home community. T h i s khaki-coated, high-booted Norwegian f a r m e r as ever was may talk to you all the way to your destination, telling you about a chorus of doctors a n d their wives; about the owner of the motion-picture theater; a musical L u t h e r a n minister; the assistant in the post office w h o is a " c r a c k " cornet player, takes correspondence courses, and gives music lessons on the side; a n d about a f o r m e r cavalryman w h o is a star bugler. H e may tell you that this g r o u p of forty men and women are meeting twice every month and that this chorus and the choruses of other clubs often meet together in a united church program. " Y o u bet you my life, it is a great thing in our town, this music." THE

MUSCATINE

CHORUS

Of all the women's choruses in rural America (and they are legion) probably none has achieved greater f a m e than the Muscatine Chorus. It is only a little more than one year old; yet its twentythree voices have flooded the corn fields with harmony in their home county, made it echo through the buildings of the State College campus

and the State F a i r G r o u n d s

and

through great halls where they have received the applause of thousands of auditors at history-making state conferences, until in J u n e , 1936, they were heard in Washington, D. C.,

112

T h e Part T h a t Music Plays

making a valuable contribution to the International Congress of R u r a l Women. T h e s e voices belong to women who live and work on scattered farms of Muscatine County, Iowa; to women

who

know isolation and what it means to be snowbound for weeks during the winter. Some of them travel thirty miles to rehearsals; and often when the thaw comes their lanes are too deep with m u d for cars to run and they are obliged to walk crosslots for a mile or more to a main road, where some kind neighbor may meet them and take them to town. T h e hands of these women of the Muscatine Chorus tell the story of hard work on the farm; the faces and the voices remind one of the line in R o b e r t Frost's poem, " Y o u can climb back u p a stream of radiance to the sky." H o w did it all happen? H o w has such perfect harmony been achieved in only one year and a half? T h e chorus grew out of a project of Agricultural Extension and the State F a r m B u r e a u Federation. It was organized through the efforts of a Home Demonstration agent and a Home Project chairman in the interest of greater volume, better music, more adequate training, and last, but not least, an opportunity for women from all parts of the county to come together socially and to form a chorus of which all Iowa may be proud. It was in 1932 that the State Farm B u r e a u held its first quartet contest. Muscatine County entered singers from Letts T o w n s h i p , and they won first place. Several quartets were then functioning through the county; but there were few opportunities for real work, and adequate leadership was lacking. Mrs. K. L . McColm conceived the idea of forming one strong county chorus. She called the women together and talked the matter over, and the Muscatine Chorus was subsequently organized.

T h e Part T h a t Music Plays

113

T h e g r o u p was f o r t u n a t e in securing as its director a lover of folks, as w e l l as a n efficient, trained musician, Mrs. L . A . C r u l l , w h o lives in M u s c a t i n e a n d teaches music there. She took the responsibility for leadership of the g r o u p , t h o u g h her o w n schedule was n o t light a n d the p a y m e n t was necessarily small. Mrs. C r u l l has given u n t i r i n g effort, encouragement, a n d i n s p i r a t i o n to the d e v e l o p m e n t of the M u s c a t i n e C h o r u s , a n d they h a v e achieved o u t s t a n d i n g results. Rehearsals are h e l d in the Y. W . C . A . b u i l d i n g every Saturday a f t e r n o o n ; a n d the h u s b a n d of a m e m b e r of the chorus r e m a r k e d , " B a t t l e , m u r d e r or sudden death

wouldn't

keep my w i f e away f r o m o n e of those meetings." T h i s chorus has s u n g for c h u r c h g r o u p s , for the C h a m b e r of C o m m e r c e , and for meetings of c l u b s of many kinds, b u t it has been o b l i g e d to decline m a n y invitations because of lack of time to p r e p a r e f o r p r o g r a m s . Distance a n d busy f a r m l i f e are b o u n d to m a k e regular rehearsals difficult, especially d u r i n g the w i n t e r months. T h e r e f o r e a n o t h e r g r o u p has been organized in the n o r t h e r n corner of the county; and the w o m e n h a v e f o u n d a way to b r i n g their beloved director to b o t h groups. T h i s n o t only w i l l d o u b l e the n u m b e r of singers b u t also w i l l save time a n d energy w h i c h before were wasted in travel. T h e m e m b e r s are p r o u d of their organization. T h e y are eager to g o a b o u t their singing in a professional way a n d " w i t h n o discordant notes." T h e y have purchased simple, attractive black gowns, all alike; and they a p p e a r professional i n d e e d w h e r e v e r they sing. A t Christmas time their carols e c h o t h r o u g h Muscatine's s h o p p i n g district by m e a n s of the l o u d speaker e q u i p m e n t generously placed in the local f u n e r a l c h a p e l by their sponsor and " c h o r u s f a t h e r , " w h o is also a music lover.

114

T h e Part T h a t Music Plays

I f only jazz-weary America might tune in often and hear this chorus sing "Bless T h i s House," " A t Dawning," "Snow Flakes," " I n d i a n L u l l a b y , " " D e e p R i v e r , " or the difficult b u t beautiful cantata, " T h e Rose of Avon T o w n " there would surely be less love-sick crooning. T h e Muscatine Chorus has in it only two or three trained voices. It is not a group of opera stars; but it is a group with a purpose and a love for singing. Mrs. McColm says, " W e have several wonderful things planned for the coming year." T h e group has its hands in the soil, a lilt in its heart, and a glorious triumphant song on its lips. It believes with Auerbach that "Music washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life." MUSIC STRESSED IN E N T I R E

EXTENSION

SERVICE

T h e Muscatine Chorus is a perfect example of the philosophy of the arts program in Agricultural Extension Service in action, and it explains clearly the reason for the program's stress on cultural activities. R u r a l choruses all over the country are making a unique contribution to the development of American music. Reports from every state in the Union carry enthusiastic comments concerning music, such as: "community sings, music festivals, for the joy of doing something that is lovely and with no contest element"; "music and drama festivals with emphasis on good sportsmanship"; "music study projects to help family, club and community find greater pleasure in hearing worthwhile music"; "songs for local leader meetings, County Council meetings, County short courses, and various community activities"; "music appreciation to fill the mind and heart with worthwhile things, for people who sing together in club meetings will forget personal dif-

The

Part T h a t Music Plays

115

ferences"; "choruses, quartets, orchestras, bands—in county festivals providing both stimulus and incentive for individual and group expression." It is often difficult to locate in these reports the references to cultural items; but diligence brings surprising results. In the midst of reports on baby beef, dairy calves, clothing, farm accounts, nutrition, the canning of meat, style shows, the bull ring, forestry, girls' clubrooms, judging teams, poultry, corn, hogs, or sheep are sure to be words of enthusiastic praise for plays, sings, folk dancing, painting, or pageantry. As Dr. Koch says of drama in these United States, " W h a t magic is here? T h e glamour, brave tradition, the romance of our teeming life of today, the vast dream of a new kingdom of humanity." T a k e away the singing voice, the melody of it, the swinging gayety of the dance, the swift movement through light and shadow, the laughter of multitudes enjoying life in leisure movements in the audience and on the stage—and the adventure and a good share of the romance of the soil are lost. T h i s is one reason why farmers demand that culture remain in agriculture. Rural America is not only singing but also developing remarkable skill in the playing of musical instruments. Ability to direct an orchestra is one of the greatest assets a teacher can have these days in applying for a position in rural areas. A school band or a school orchestra is as necessary as arithmetic; or so it seems. T h e r e are state music festivals in which parades are so long that they take three hours to pass a given point. Each school appears in its own uniform with goldbraided, brilliantly-lined capes, brass buttons, and all. Band mothers' organizations have been formed to raise money to defray the expense of this paraphernalia and to sponsor the local groups of players.

116

T h e Part T h a t Music Plays

F o u r - Η C l u b orchestras are n u m e r o u s ; a n d the most expert m e m b e r s o f local groups are invited to become m e m b e r s of state 4"H orchestras. I n f o r m a t i o n a l m a t e r i a l in W i s c o n s i n includes this p a r a g r a p h : " W e can use an u n l i m i t e d n u m b e r of violins, ccllos, or strong bass, b u t the n u m b e r of

flutes,

clarinets, trumpets, trombones, F r e n c h horns, melophones, tubas, s a x o p h o n e s a n d d r u m s will be limited. O n e pianist will be selected. W e c a n n o t use b a n j o s , ukeleles, guitars or mandolins." T h i s is certainly clear a n d to the p o i n t ; a n d it reveals s o m e t h i n g of the interest t h a t is m o u n t i n g ever higher a n d s o m e t h i n g regarding the standards for music a n d musicians. Orchestras a n d bands are constantly

undergirding

other

kinds of programs. T h e r e are b a n d concerts in the parks in summer, selections played here and there on play programs, at g r a d u a t i o n exercises, on special festival occasions, in parades, a n d at c h u r c h functions. O n e m o t h e r said, " E v e r y time my boy stops d o i n g a n y t h i n g else, he is asked to take his t r o m b o n e a n d play it, here, there and everywhere."

XII

A Leadership Training Center at Jackson's Mill, West Virginia If I had to write a motto over the portals of leisure, I would do it in three words—skill, creation, beauty—and I would call the whole house, the House of Joy.1 WEST

VIRGINIA

f a r m p e o p l e h a v e been e n c o u r a g e d

to

m a k e t h e m o s t o f t h e i r u n i q u e r e s o u r c e s in t h e d e v e l o p m e n t of t h e i r c u l t u r a l p r o g r a m . P i c t u r e s , as well as stories told by state leaders, s h o w w h a t c o l o r f u l events t h e i r h i s t o r i c a l p a r a d e s h a v e b e e n , t h e i r h a r v e s t a n d s p r i n g festivals, t o u r n a ments, jubilees, and pageants. I n a n a r t i c l e c a l l e d " C a n n e d A m u s e m e n t , " in t h e Virginia

Farm

News,

West

B e t t y E c k h a r d t , state r e c r e a t i o n spe-

cialist, tells h o w v a r i o u s g r o u p s h a v e p l a n n e d for a n d dev e l o p e d special c e l e b r a t i o n events. She says: In these modern days, we know that we must deal with economic, educational and social problems, not on the old community basis, but on the basis of the trade area. T h e rural neighborhood that wishes to work out a fine type of leisure-time program must know what the near-by town is offering and h e l p to encourage worth-while activities for both town and country. In planning future events, groups first consider what opportunities are available. Is there a community band or orchestra or chorus? W h a t about dramatics? Is there a barn or a hall or a school available where folks can paint their own scenery, make their own lighting equipment, and put on their own plays? W h a t opportunities are there to borrow books? Is there an athletic field, a little park or grove which might be used as an open-air community center or picnic ground? 1 L. P. Jacks, The Education of the Whole Man, Harper & Brothers, 193'- Ρ- 6 5·

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Training for Leadership

DISTINCTIVE PROGRAMS

FROM

EVERY-DAY

MATERIAL

Miss E c k h a r d t tells of the South B r a n c h Valley

riding

tournaments, events traditional f r o m the days when knighth o o d was in flower and k n o w n to be c o n t i n u e d in only one o t h e r region in the U n i t e d States; of parades a l o n g the turnp i k e in which I n d i a n chiefs, hunters a n d trappers, packhorses, colonial families in stagecoaches, fiddlers r i d i n g 011 floats

with log-cabin backgrounds, pioneers in

Conestoga

w a g o n s a n d ox-carts, people of a later p e r i o d d r i v i n g an oldtime automobile, a n d

finally

the 1936 West V i r g i n i a n s in

the latest m o d e l touring cars. T h u s , i n celebration of the o p e n i n g of a new h i g h w a y thousands saw something of the history of their people and of the modes of transportation a l o n g a road w h i c h was once an I n d i a n trail but is n o w a f a m o u s tourist h i g h w a y . T h e historical p a r a d e is i m p o r t a n t as home-talent entertainment in West V i r g i n i a and furnishes v i t a l material f o r the b u i l d i n g of a p r o g r a m w i t h m e a n i n g . It requires c a r e f u l organization, research, a n d i m a g i n a t i o n ; b u t it draws together the people of w i d e areas in a j o i n t venture that is discussed long a f t e r the procession passes. So it is that a l t h o u g h they seem c o m m o n p l a c e a n d ordin a r y in n a m e events a n d projects in West V i r g i n i a take on special significance a n d become distinctive in the annals of p r o g r a m - m a k i n g because leaders a n d g r o u p s are keen to discover the special values and different contributions possible in common everyday-life material. A n outstanding exa m p l e of what this means is f o u n d in the Jackson's M i l l State 4 - H C a m p project, f o r w h i c h W i l l i a m H . K e n d r i c k has been the director since its beginning. C a m p s are to be f o u n d in all sections of the country; a n d the country knows h o w great are the values derived f r o m

T r a i n i n g for Leadership

119

them. B u t the camp at Jackson's Mill is different. In fact there are no other camps like it in the United States. It is West Virginia's leadership-training school, carried on under the direction of the Extension Service of the College of Agriculture, West Virginia University. It is a pioneer development of its kind, not only in America, but also in the world. It is here that 4 Η boys and 4-H girls, other young people, f a r m women, farmers, ministers, church groups, co-operative associations, and various other state-wide organizations come for their annual meetings and training schools for the development of leadership that reaches to the farthest corners of the state and far beyond the state boundaries. West V i r g i n i a Extension Service and the former director, Nat. T . Frame, have long been known for pioneer work in regional planning, in the development of broad country-life interests through L i f e Study Institutes, regional leadership training camps, country-life conferences, and

community

study. It was in 1920 that five acres of land were donated by the M o n o n g a h e l a West Penn Public Service Company for a state 4-Η camp. T o this original grant citizens of Lewis County added another thirty acres of the old Andrew Jackson f a r m in 1 9 2 1 ; later the state purchased several other tracts, until today the grounds include 523 acres of lovely mountain country with a broad level valley at the center, around which are grouped the unique camp buildings. Eleven counties have already constructed their own cabins at Jackson's Mill, and it is expected that eventually each of the fifty-five counties will have a home at the camp, either of its own or in co-operation with other counties. T h e story of the b u i l d i n g of the cabins is thrilling. One county group raised its first money for a building f u n d through an old-

ι so

Training for Leadership

hen party. M o r e than three hundred hens were sold; and after the first dollars began to roll in, the rest was easily accomplished. One county built its camp house with money earned from booths at the fair; U p s h u r County's camp was built of stone, and over the fireplace was placed a large marble slab set in for permanent record of this venture in building, as well as for interesting decoration. T h e 4 Η g r o u p chiseled on this slab a m a p of their county, with the names and boundaries of each community in it. Not only does it record where these 4-H members live, but also it makes clear that they have studied their own communities and that through study new appreciations have developed that come from intercommunity understanding. A n o t h e r cabin was made possible by the joint effort of the members of a 4-H C l u b and of the F a r m Women's groups, w h o raised the first money; the F a r m B u r e a u furnished the windows; the Quota Club, the front and back doors; the Kiwanis C l u b supplied the roof and even sent members to put it on; and the R o t a r y C l u b laid the floor, in keeping with its motto that has to do with laying firm foundations. One cabin was built by the 4-H members themselves, with the help of teachers, pastors, and farmers. Another was built entirely by the teachers of the county. T h e governor of the state actually helped to build the camp house which the people of his home county were building. With this interest in owning a part of their State C a m p equipment spreading over the state, it is no wonder that Jackson's M i l l has been called the "mecca of inspiration for West V i r g i n i a . " T h i s is historic ground. T h e old mill, more than one hundred years old, once owned by Andrew Jackson's family and close to which was loeated his boyhood

T r a i n i n g for Leadership

121

home, still stands. Beside the modern c a m p buildings stands the historic M c W h o r t e r log cabin, moved here in 1927. T h i s old home of one of the first families to settle in this section of the country is a constant reminder that the State 4-H C a m p is indeed a pioneer project. LEADERSHIP

TRAINING

A T JACKSON'S

IS

EMPHASIZED

MILL

During the summer months the quiet valley becomes a veritable boom village. Leaders

f r o m local

communities

spend busy, happy days here, learning new skills, discussing problems and plans with the best-trained leaders the state can provide, t r a m p i n g through the woods, singing around the campfire, a n d meeting new friends. W o r k and play are properly balanced. Developing appreciation of finer values is a definite part of the program. Volunteer leadership is the keynote to the success of the project. T h e hundreds of volunteer leaders w h o come for a week's intensive training are carrying the camp influence f a r into the hills of every section of the state. Music, drama, arts, and crafts hold important places in the broad program. F r o m the time of the rural ministers' camp early in M a y to the annual Country L i f e J u b i l e e in September the c a m p is literally a laboratory of community music; and the summer's music program has its climax in the annual State Forest Festival, in October. U n d e r the able direction of Sara H u f f , a trained musician and a nationally-known leader in community music, campers enjoy working individually in the studio, as well as in groups interested in the preparation of programs f o r vesper services, camp-fire gatherings, a n d special programs.

The

1936 camp boasted a vested choir, choruses of boys and of

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T r a i n i n g for Leadership

girls, a chorus of more than four hundred farm women, an orchestra, and a band. Junior and senior 4-H girl campers numbered 625, and the 4 Ή boy campers, 250. They went home to sing many old and new West Virginia folk songs and many other songs for their winter club meetings. At the Farm Women's Camp, in August, more than four hundred leaders met to discuss home and community problems. Many leaders of music in local clubs discussed music plans for home programs and joined in the great chorus, every day becoming more at home with difficult selections and adding new songs to the already large number that have come out of the hill country of this singing state. Miss Huff said, "There is never any question of who will sing in a chorus. Just say we're going to sing and they all come and they all sing." It is significant that West Virginia is a member of the English Folk Song Society, as well as the American society. Groups sing over the radio, and Miss Huff has introduced many an isolated community group over the air to the radio public. County festivals, fairs, and competitions aim to send their best singers to the state festival. Therefore Jackson's Mill campers hear music from the Strawberry Festival, in Upshur County; the Rhododendron Festival, in Webster County; the Forest Festival, at Elkins; the Apple Harvest Festival, in the Eastern Panhandle; the Pioneer Festival, that has so well advertised Black Water Falls in Tucker County; the River Festival, which is held beside the busy Ohio River late in June; even the music from the Allegheny tablelands, which is an area beginning at Pittsburgh and sweeping in a semicircle through a corner of Maryland to Elkins and to Clarksburg.

Training for Leadership WEST

VIRGINIA

RECREATION

AND ART

123

LEAGUE

One of the movements in West Virginia which is directed toward more attractive and inviting life f o r rural communities has resulted in an organization known as the Central West Virginia Recreation and A r t L e a g u e . T h r o u g h recreational activities promoted by the L e a g u e people in many sections of the state have found new interest and satisfaction in their homes, schools, and churches. C o m m u n i t y

and

county round-ups, and intercommunity events have steadily increased; and these have culminated in the annual Spring R o u n d - u p and the Fall R o u n d - u p J u b i l e e , at Jackson's Mill, where the best phases of the year's work are brought together in a huge demonstration at the a n n u a l 4-H R e g i o n a l Fair. As many as 20,000 people have assembled at one time to participate in this event, which includes exhibits of all sorts, demonstrations, little-theater productions,

readings,

games, speeches, and story-telling. H a n d c r a f t articles, quilts, blankets, woven rugs, hickory split-baskets, and woodwork are displayed. T h e r e are no midway concessions; and there is 110 demand for them, nor is there room. T h e r e is mountain music of that region, with special concerts by chorus, band, and orchestra. T h e climax is a pageant called " T h e Spirit of Progress," built upon ideas gathered from the country folk and produced simply on the final evening of the jubilee. LIFE-STUDY

INSTITUTES

For fifteen years the West Virginia Agricultural Extension Division has been emphasizing the h u m a n and the social factors in agriculture. During these years 2,500 country-life

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Training

for

Leadership

conferences h a v e been held in 350 different communities. For nine years the presidents of the six church-related colleges have been w o r k i n g w i t h the Extension Sociologist a n d E x e c u t i v e Secretary of the L i f e Study Institute, A . H. R a p king, in the interest of a p r o g r a m in adult education. T h i s Institute was organized in 1929 to develop the foll o w i n g objectives: 1. T o provide a medium through which co-operating organizations can promote a united program in the interest of studying Life as related to the economic, social, educational, recreational and spiritual phases of our changing order. 2. T o create and stimulate interest in a study of the historical and cultural background of the West Virginia people. 3. T o stimulate and clarify thinking concerning our relationships to our nation and to the world community. 4. T o help meet the need for good wholesome leisure-time activities. 5. T o aid homes, churches and schools to make their best possible contributions to die changing social order. 6. T o assist in the development of a more adequate philosophy of life. R e v e r e n d a n d Mrs. R a p k i n g have been the prime movers in the project, b u t the idea has spread even into isolated communities t h r o u g h o u t the state. Some sixty life-study groups have been organized w i t h eight hundred members. Certificates of progress have been awarded to 540 members, w h o have been interested in the study of subjects such as: A m e r i c a n History a n d Literature, T h e Family, Drama, G e n e r a l Science, Sociology, W o r l d Civilization, Music, N e w a n d O l d T e s t a m e n t History, Philosophy of Education, Citizenship, T h e L i f e of Christ. G r o u p s that have become part of the Institute i n c l u d e University W o m e n , Farm Bureau (men a n d w o m e n ) , W o m e n ' s Christian T e m p e r a n c e U n i o n , State Ministerial

C o n f e r e n c e Commission, West

Virginia

T r a i n i n g for Leadership C o u n c i l of C h r i s t i a n

Education,

F e d e r a t i o n of

125 Woman's

C l u b s , West V i r g i n i a P a r e n t - T e a c h e r A s s o c i a t i o n , a n d m a n y more. T h i s Institute partakes of the very n a t u r e of the state and its life. It is significant that the arts are g i v e n e q u a l place w i t h other subjects to be studied a n d discussed. N o t o n l y in camps, but also in all the country-life p r o g r a m s this factor of b a l a n c e has been considered. M r . R a p k i n g , E x t e n s i o n sociologist, is a f a r m e r a n d a pastor and lives in the o p e n - c o u n t r y c o m m u n i t y of

Good

H o p e , w h e r e he has a f a r m m a r k e t . H e travels o v e r the state as a farmer, as well as a m e m b e r of the staff of the A g r i c u l tural Extension Service. Life-study institutes h a v e h a d their b e g i n n i n g s before the o p e n fire in M r . R a p k i n g ' s f a r m l i v i n g r o o m . T h i s f a r m h o m e is o n e of W e s t V i r g i n i a ' s leadershipt r a i n i n g centers; a n d m a n y o t h e r centers h a v e d e v e l o p e d in the same homey a t m o s p h e r e u n d e r his u n d e r s t a n d i n g leadership. T h e p r o d u c t i o n of plays a n d music festivals has develo p e d o u t of the very h e a r t of the p l a n . T h e y h a v e b e e n imp o r t a n t in the study of citizenship, in the scoring of comm u n i t i e s (one of the m e t h o d s used in h e l p i n g c o m m u n i t i e s to discover the needs of their i n d i v i d u a l areas), a n d in the research that has taken place in the study of local histories. One-hundred-seventy c o m m u n i t i e s h a v e m a d e self-studies to date, and more than half these h a v e e n d e a v o r e d to m a k e those histories c o m e alive in p a g e a n t r y of o n e sort or ano t h e r . T h e stories of e d u c a t i o n a l p r o j e c t s u n d e r t a k e n

in

little places are f u l l of d r a m a . C o m m u n i t i e s are b e i n g introd u c e d over the radio, a n d local leaders are for the first time s p e a k i n g and s i n g i n g to r a d i o audiences. T h e r e are comm u n i t i e s that k e e p y e a r b o o k s in w h i c h c o u n c i l s lay out their

126

Training for Leadership

plans, objectives, and methods for meeting the expressed needs of their people. Drama, music, folk events are inevitably natural parts of these plans. Devices such as the Life Study Institute, Recreation and Art League, and Education through Organized Community Activities are helping West Virginia to build strong and are wisely blazing the way toward better standards of living and more satisfying life in rural communities. T h e project begun at Jackson's Mill under the direction of far-seeing leadership has become one of the most progressive leadership-training centers in the country. Other states have studied the plan and seen the importance of it. With the rising tide of interest in adult education, more interest than ever before has been aroused here; and out from this rural center have come leaders who have more than proven the soundness of the undertaking, not only throughout the state, but also throughout the country.

XIII

An Experiment in Regional Planning at Oglebay Park, Wheeling, West Virginia There is a healthy stirring of the deeps, particularly among the younger men and women, who are growing determined that they are not to function solely as consumers for the benefits of business, but intend to lead sane and civilized lives.1

T H I S is the story of the development of a modern program of recreation and adult education centered in a beautiful 750-acre playground, atop the Ohio County hills; the story of a rural-urban project centering in a park that serves some 200,000 people who live in the tri-state W h e e l i n g area, which covers parts of f o u r counties in the P a n h a n d l e section of West Virginia, two Ohio counties, and one county in Pennsylvania. It is significant that the Agricultural Extension Service took the initiative in this regional p l a n n i n g project. It is an outstanding demonstration of what can be accomplished when a group of people, seeing the latent possibilities in their resources, use both insight and imagination in a cooperative venture for the enrichment of life in their environment. It is the first recognition on the part of any State Extension Service of the m u t u a l interest of rural and urban people. In the summer of 1926 Colonel E a r l W . Oglebay died, 1 James T r u s l o w Adams quoted in We Are Builders T h e Association Press, p. 45.

of a New

World,

128

Regional

Planning

leaving his beautiful model farm to the city of Wheeling. His will specified that the land must be used for recreational and educational purposes and for nothing else. T h e city was given three years to decide whether or not it should accept the bequest. T h i s country-gentleman's estate included a lovely old mansion, model dairy barn, stables, tenant houses and guest houses, greenhouses and conservatory, acres of fine forest and farmlands, and well-kept roads. Superb equipment, this; and while the city debated ways and means of financing the upkeep of the gift, the executors of the estate fortunately turned to Nat. T . Frame, then director of the Extension Division of the West Virginia University, now the newly appointed director of the Institute at Oglebay Park, for suggestions concerning the type of program that could best meet the needs of the area. In 1928 the Wheeling City Council formally accepted the farm as city property, named it Oglebay Park, and entrusted its care to the Wheeling Park Commission. T h e commission requested the Extension Division workers to direct and operate the program. In order to give Wheeling citizens a direct voice in the conduct of the program, the Extension Service staff at the Park organized an Activities Committee. From the beginning urban and rural residents have worked shoulder to shoulder in developing the many-sided program which aims to provide and increase the opportunities for public recreation, popular education, and cultural activities. T h e Activities Committee has since become part of what is known as Oglebay Institute, an incorporated organization of twenty-five trustees and representatives from 1 1 0 urban and rural organizations in that area. T h e park, with maintenance and physical improvements financed by city tax

Regional Planning

129

funds, is now ably supervised by Homer Fish. T h e institute program is financed by Federal and state funds, by membership dues, and by the interest from the Sarita Oglebay Russel endowment fund. It is the only instance outside New England in which urban and rural tax funds are being pooled in a specific project. Besides Betty Eckhardt, state recreation specialist and executive secretary, the "activities" staff includes: A. B. Brooks, noted naturalist; John Handlan, publicity and public-contact, as well as hobby-club, supervisor; Edwin M. Steckel, director of music; Frank Sanders, assistant recreation specialist and director of music in rural areas; Eugene W. Beatty, forester; Herbert Sanborn, director of exhibits; Valeria Yochem Curtin, director of arts and crafts; and other specialists who are employed occasionally for shorttime projects. Great things have been accomplished at Oglebay Park. T h e mansion now houses a valuable museum. T h e great barn has been converted into a theater and dance pavilion. T o this barn people once came from near and far to see some of the world's prize cattle; today they come from miles around to dance square dances on Friday evenings and to witness and to take part in all kinds of home-talent events. T h e rural people have been responsible for building and equipping the new stage (where once was a high haymow) and for laying the new dance floor. Money was raised for these improvements by square dances. T h e theater, which has the same floor space as in olden days, seats six hundred people. Below the theater is a spacious lobby for games and sociability. Here also are craft workshops and a children's museum. Adjoining the barn is another building, once a

130

Regional Planning

cattle shed, but now a lovely, sunny d i n i n g room, with an outdoor tearoom under an open shed. Mrs. Curtin, in her artistic fashion, has painted screens, walls, cupboards, and the beams in the ceiling with gay Swedish designs. Where once was a bull pen is now a well-equipped kitchen and cafeteria. T h e r e are ten miles of woodsy nature trails, a camp-fire circle in a secluded spot, a new swimming pool, a nine-hole golf course, two tennis courts, two h u n d r e d picnic sites, for which reservations are made f a r in advance. T h e stables offer good mounts for rent by the hour, and the bridle paths are seldom deserted in good weather. On the slope overlooking a deep valley is a picturesque formal garden, having a fountain and great

umbrellas,

where the C. C. C. boys have just completed a permanent open-air theater. It is here that thousands come together in J u l y and August for community sings, symphonette concerts, pageants, vespers, and special occasions. Easter Sunrise Services, A r b o r Day and A u t u m n Festivals, and 4-H R e g i o n a l Fairs, are red-letter events of each season. C o l o r f u l festivals bring thousands to the park. F r o m J u n e to September the craft shop, adapted f r o m an old calf pen, is busy with weaving, pottery making, metal work, dyeing, and the making of marionettes. T h e pottery firing is done without cost by one of the enthusiastic members w h o also operates a neighboring tile factory. Wednesdays are set aside for special craft work f o r f a r m women.

REGIONAL

FAIR

AT

OGLEBAY

PARK

One of the six a n n u a l regional fairs is held at Oglebay Park. T o this three-day event come the winners from the

Regional Planning

131

various county fairs. In 1936 more than f o u r hundred f a r m people took part in a great music festival called, " T h e Spirit of American M u s i c . " T h e choruses of the five counties came in costumes representing historical groups: Indians, negroes, pioneers, colonial families, and families of the present day. T h e r e were exhibits of 4-H projects, a conservation exhibit of special beauty, a flower show, an evening of plays, and a circus. Especially important was the exhibit of prints which f a r m women brought to the fair. D u r i n g the year, after the exhibit of Country L i f e prints had been shown at the park in the spring, f a r m women were encouraged to make their own collection of prints, to photograph beauty spots on their home lands, to keep scrap books. T h e crafts expert went out to rural communities and talked with the women about color to be f o u n d in the woods, about landscapes, and about how to find beauty in common things. She showed the groups how to frame prints, using proper mats and artistic frames. A t the regional f a i r these pictures were all h u n g in the c a m p lobby in connection with a return exhibit of Country L i f e prints. T h e two interpretations showed some interesting and valuable contrasts; and the visitors had an opportunity to compare the professional with amateur efforts. Important also was the flower show, in which there appeared not only prize blooms of many varieties but also miniature flower arrangements; bouquets carefully arranged according to color of blossom and shape of bowl. Certain makes of old-fashioned pickle jars made iron weed and goldenrod conspicuous among the.most b e a u t i f u l exhibits in the show. T h e r e were perfectly-arranged tables with bowls of

flowers,

candlesticks, and silver. T h e W h e e l i n g G a r d e n C l u b had

132

Regional

Planning

long wished to include farm women in its annual show; but they had never felt quite equal to the effort. In 1936 two leading members of the Wheeling C l u b served as judges for the farm women's exhibit, and they did so with such friendly and genuine interest that another year will undoubtedly find both city and rural groups participating with no hesitation on the part of anyone. One of the most unusual phases of the Oglebay Park program is the Nature Project. A. B . Brooks is a native of West Virginia and has lived close to the woods and the wood dwellers all his life. T h e A n n u a l T r a i n i n g Courses for Leaders, the J u n i o r Nature Courses, trips into the mountains, and nature walks under his direction are counted among the most popular activities in the region. T h e Nature School held annually is of two weeks' duration, and it is followed by two weeks in the mountains at a forest camp. People who attend the school receive no credits, and no special previous experience is required for attendants. It is considered enough that they are interested. T h e faculty for this course includes local staff members in music, sketching, forestry, and nature lore. Volunteer experts are often included. A. R . Waldron, noted Pennsylvania biologist, has sent as many as sixty students to take these nature courses during the last five years. No technical information is given unless it is requested. Presentations are made entirely from a popular standpoint; actual contact with nature is the keynote. Besides the classes in the nature schools there are early Sunday-morning bird walks, when large groups of men, women, boys, and girls or smaller special groups wander along the trails. Mr. Brooks says:

Regional Planning

133

We go quietly. There is never any call for using disciplinary measures. W e walk as noiselessly as possible, listening always for new bird-songs. If a leader does not have the attitude of one travelling over the trail for the first time in his life, he is not the right kind of leader. Now and then we stop in some dingle and completely relax. Sometimes we just listen; sometimes we read a little poetry; sometimes we sing; and sometimes we worship. It's a good thing to walk in silence. Nature and silence can do much for people of today. T h e r e is also a great four-year conservation project under way. It is a 4-H C l u b forestry project which has now eightyseven members at work in the region. Each member agrees to plant 500 trees a year. By so doing it is intended that he will gain knowledge of trees, become acquainted with the forest conditions of his state, develop greater interest in the farm on which he lives, and increase his appreciation of trees and forests for their commercial and ornamental values. T h i s is a co-operative project under the direction of Institute foresters, the naturalist at Oglebay Park, and the state 4-H C l u b department of the Agricultural Extension Service. T h e Wheeling area is sometimes called the "Workshop of the Central West." When one drives down the National Highway along the Ohio River, through Hancock, Brooke, and Ohio counties, and when one watches the red flares from the Bessemer furnaces shooting into the night sky, illuminating the black smokestacks of the great steel factories f o r miles; one realizes why it is that farmers in the region mark their success not by shipments of huge crops to distant markets but by the rise or fall in the steel output and the attendant home market for foodstuffs. Probably this is one reason why rural and urban people have found little difficulty in a joint venture with regard to a recreation program. Oglebay Park has seen people of many nationalities play

134

Regional Planning

a n d rest, d a n c e , sing, a n d p i c n i c u n d e r its g r e a t trees. It is a p l a c e w h e r e c u l t u r a l activities find r i c h soil in w h i c h

to

g r o w ; w h e r e o u t s t a n d i n g l e a d e r s h i p has m a d e f o r m o r e leade r s h i p d e v e l o p m e n t ; w h e r e m a n y k i n d s of p e o p l e h a v e c o m e t o g e t h e r to e n j o y w h o l e s o m e e n t e r t a i n m e n t a n d p a r t i c i p a t e in a c t i v i t i e s of t h e i r o w n c h o i c e in the interest of

better

living. T H E PARK

IDEA SPREADS T O H A N C O C K

COUNTY

It is i n t e r e s t i n g that a n o t h e r r e c r e a t i o n park is n o w b e i n g d e v e l o p e d in the n o r t h e r n e n d of the P a n h a n d l e a r e a , at Tomlinson's

Run,

Hancock

County,

West

Virginia.

Mr.

W a l t e r G u m b l e , c o u n t y a g e n t , is l a r g e l y r e s p o n s i b l e f o r its o r i g i n . T h e i n s p i r a t i o n , h e says, c a m e f r o m O g l e b a y

Park.

H i s i d e a w a s to use a c o m p a r a t i v e l y s m a l l a r e a of w o o d e d l a n d w h i c h was u n s u i t a b l e f o r f a r m i n g a n d to t u r n it i n t o a p l a y g r o u n d o n a m i n i a t u r e O g l e b a y P a r k basis. T h e

farm

groups under Mr. G u m b l e ' s leadership offered the C o u n t y C o u r t d o l l a r f o r d o l l a r f o r the p u r c h a s e of l a n d . B e f o r e l o n g , h o w e v e r , the p r o j e c t g r e w b e y o n d the f u r t h e s t d r e a m s

of

the p e o p l e of the c o u n t y . T h e State P a r k C o n s e r v a t i o n Service o f f e r e d to b r i n g i n a w o r k e r s ' c a m p a n d to d e v e l o p the trails, b u i l d l o d g e b u i l d i n g s , a n d clear t h e l a n d . A t p r e s e n t m o r e t h a n n i n e h u n d r e d acres h a v e b e e n p u r chased; a n d b e f o r e it is c o m p l e t e d the p a r k w i l l i n c l u d e some s i x t e e n h u n d r e d acres. T h i s is w i l d e r c o u n t r y t h a n t h e p a r k lands

near

Wheeling.

streams, steep w o o d e d

There

are

deep

hillsides. T h e r e

ravines,

rushing

are p l a n s f o r

b u i l d i n g of c a b i n s f o r tourists a n d c a b i n s f o r g r o u p s

the of

c a m p e r s in the r e g i o n . T h e p a r k is n e a r e n o u g h to the steel m i l l s u p a n d d o w n t h e r i v e r to o f f e r a real p l a y g r o u n d to the w o r k e r s , as w e l l as to the f a r m g r o u p s b a c k of t h e slopes.

Regional Planning

135

T h u s the idea of regional p l a n n i n g spreads; and a g a i n the p e o p l e of W e s t V i r g i n i a and n e i g h b o r i n g areas are enthusiastically p l a n n i n g ahead for the b u i l d i n g of a satisfying leisure-time program, not in commercialized e n t e r t a i n m e n t , b u t by m a k i n g close contacts w i t h nature, seeking to regain their b i r t h r i g h t in a w o o d l a n d park, d e v e l o p i n g a p r o g r a m that shall be their o w n , b e a r i n g in m i n d the needs of all the p e o p l e in the region. In view of the g r o w i n g f e e l i n g that A g r i c u l t u r a l Extension should e x p a n d its g e o g r a p h i c area of service at least to rural non-farm p o p u l a t i o n , this p r o j e c t is i m p o r t a n t indeed.

XIV

T h e Little Stringed People Play Their Parts With Mr. Punch, common ground,

both children and grown-ups for both relish laughter

meet

on

I T IS d o u b t f u l w h e t h e r " T h e L i t t l e Alley Players" of Stutsm a n C o u n t y , N o r t h D a k o t a , will ever see their names in electric lights a b o v e the e n t r a n c e of a Broadway Strings w o u l d surely b e c o m e

tangled and

theater.

loosely-jointed

knees w o u l d give way at the idea. Y e t this t r o u p e has had the u n u s u a l h o n o r o f a t t r a c t i n g audiences m a d e u p of the people of m a n y n a t i o n s , p e o p l e who have become so interested in the a c t i n g t h a t they have offered to furnish

the

actors with new costumes of G e r m a n y , Russia, Poland, Norway, Sweden, a n d o t h e r countries they have k n o w n .

The

actors are m a r i o n e t t e s ; a n d so there is in the m a k i n g a mario n e t t e t r o u p e Avhich may o n e day produce

international

folk plays. A H o m e D e m o n s t r a t i o n agent is responsible for this project. W h e n a s o p h o m o r e in the University of Illinois, Magdalene H e i b e r g b e c a m e interested in m a r i o n e t t e s and set out to learn t h e i r history, to learn how to m a k e and m a n i p u l a t e them a n d how to b u i l d a m a r i o n e t t e theater. L i t t l e did she know

that

her

interest w o u l d one day change

a

whole

county's idea of good t h e a t e r on the plains of N o r t h Dakota. Soon a f t e r Miss H e i b e r g c a m e to S t u t s m a n C o u n t y as H o m e D e m o n s t r a t i o n agent she b r o u g h t out her little doll friends ι Design, M a y , 1936.

Puppets

137

one evening and entertained an enthralled group of 4-H Club girls. They at once wanted to make some. Miss Heiberg remembered the hard work, patience, and long study necessary for the skillful manipulation of marionettes and disregarded their requests. But the girls continued to talk, and enthusiasm grew.

MARIONETTES

JOIN

IN

COMMUNITY

CELEBRATION

Finally something had to be done about it. Jamestown, North Dakota, was celebrating its fiftieth anniversary, and a leading business woman came to Miss Heiberg asking for help on a booth. Would it be possible to have a marionette show ready for the great event? Miss Heiberg thought so. She talked the matter over with the girls, and they agreed to go to work in earnest. They met at Miss Heiberg's apartment and sewed, pasted, studied, and rehearsed steadily in all their free time. They practiced manipulating the strings on the stairs over the banisters in the hall. Their play was Little Red Riding Hood. Then they began to hunt for a suitable place to stage the play. They had no little theater at that time. Finally they got permission to board up an alley between two stores on Main Street. Benches were installed for seats. A stage was elevated upon wooden horses and pop cases. Wires were strung from one building to the other, and unbleached muslin curtains were hung for a drop. A green monk's-cloth draw-curtain finished the outfit. Trees were used as background scenery. T h e booth performance was a great success. Barkers along the street brought in crowds. T h e charge for admittance was five or ten cents, and the company made $33.00. For some special footlights it had paid $10, and this

138

Puppets

was returned to the "artists" by the benefactress who sponsored the production. Well, interest continued. T h e group was invited to give performances in other parts of the county. On each trip they made enough money to cover travel expenses, gas, and oil. L a t e r they built their own little theater. It has dark green curtains and is housed in a basement room at the public library, where a busy group meet regularly to work, to rehearse, and to try out new plays, lighting effects, scenery, and so forth. T h e r e are now fifteen doll actors, and more are being made. T h e y are spoken of as though they were alive. "She did so well that evening out at Pingree," one of the manipulators declared. " O u r wolf has mange, but we hate to have another coat put on him. We like him just as he is," said another. It's f u n to hear the group talk about their actors.

MARIONETTES

TAKE

TO T H E

ROAD

Twenty-eight performances have been given to date, and more than six thousand people have been in the audiences. T h e antics of the famous little people have caused laughter at meetings of parent-teacher associations and of the Knights of C o l u m b u s ; in churches and in schools; at meetings of other 4-H Clubs, of the Y o u n g Citizens League, and of other organizations. At the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Little

Country

T h e a t r e this group was invited to present a play as the final event of the festival. First the history of marionettes was given; two performances followed, and then a banquet was given in the L i n c o l n L o g Cabin with Mr. A r v o l d as honored guest and host. D u r i n g the dinner one of the marionette group paid a tribute to Mr. Arvold in the following words:

Puppets

139

There are 4-H's in our clover T h a t is known the whole world over, T h e Head H—you have filled, T h e Heart H—you have stirred, T h e Hand H—you have guided. T h e Health H—you have fostered, Your inspiration—that we may enjoy a simple, full and happy rural life will never die!

T h e little master of ceremonies looked spruce in his jaunty white satin sailor suit, white shoes, and white gloves, with a four-leaf clover in his white sailor cap. It is possible that he forgot that Mr. Arvold was a very tall m a n ; and it is quite possible that Mr. Arvold entirely forgot that the "speaker" was only ten inches tall. T h e Little Alley Players now have their minds on new plays. As they have traveled about the country, playing before Homemakers' groups, R o y a l

Neighbors, F. E. R . Α.,

school children, and business women's clubs they have made many new friends. T h e y have performed in college chapels, and in theaters, in houses and in camps, in schoolhouses and in church buildings. Proceeds left f r o m performances are set aside to pay part of the expenses for members w h o can attend the marionette school planned by Mr. Arvold for 1937 at the agricultural college. Meantime farm women who are w o r k i n g on their projects with the Home Demonstration agent in reviving old country arts, such as weaving, knitting, and crocheting, and in making modern application of old designs, are interested in contributing new costumes of the old country to the Little Alley Players. T h i s means the disappearance of nationality barriers a n d the forming of closer friendships between communities and between generations. It also means that the Little Alley

140

Puppets

P l a y e r s w i l l h a v e a b e a u t i f u l i n t e r n a t i o n a l e x h i b i t a n d , if p l a n s d e v e l o p , t h e b e g i n n i n g of the

first

folk-marionette

t h e a t e r in r u r a l A m e r i c a . M a r i o n e t t e s h a v e n a t u r a l l y b e c o m e the m a j o r b r a n c h c r a f t p r o j e c t d u r i n g 4 - H c a m p p e r i o d at Spirit L a k e , fifteen m i l e s f r o m J a m e s t o w n . In 1936 e a c h of the t h i r t y - f o u r girls a n d l e a d e r s p l a n n e d a n d m a d e c h a r a c t e r s for the p l a y Hansel Gretel

and

a n d l e a r n e d to m a n i p u l a t e the dolls. In p l a n n i n g t h e

c h a r a c t e r s the g r o u p a r r a n g e d t h a t the girls f r o m e a c h c o m m u n i t y m i g h t f i n a l l y h a v e a w h o l e set f o r the p l a y a n d t h u s w o u l d be a b l e t o g i v e p e r f o r m a n c e s a f t e r she r e t u r n e d h o m e . Miss H e i b e r g r e p o r t s : It was an ambitious and excited group which set out on the project when I announced that they might make one marionette for each club or if they were eager to work hard, they might make one each. T h e y could not be satisfied with one per club and so the fun was begun. T o get them interested in the project I gave them an opportunity to manipulate the marionettes in the Red Riding Hood play and prepare some original stunt for the evening program. T h e y responded with amazing skill and cleverness, and their enthusiasm gave me confidence in their ability. Every girl from the smallest to the eldest worked with such zeal to get the marionettes to the action stage that it was almost humorous. W h e n they were finally completed, a reader was chosen from the group, and one of the older members was selected to direct the play. She was assisted by several of the leaders; and after one morning of brief rehearsals the show was presented. T h e night before, tryouts for the play were held and those who could manipulate their marionettes best were selected to put on the play. All others were divided into groups for skits, dances or songs, so that every marionette had a part in the final performance. T h e results were much beyond my expectations and were most gratifying. T h e weather has been so unbearably hot and we have been so taken up with Achievement Days and County and State Fairs that we have not done so much with the women and the project

Puppets

141

which I h a d in mind for them. W e still have hopes of w o r k i n g u p these characters from many countries; and after my trip to the conference of the Associated C o u n t r y W o m e n of the W o r l d at W a s h i n g t o n in J u n e I can see ever so many interesting things we might work out in this line. Below is the order in which o u r 4 - H C a m p project was carried out: First day R e a d play and planned characters T r a c e d and cut patterns L a i d patterns on cloth Second d a y . . . C u t out cloth marionettes Started seaming T h i r d d a y . . . .Finished seaming Fourth d a y . . . Completed stuffing F i f t h day Began costuming Sixth day Finished costuming Completed stringing Practised manipulation Seventh d a y . .Rehearsals for play and program Presentation of program

THE

"HAPPY

JACK

PLAYERS,"

OF

NORTH

CAROLINA

A n o t h e r busy little puppet group, this one in

North

Carolina, can tell a w o n d e r f u l story of adventure. H a p p y J a c k Company has played Circus

or Bust

The

before

more than five hundred enthusiastic audiences—for

two

hundred and fifty thousand school children of North Carolina. T h i s is a health-propaganda play concerning a small boy who is unable to attend the circus because of a toothache. T h e dentist comes to the rescue, and Little J a c k goes off to the circus and has a beautiful time. So the ancient art of puppetry is serving modern educational ends. T h i s play has aroused such interest in puppetry that the Carolina Playmakers, who are producing it for the State B o a r d of Health, have announced a summer-school course in educational puppetry with full university credit.

142

Puppets

It seems queer to find that hand-puppets have a year's contract signed to play in the schools of an entire state—on the "banks" of Currituk Sound, in the Blue Ridge country, and down in a coastal county. These little people performed in New Orleans before the American Dental Association. They were guests of the Home Economics Convention in North Carolina. They have appeared before several district meetings of dentists, and were applauded at the Conference of Directors of the drama which was held in the Playmakers' Theatre, in Chapel Hill. They have traveled eighteen thousand miles. Says Frederick Koch, Jr. (he and Wallace Bourne, Jr., are the puppeteers): M o r e than 5,000 years ago priests of the Orient used puppets in their temples to impress their superstitions. Perhaps Mr. B o u r n e a n d I are priests of a new order, a n d 5,000 years hence much of o u r up-to-the-minute health p r o p a g a n d a of today may be looked u p o n as twentieth century superstition. Nevertheless we hope that the archaeologist of the dim future will find unusually good teeth a m o n g the N o r t h Carolinians of this stratum.

Meantime Little Jack's fan mail continues to stream in; and all over North Carolina you will find cards from Little Jack treasured by his hosts of young admirers.

XV

Farmers Write Their Own Plays The theatre can only be vital and essential to the extent that it is an expression of its time. Its force will not be determined by its perfections or imperfections but by its stride.1

I N 1905 Frederick H. Koch went to the University of North Dakota as a young instructor in English. When he inquired timidly one day what kind of plays had been presented there, an upper classman replied, "Last year we did The Merchant of Venice up-to-date." At first, the professor was a little discouraged; then the idea came to him—Why not? Why, he's right! Why shouldn't drama be up-to-date and about the life we live and the people we know? Later, when he began to lay foundations for the development of his dream of a regional theater, he found the boys and girls of this prairie country "eager to write plays of the farm and the ranch, of cowboys and homesteaders, plays near to the windswept soil, plays telling of long bitter winters in the little sod shanty; but plays singing too of the prairie spring time, of unflecked sunshine, of the wilderness gay with wild roses, of the fenceless fields welling over with lark song, plays of the travail and achievement of the prairie people." Today it is the prairie people themselves who are making real the vision which Dr. Koch once had for the developi Arthur Hopkins quoted in a Wisconsin Dramatic G u i l d Program, March, 1935.

144

Farmers Write T h e i r Own Plays

ment of native drama in North Dakota. While the university is today interested in sophisticated social drama of distant places, and hails Post Road

as its latest success, Mrs. Ams-

paugh, on her prairie homestead f a r out on the plains, sitting at her sewing machine writes a play about soap. Years ago she came here as the wife of a homesteader, one of the pioneers. H e r play grew out of a Homemakers' project of the Agricultural Extension program; and it had so much in it of the life of North Dakota that Mr. Arvold heard of it at the Little Country T h e a t r e . He made a visit to the Amspaugh farm and invited the author to go to Fargo and present her play. For Mrs. Amspaugh it was the first trip to Fargo in many years; but she went and scored another success for the Little Country T h e a t r e . Part of the play was broadcast over the radio. Mrs. Amspaugh is now at work on a second play under Mr. Arvold's supervision. She knows whereof she writes. She has seen the dust blow; she has been snowbound for weeks at a time. She tells of North Dakota truly. Her first play reminds one of the epic, Pageant

of the Northwest,

which was

presented in 1 9 1 4 , when the beautiful Bankside

Theatre

was dedicated at the University of North Dakota.

This

pageant was written by eighteen undergraduates in their enthusiasm to build with Dr. Koch a folk theater which for a while flourished, but which did not take deep root until transplanted to the warm, verdant,

fiddle-strumming,

ballad-

singing state of North Carolina. It is extremely interesting that in 1936 we f o u n d a Norwegian girl from this same prairie country, now a student of the University of North Carolina, writing a prize play, Prairie

Dust. Here is a student writing of man's con-

Farmers Write T h e i r Own Plays

145

fiict with nature in the great drought during the years 1931 to 1935· Dust and grasshoppers left the land sterile and the farmers desperate. T h e young author tells us that these years left with her an indelible memory of grayness of sky, of earth, and of men. Gerd Bernhart writes of the land she knows. Of many writers this cannot be said. One f a r m woman writes of K i n g K n u t e and his far-away country, while her real story is at her own doorstep. Dr. Koch tells of a student who wrote a theme about a storm in New York City. H e couldn't understand how the boy, w h o lived in the country and had never seen New York City, had happened to write on such a subject. W h e n he asked why, the boy answered, " I saw where the cyclone had driven a hitching post right through a telegraph pole. T h a t ' s where I got my idea." Dr. Koch said, " Y o u went through that cyclone yourself, didn't you? T h e n you wrote about a storm at the Flat Iron Building in New York City. W h y ? " " O h , I thought it would be more interesting," the student explained. B u t in the country today there are individuals who, like Mrs. Amspaugh, are beginning to see the "interestingness" nearer home. PLAY-WRITING

IN

WISCONSIN

Mrs. Carl Felton, who lives on a farm near Madison, Wisconsin, and is a moving spirit of the Hillcrest Community C l u b , became convinced that the farmer and his family are too often burlesqued—that rural plays are often overdrawn and untrue to life. She said, " W e wanted a play in which the audience could laugh with,

not at, the farmer. So, not

without serious misgivings, I attempted to write such a play.

146 Goose

Farmers Write T h e i r Own Plays Money

is the result." Goose

Money

is about f a r m

people, about normal neighborhood happenings. T h e Hillcrest Players saw that the play not only described farm problems as they had experienced them, but revealed possibilities in the open country beyond the everyday grubbings for a livelihood. T h e y produced the play in the Dane County H o m e T a l e n t T o u r n a m e n t , in 1928; a n d they took it to Madison d u r i n g F a r m and H o m e Week. In her opening statement Mrs. Felton says, Perhaps it may encourage other farm folks to write plays to fit their individual needs, to know that I am not a college woman, and had never written anything before. In short, I am just an ordinary farm woman with the usual trials and tribulations, likes and dislikes, hopes and despairs. Unquestionably, the most faithful delineation of rural life should come from the people who have experienced it in all its phases, and I shall be happy indeed if Goose Money tempts other farm men and women to try their hand at developing real rural folk drama.

T h i s kind of play has an immediate local appeal that straightway spreads through whole areas if the theme is true. T h e author of this volume, for one, would like to have five cents for every time she has seen Goose Money

produced on

all sorts and conditions of stages in Wisconsin, Iowa, and North Dakota, and has noted its success in reports from other states in the region. Wisconsin has been especially blessed by h a v i n g a host of native playwrights and friends of the theater: among them Zona Gale, W i l l i a m Ellery Leonard, and T h o m a s H . Dickinson. T h e R e v e r e n d W . H . Mansfield, of Allenville, has written many plays that have been produced over and over again in the M i d d l e West. Calista C l a r k , of Muscoda; Carol R e i d ,

Farmers Write Their Own Plays

147

of Oconomowoc; Louise Halliwell, author of Hyacinths for Christmas; J . Clark Weaver, author of Cloudburst; and many others have also written successful plays. PLAY-WRITING

IN NORTH

CAROLINA

Plays are coming from North Carolina which are "as native and indigenous to American soil as the plays of Colum or Synge to Ireland," says Lloyd Morris in the International Book Review. This year students came to the university at Chapel Hill from twenty-six states and several foreign countries, including China, Egypt, and Mexico, and they are writing of the lands they know. Josephine Niggli is a native of Monterray Nuevo Leon, Mexico. Her home is on an old Mexican estate of many acres. Since September of last year she has written ten Mexican folk plays; one, Tooth or Shave, is about a barber who lived in a little town near Miss Niggli's home. Others include Azteca, a tragedy of pre-conquest Mexico; The Cry of Dolores, a story of Mexican independence; The Red Velvet Coat, Sunday Costs Five Pesos, comedies of Mexican villages; and Soldadera, in which is portrayed with remarkable insight, the effect of the revolution on the women of Mexico. Miss Niggli says, "Their only consolation was to weep over the graves of their dead. Unfortunately there are no graves for dead dreams." North Carolinian students are writing of fisher folk, mountain people, negroes, hill farmers, mill people, tenant fanners, and colonial ladies. A student from Tennessee writes of Davy Crockett, a folk drama of the Tennessee frontier; a student from Texas writes Election, a play about politics in a little Texas village. They are plays of locality, but they have broad significance.

148

Farmers W r i t e T h e i r O w n

A MOTION

PICTURE DISCUSSES USES OF

Plays LAND

It is natural that for the most part comedies have so far ruled the rural stage. T h e m a i n idea has been to get just as far as possible from reality, taxes, mortgages, low prices, and the problem of middlemen. T o have a good laugh has been an important factor in production. But the educational play and the folk-play have slowly taken their places on the screen and the stage. T h e United States government has released a film, The Plow That Broke the Plains, which explains why there have been devastating dust storms in the Middle West and warns of what is to come in the future if effective steps are not taken at once to save the vast stretch of country from becoming a desert. Of this film the Boston Herald says, "It is entertainment, unless you narrow that term down to exclude what is profoundly interesting and moving, simply because it is not amusing. It is as dramatic as anything could be, the struggle between man and nature." T h e National Board of Review says, " T h e importance of the film aside from its purpose is the surprising artistic skill with which it has been made, surprising because one does not expect anything so utilitarian in intention to bother to be artistic or even to see how much its utility may be enhanced by the recreated life that only art can give it." T h e program is held together by music which unifies and heightens the film's emotional content. T h e scenes shift from the days of cattle grazing on natural grasslands, to the days when farmers conceived the idea of plowing u p the grass and planting grain. T h e r e follow scenes of the war period, when prices soared; when more new machines were invented; and when everybody planted wheat and bought livestock. T h e n came the crash—followed

Farmers Write T h e i r O w n Plays

149

by d r o u g h t . T h i s time, n o grass to h o l d m o i s t u r e in the soil, so—dust storms. Families b e g a n p u s h i n g westward, this time in b r o k e n - d o w n cars; n o covered w a g o n s n o w . T h e picture ends w i t h a statement of

the w o r k

of the

Resettlement

B u r e a u a n d of other g o v e r n m e n t plans. O n e misses actors in the picture. O n l y a pleasant voice offstage is h e a r d c o m m e n t i n g o n w h a t is b e i n g shown. T h e picture is f u l l of d r a m a t i c possibilities, h o w e v e r , a n d has started lively discussion. H e r e is a device for g i v i n g m e a n i n g to a present-day p r o b l e m a n d its solution. O n e m o r e t h i n g w o u l d m a k e it perfect, n a m e l y , farmers t e l l i n g their o w n d r a m a t i c story on the stage in their o w n characterization of their o w n play. A p l a y that tells of the things close to the heart of f a r m life can d o still m o r e to m a k e the c o u n t r y u n d e r s t a n d w h a t f a r m l i f e is a b o u t , w h a t p r o b l e m s n e e d attention, w h y it is that prices are l o w a n d farms are b e i n g a b a n d o n e d , w h y cattle are b e i n g sold a n d interest is g o i n g unpaid. Plays that h e l p f a r m f o l k to forget their troubles s h o u l d g o on, a n d their n u m b e r s h o u l d increase; b u t plays that enl i g h t e n audiences o t h e r than rural audiences m i g h t well receive m o r e serious consideration. S o m e a u d i t o r s in Boston's audiences h a v e in all p r o b a b i l i t y l e a r n e d a b o u t the dustb o w l situation for the first time f r o m The the

Plow

That

Broke

Plains.

R u r a l actors h a v e so far been a f r a i d of the utilitarian, serious play. It is the e x c e p t i o n a l cast that dares tackle even the simplest type of p r o p a g a n d a

p l a y ; yet w h e n a r u r a l

g r o u p has presented one, its success has been

surprising.

T h e r e is The Edge of the Law, w h i c h was given in the d r a m a t o u r n a m e n t in V a l l e y C i t y , N o r t h D a k o t a . F o u r m e n were in the cast. T h e l e a d i n g c h a r a c t e r was the o w n e r of a twelve-

150

Farmers W r i t e T h e i r O w n

Plays

hundred-acre farm. Broadway producers might have been interested in his sustained acting of the part of the judge. What a perfect actor for a play about the drought conditions he knows so well! N o play to compare with the film about "the plow that broke the plains" has yet been written, but if ever one is, it will do more than speeches in high places or appeals over the radio or in the press to send home the idea that all is not well in our farm country. Can we not look forward to such a play written by farmers and acted by farmers? Rural America does not go folk dancing, singing in choruses, or acting in comedies because it is joyously carefree, but in order to help its people forget their dilemma, to build up stronger foundations of understanding and friendliness, to enable them to continue the struggle with the elements and to work out better social and economic plans for the future. Novelists and poets have written about the unending struggle for existence which farmers have to face. Students of the theater have acted and danced out the theme in laboratory performance and before selected audiences. T h e general public is oblivious of the fact that such a struggle is in progress; and until our regional theater goes beyond the historical pageant and the play that shows only the sunny side of life the public will still wonder what the papers mean when they report "death from drought," "the worst corn crop since 1881," and so forth. Farm people are beginning to create such plays; but they are scarce. A play to equal in vividness the novel Second Hoeing, with its story of the sugar-beet fields which rings so true, needs to be written. So does the story of the tragedy of seasonal workers of the orchards of America and that of the cotton share cropper.

Farmers Write Their Own Plays W h a t Sidney Kingsley, a u t h o r of Men

in White,

a c c o m p l i s h e d in his more recent play, Dead

151 has n o w

End,

r u r a l peo-

ple m i g h t d o w i t h a story of the conflicts they

themselves

faced in 1936. Mr. Kingsley's play is a b o u t the East Side tenements of N e w Y o r k , a n d its m a i n a p p e a l lies in the fact that y o u t h itself tells its o w n story. Several of the actors are boys f r o m the M a d i s o n S q u a r e Boys' C l u b . T h e new effort to enlist the interest of y o u n g f a r m m e n a n d w o m e n , w h o until n o w h a v e o f t e n been the m i n o r i t y g r o u p in the Extension Service p r o g r a m , m i g h t w e l l i n c l u d e s o m e t h i n g of dramatic realism in its p r o g r a m . T h i s g r o u p has shown m a r k e d interest n e i t h e r in a r e c r e a t i o n a l p r o g r a m n o r in a p u r e l y i n t e l l e c t u a l one. B o t h k i n d s of

program

h a v e met, o n l y too often, w i t h l u k e w a r m response. B u t offer the y o u n g farm men a n d w o m e n some real p r o j e c t to g r a p p l e with, an o p p o r t u n i t y to h e l p i n t e r p r e t their o w n difficult situation more clearly, t o g e t h e r w i t h e n o u g h recreational activities to meet n o r m a l needs, a n d their interest may be aroused. M a n y y o u n g m e n a n d w o m e n h a v e d r i f t e d back to the farms because they were u n e m p l o y e d or h a d n o t sufficient m o n e y to c o n t i n u e their college w o r k . Figures d o not tell the story. A play of the K i n g s l e y variety m i g h t tell it very w e l l ; a n d in w r i t i n g a n d p r o d u c i n g it y o u n g f a r m people m i g h t find a c u l t u r a l satisfaction l o n g v a i n l y s o u g h t . Back in the m o u n t a i n s in m a n y states there were yesterday c o m m u n i t i e s where today o n l y a f e w o l d

prospectors

remain. T h e story of such c o m m u n i t i e s is d r a m a t i c , v i v i d , a n d a b o u t to be lost unless told b e f o r e l o n g . Pages and pages in o u r rural d r a m a story are still e m p t y . If filled, they w o u l d m a k e p e r m a n e n t v a l u a b l e records; a n d at the same time they c o u l d b r i n g A m e r i c a up-to-date o n the things that m a t t e r far f r o m the m a i n h i g h w a y s i n isolated areas.

really

XVI

The Importance of Folk Events We are a nation of immigrants and we have a dazzling wealth of folk-art brought in with the tide of immigration from many countries. Surely every effort should be made to preserve and assimilate this music and dancing to all nationalities that make up the people of our country, so that we may not only have these added resources for social enjoyment but that our national life may be enriched with the beauty, color and joy of living, which may become the foundation of a yet undreamed-of art in the development of this country,1 F O L K D A N C I N G and folk music have been of outstanding importance a m o n g the rapidly-developing recreational activities of farm people in this country during these last years of agricultural adjustment. F r o m the Agricultural Extension Division of every state college in the union have come reports of color and vitality added to one program or another by country dances of America or folk dances of the old world. Leadership-training schools, recreation institutes, and the county and district recreation councils growing out of them have all leaned heavily upon the sure enthusiasm among all sorts of groups for learning the folk tunes. O n e of the main reasons for the nation-wide popularity of N a t i o n a l R e c r e a t i o n specialists and their skillfully-organized training institutes is that in their amazing magical bags of tricks they carry the keys to doors opening into the colorful, joyous, rhythmical, scintillating folk life of the peoples 1

Elizabeth Burchenal, folk-dance authority.

T h e Importance of Folk Events

153

of the wide world. Men and women who came to this country long ago and have almost forgotten the old songs and dances which they knew in little villages in Sweden, in Germany, in Norway, and in other lands have often had fond memories awakened by seeing them again here. How many instances there are of meetings which have become electrified when a usually silent man or woman has suddenly recognized an old folk tune! "Why, I know that song," someone has exclaimed. "We used to dance it—like this!" And they have forgotten everything else in their enthusiasm in teaching the whole group. How many articulate leaders have been cultivated in just this way? T h e reports of Jack Knapp, Augustus Zanzig, William Jackson, John Bradford, and others who travel through the country meeting farm groups everywhere are full of stories of just such incidents; and because of them the schedules of these men are crowded literally years in advance. KENTUCKY

As camps have developed throughout the country, they have more and more become recreational training grounds and sources of opportunities for the year's program. Demonstrations have whetted the interest and awakened new enthusiasms for future programs. T h e 1935 report from a Homemakers' camp in Kentucky tells of a camp recreation project built around a developing interest among farm women in other parts of this country and in other lands. It consisted of a trip by "Mrs. Kentucky Homemaker" which took her to Fort Harrod of olden days, where pioneers were playing the folk game, "Way down yonder in the paw paw patch." It took her to the mountains of West Virginia, to the maple groves of New England, and to the home of a

154

T h e Importance of Folk Events

F r e n c h C a n a d i a n w o m a n . It took her on a boat trip f r o m Q u e b e c across the seas on a visit to "the W e l s h " ; and to an Irish w o m a n ' s c a m p ; a n d it let her attend a Scotch celebration. In each scene " M r s . K e n t u c k y H o m e m a k e r " saw some festival, game, or dance or h e a r d some legend or poetry typical of the p e o p l e of the country she was visiting. T h e story of the trip, the a p p r o p r i a t e part of w h i c h was read b e f o r e each scene, gave the audience some idea of the life of the people visited a n d a b a c k g r o u n d for u n d e r s t a n d i n g the p r o g r a m . Scenes like these c o u l d be used i n d i v i d u a l l y a n d have been widely so used t h r o u g h o u t K e n t u c k y . Some of the material for this event was secured f r o m the festival number

of

the

publication

of

the

Associated

Country

W o m e n of the W o r l d . A by-product of this project is a program

of

correspondence

between

recreation

leaders

of

K e n t u c k y and leaders in the C a n a d i a n W o m e n ' s Institutes. T h e c a m p p r o g r a m in K e n t u c k y is a demonstration of the artistic, worth-while events possible w i t h a m i n i m u m of time, energy, and e q u i p m e n t . T h e t r a i n i n g schools elaborate the details, add material, and h e l p leaders to utilize the material in m e e t i n g the recreational needs of their o w n communities. Z e l m a M o n r o e , supervisor for western K e n t u c k y , w h o prepared the " M r s . K e n t u c k y H o m e m a k e r "

material,

has carried on a m a j o r project in recreation in one county throughout

the year. F a m i l y nights are observed in

this

K e n t u c k y county, and n e w recreational e q u i p m e n t has been m a d e possible, both home-made and purchased. N e w games a n d dances have been taught. E q u i p m e n t for schools and c o m m u n i t y p l a y g r o u n d s has been acquired. H o b b i e s have been developed.

T h e Importance of Folk Events

155

WISCONSIN

In M a r a t h o n County, Wisconsin, the turning point in the attitude of various nationalities to one another came about through a pageant called The

Gifts

They

Brought,

which combined handicraft, folk dances, music, and drama. For several years play days had been held each year in the county, with sometimes as many as six hundred

partic-

ipating and with between five and six thousand

specta-

tors. T h e pageant seemed a new way to continue interest in these meetings; and under the supervision of a live-wire Home Demonstration agent a folk festival brought together Swedish, G e r m a n , Bohemian, Hungarian, Italian, and American groups. T h e y made their own costumes. Many were able to furnish authentic foreign costumes which had long been folded away in trunks. T h e County Highway Department helped in the building of a huge out-door stage on the fair grounds at Wausau. T h e infantry and high-school bands played. T h e Woman's C l u b set up a refreshment stand and

thereby

helped to pay the necessary expenses of the event. In the f o l l o w i n g year this pageant led to an historical event showing contrasts in the old and the new methods used in farming, with scenes of Indian, pioneer, and nationality development. It was informal throughout and included old-time f a r m customs, a party of long ago, a tavern scene, and scenes depicting the ways of the farmer in 1934. T h e 1935 production of What Men Live By raised standards still higher. A n d 1936 called for a folk dance and a song festival combined.

156 NORTH

T h e Importance of Folk Events DAKOTA

N o r t h D a k o t a has been especially interested in folk dancing. E d n a Sommerfield, E x t e n s i o n specialist in c l o t h i n g , has p r e p a r e d a s p l e n d i d b u l l e t i n f o r 4-H C l u b s o n the s u b j e c t . She says in a f o r e w o r d , " T h e real p u r p o s e of any folk d a n c e is play—simple, w h o l e s o m e , a n d s p o n t a n e o u s . It is not intended to be observed a n d a d m i r e d b u t is a creative expression or activity in w h i c h all can p a r t i c i p a t e . " F o l k d a n c i n g is of v a l u e to 4-H C l u b m e m b e r s in m a n y ways. It teaches courtesy a n d respect; it encourages greater care for personal a p p e a r a n c e ;

it helps to o v e r c o m e

consciousness and develops grace; it satisfies a desire

selffor

n o r m a l social life in a g r o u p ; it gives the i n d i v i d u a l a n d the g r o u p an a p p r e c i a t i o n of the h e r i t a g e of o u r forefathers; and it brings m i n d , body, and spirit i n t o h a r m o n y . " OLD C O U N T R Y

DANCES

ARE

POPULAR

A W i s c o n s i n R u r a l Music a n d F o l k Festival presented in the little theater at the state fair is t y p i c a l of the w i d e variety of skills in folk music a n d f o l k

dancing which

can

be

achieved by states in their p r o g r a m s . G r o u p s are selected w h o h a v e p a r t i c i p a t e d in f o r m e r c o u n t y festivals, and they i n c l u d e some h u n d r e d s of r u r a l f o l k . T h e p r o g r a m is a cooperative effort by the State F a i r B o a r d , the W i s c o n s i n College of A g r i c u l t u r e , and the State F e d e r a t i o n of M u s i c C l u b s . In 1935 were i n c l u d e d : r h y t h m b a n d selections; quartets of teachers; f o l k dances of I r e l a n d , S c o t l a n d , H o l l a n d ,

Ger-

many, and N o r w a y ; p i a n o a n d c h o r a l selections; folk songs of the Slovakian, the G e r m a n , the F l e m i s h p e o p l e a n d the p e o p l e of the S o u t h e r n m o u n t a i n s ; o l d E n g l i s h ballads sung

The

Importance

of Folk Events

157

by a chorus of c o m b i n e d clubs; m i x e d and male chorus music; and a h a r m o n i c a b a n d . Folk d a n c i n g is t a k i n g a real hold, especially in areas where people of m a n y different nationalities are l i v i n g o n farms. T r a i n i n g schools are training local leaders in this new phase of the recreation program; the local leaders in turn are teaching local groups. In W a u p a c a C o u n t y , Wisconsin, two couples f r o m each of twenty organizations attended two training schools; a n d these forty people returned h o m e a n d taught the dances, thus m a k i n g it possible for their o w n groups to enter the a n n u a l county music festival in the spring. NEW

ENGLAND

In N e w H a m p s h i r e institutes under the leadership of A g r i c u l t u r a l E x t e n s i o n a n d the N a t i o n a l R e c r e a t i o n Association have been f o l l o w e d by recreation surveys to discover the real interests a n d needs of local groups. Follow-up leadership schools h a v e a d d e d special types of source materials for different kinds of groups a n d communities where local recreation committees have been organized to carry o n satisfactory programs t h r o u g h the year. Folk-dancing groups are a p p e a r i n g in m a n y little places a n d are becoming so well k n o w n that they are in d e m a n d for various programs inside and outside their districts. T h e story of folk events of native and of foreign backg r o u n d is endless. R u r a l A m e r i c a is singing the o l d folk tunes a n d d a n c i n g to them o n the stages of Granges a n d lodge halls, in little theaters, on fair grounds, on college campuses, in crossroads, a n d in consolidated schools, u n d e r the cottonwoods at the edge of a pasture a n d on picnic

158

T h e Importance of Folk Events

grounds at brook sides. In these activities farmers have put on native costume and forgotten time, age, and trouble. T h e boys and girls of 4-H Clubs and their families and friends know the mountain dances of our own land; and it is refreshing indeed to find that country dances are enjoyed here and there as a popular part of a modern dance program. Indeed, the old dance usually has to be repeated many times in order to still the applause. A t a 4-H C l u b convention in J u n e , 1936, at Ithaca, New York, a party was held one evening in the great armory on the Cornell campus. A b o u t one thousand persons were present. Half of the great hall was partitioned off for ballroom dancing, for which a peppy jazz orchestra played.

The

other half was given over to folk dancing, with Bill Smith, of the Extension staff, calling off the dances through a loud speaker, while an accordion furnished the music. T h e r e were as many in the folk-dance section as in the other section. It was something of a feat for one accordion to keep up with the jazz band; but somehow it succeeded. Four huge circles of laughing boys and girls were weaving in and out to the tune of an old Swedish folk dance. In the distance shuffling feet were moving slowly to a modern " L o v e Me T o n i g h t " melody. T w o thousand feet in the same pavilion danced to tunes that bridged a gap of three hundred years or more. T h e story goes on to tell of a revival of interest in English folk tunes and dances. R u r a l groups are singing " J o h n Peel," and dancing the old English country dances; they are playing the Swedish weaving game with movements representing the preparation of flax for the weaving of linens. T h e y know the Swedish Wedding March. G e r m a n f a r m women sing in their own language and dance to the old

T h e Importance of Folk Events

15g

tune, " C o m e L e t Us Be J o y f u l . " Here are groups dancing " H u n s d o n H o u s e " to the music of an old Cornish May song. At a picnic in some summer grove, you may hear gypsy songs around a camp fire and learn to dance the famous gypsy cserebogar;

programs are varied with Irish jigs and

old Irish love songs, such as "Farewell to C u c h u l l i a n " ; Dutch clogs, French minuets, Scotch flings, and H u n g a r i a n clap dances. T h e s e activities do not stand alone and unrelated to the rest of the program. T h e y

reveal much concerning

the

places and the people f r o m which the old songs and dances came, so that everyone to w h o m the program appeals may learn something about the customs and manners of those people and about the musicians w h o gave the old tunes to the world. T h e s e folk events carry some of their auditors to f a r places which they have never seen; and they also awaken memories of the homeland in many who came f r o m f a r countries to live on American farms. There's a two-way value to these programs: they inspire new visions, dreams, and ambitions in native Americans; and they renew old dreams and stir old memories in Americans who came from other lands to share their own rich inheritance with us.

XVII

Hobbies Those who ride a hobby they will not only become but the world in which eternal surprise.1

will never cease growing, for interesting persons themselves, they live will always be one

I N the rooms of a C h a m b e r of Commerce over a dry goods store in Carroll County, Iowa, a hobby meeting was in session. D r i f t e d roads had kept the group from meeting for more than a month, and the women were "catching u p " on the news of past happenings and especially glad to see one another again. Plans were being laid for their third hobby exhibit, that of 1936, which was to be held at the State F a i r with the co-operation of the community-development section of the Iowa State College Extension Service. T h e purposes of this endeavor were stated by the hobby group as follows: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Creating interesting uses of time Suggesting types of enjoyment which others may adopt Providing experiences in creating and' enjoying art Furthering education Adding to friendly relationships in home and community Do you remember the meetings of the average sewing

society, where discussion ran along on a dead level and 1 Z e l a h H e i n b a u g h , in G u i d e B o o k f o r S e n i o r H i g h School G i r l serves, p . 5 3 .

Re-

Hobbies

161

finally died a natural death in the kitchen, where food and the serving of it furnished salvation for embarrassed silences? There was no trace of such a situation in this hobby meeting. Conversation ran the whole gamut of the life of the Middle West, from antiques and how to refinish the old chest to landscape gardening. T h e women had different hobbies, and the finding of one more piece of "rose in snow" Sandwich glass mattered more that day than interest and taxes. T h e r e was talk of a new fern for the rock garden, of the grafting of plants, and of the renovating of old houses. T h e women told of new ideas for the caning of chair seats; they talked with interest about collections of old German silver; about shawls and linens that had come from chests in the old country and been used by members of the family throughout several generations; about old laces, coverlets, china, and vases; and about the joy of owning white leghorns with "never" a black feather. These women know the value of Rookwood china and are proud owners of pieces that might grace the shelves of a museum. T h e discussion seemed so at home in Carroll County. One member of the group added much to this intimate atmosphere because of her interest in history. She professed to be the oldest resident in Carroll County having always lived there. She had been brought up in a log cabin near where the local post office now stands—a cabin made of solid walnut logs. She remembered the time when her nearest neighbor, as well as the nearest doctor, lived thirty miles away. Her ancestors had come to America in a sailing vessel. Now she lives in a lovely old house full of antiques, a house kept lovely because, as she says, " W e haven't kept moving around. We came here to live and we're still here." It was

Hobbies she w h o brought the old laces to the meeting, laces which she herself had made in school, in 1880. T h e chairman, Mrs. T . W . Everts, of Glidden, Iowa, is one of the prime movers of the hobby idea. Concerning it she said: It all grew out of the H o m e Project work of the Agricultural Extension Service. I began to find out how little I knew about great art and artists, and I made u p my mind I had to learn. I started collecting pictures. A t the library I f o u n d such interesting books and I settled down to study. I asked my neighbors to save pictures from magazine covers. My family began saving pictures whenever they came across copies of the old masters. My collection now includes eight volumes and is growing all the time. W h e n drifts closed our roads this winter, the children and even their father got busy on some of the long evenings and helped paste. W e closed the front of our house and moved into the kitchen and dining room to keep warm. W e had lots of fun around the table working on the collection.

T h e eight beautifully-bound volumes are works of art in their own right. T h e y have been in demand by the ParentTeacher Association, the Woman's Club, the School, and many other groups. So it is that interest in hobbies often spreads through community and county. In one volume are "Iowa Paintings." In others are Madonnas and

pictures

from the life of Christ, along with neatly-typed pages of passages from the Scriptures and other pages telling about the pictures and the painters in the collector's own words. T h e r e are volumes of English, French, German, and Italian paintings and of the works of artists of other nationalities. At the Iowa State Fair in 1935, thirty-six farm women exhibited hobbies: oil paintings, hand-made cards, felt work, original poems, quilts of four generations, and braided rugs. Other avocational interests included the weaving of Iowa

Hobbies

163

corn husks, oriental glass, cookery, wedding cakes, needlecraft, old money, samplers, miniatures, and basket work. These w o m e n speak interestingly about their hobbies. A collector of family heirlooms said, The thing that interests me most is not so much the article as the story each brings to mind. We all love history and I believe this early training in personal history makes the world history a little more fascinating. An artist, working in oils, said, I became absorbed in my paintings—care disappeared as though by magic; time flies unheeded. A weaver said, I like to gather corn leaves in the early fall before they turn brown, and collect the wild slough grasses that grow in the swamps. I store them away in my attic which has been converted into a workshop. T h e n in winter—what fun it is to hie u p there to wrap, twist and weave a basket, a tray, a lamp. T o a farm w o m a n working with clay, "The premiums are paid in time and thought. T h e dividends are cumulative." One farm w o m a n has taken to "wool gathering." She says, Wool, from sheep to parlor, has become a hobby productive of much enjoyment to myself, my family and friends. We have always raised good sheep selected for the quality of their wool. I found the virgin wool interesting to work with, as well as useful. I take great delight in carding it by hand, as my grandmother did, and the layers of carded softness make beautiful, warm, light-weight comforters and quilts, a joy to the whole family. Excellent dyes, easy to use, give wool a wide variety of effective and artistic colors; with these I make my hooked rugs for bedrooms and living rooms. I derive a lasting satisfaction from producing these lovely, useful and unusual articles for our home.

164

Hobbies

I t is my favorite recreation at all seasons, and ray daughters are learning to e n j o y both the work and the finished products as much as I, making for greater h a r m o n y and congeniality.

Another reports that "hobby" pictures have added fuel to the flame of home satisfactions. W h e n I was a very small girl, we used to make all-day Sunday visits at my parental grandmother's home. T h e r e were three things that I particularly r e m e m b e r about these visits. Grandmother gave us bread with sugar on it for lunch; she had two long beds of flowers, one on each side of the walk down to the front gate; the third attraction was three pictures that hung in the parlor. At that time I solemnly decided that when I got married (I never doubted but that I would) I was going to live on a farm and have a flower garden and pictures just like grandmother's. As I r e m e m b e r these pictures, o n e of them was " Q u e e n L o u i s e " by R i c h t e r ; o n e " T h e T w o Sisters" by M u n i e r ; the other one I have never seen since those childhood days. My interest in both subjects has never abated. I hardly know which o f the two subjects interests m e the most. As I grew older I studied whatever camc to hand. I clipped pictures from magazines, took them from calendars anywhere just so I got them. If a magazine offered a group of pictures as an inducement for a subscription or a renewal, they could be very sure of mine. It mattered not if the picture was approved by the critics or not; if I liked it, I kept it. If I could find something especially outstanding about the picture or artist, so much the better. O n e day I received a sample copy of The Mentor. I subscribed immediately. T h e ones on art especially fascinated me, and I was happy for days. T h e n I took to sending for picture catalogues. Some of them I found had quite a bit of information in them. T h a t was all that I got, as I seldom sent for any pictures. T h e Farm B u r e a u H o m e Project " H o m e F u r n i s h i n g " added more fuel to the flame. T h e lesson, "Pictures for the H o m e , " gave me much needed information, not only on pictures themselves, but on proper hanging, suitable background, correct framing, what types to use in living rooms, bedrooms, dining-rooms, where to keep the family portraits, and a lot of general information that most of us needed, and I hope appreciated as well as applied

Hobbies

165

to our everyday living. It was for this lesson that I began arranging a few of my pictures, since I was the cooperator for my district, and I wanted to give the lesson as well as possible. T h e task proved to be most interesting, and I think created quite a bit of interest in the project. Other cooperators borrowed my pictures for their follow-up lesson. I have also loaned my collection to the school for picture study. O u r local 4-H Club had picture study for two years. It was at tfiis time that I began to realize that my interest in pictures was really something more than a passing fancy. My family had somehow absorbed some of my interest, love, and also some knowledge of worthwhile pictures. T h e n we began to enjoy a common interest together. I feel that through the study of pictures and landscaping we have been able to make our home much more attractive than it would otherwise have been. T h e children feel more interest in an attractive home, and like to ask their friends to their home, if it is one that they may be proud of. Therefore, it isn't my hobby any more, it's our hobby.

Mrs. W. Van Bloom of Dayton, Iowa, won first rank on a landscape-development hobby. The Nation's

Agriculture

and several other magazines have told the story of how she made up her mind that "just because she lived on a rented farm was no reason that it should be a hovel." Mrs. Van Bloom said, I started to clean up the back yard. It needed it. But I began to love doing it, and I've kept on for five years. I've planted shrubbery; I've set out trees; I've developed a garden. Did you notice the flagstone walk? T h a t has been added. My neighbors all around here have caught my enthusiasm and some of them have gone way ahead of me in making their grounds lovely. FARMERS

DISCUSS

ART

IN

WORK

Some of those neighbors were present one evening when Mrs. Bloom was telling about her project. A blizzard was blowing snow against the frosty windows, but it was very

166

Hobbies

cozy and warm in the Bloom living room. Several farmers and their wives, girls and boys, the hired man, and Dr. W . H. Stacy, of the Agricultural Extension Service and the author of this volume were there. During the discussion of Mrs. Bloom's ideas on "taking away that rented look" the question was raised, " W h e n a boy brings a prize calf to the show, or a prize cow with horns and hooves oiled and shined, her coat washed, brushed and curled, her tail combed and waved like a plume, does the boy not have something in common with the painter who paints a picture, a chorus that works toward perfection in harmony, a housewife who weaves a beautiful pattern into a rug?" A master farmer present answered, "Yes, and so does a farmer who takes pride in planting his corn in straight rows and achieves soul-satisfaction as they change in height and depth and color day by day." Another said, " A n d there's the man who keeps his fences in repair and his roadsides clear of weeds. I admit there's an element of competition involved here, but I believe the man who cares about these things is aware of beauty and working toward something like art." Still another said: "I believe a farmer who is proud of his home surroundings, of his farm machinery, of his barns and the livestock in them, is something of an artist. I think the minute a man begins reaching toward perfection in any line, he's expressing what artists are after when they paint pictures. "Suppose a man is in some other business, but has money to spend. Suppose he spends it on a herd of pure Holsteins and hires some expert to take care of them. He doesn't live on the farm, but enjoys going out there to see them. Is he an artist?

Hobbies

167

"Well, maybe, the man he hires is more of an artist. Maybe the owner is more like the art collector, the man with the hobby, like Mrs. Bloom, here. He appreciates fine herds. He is willing to spend a fortune to own one. He furnishes the outlet—yes, he's the collector." One of the wives said, "I've been thinking about all this, and it's not true with us. O n our farm our cattle are not pure-bred. They aren't art by any means. T h e y either mean money or we don't keep them. It's necessary that our herd provide a living and that's all there is to it." Her husband cut in, " B u t if we had the money, we'd have the best pure-bred

herd

in

the county.

Yes

sir,

now

wouldn't we?" She. "I know that. I know exactly how fine they would be!" Well,

the discussion ran on until

refreshments

were

served; excellent fruit salad with delicious dressing, sandwiches with home-made bread and butter, coffee, and fresh sponge cake piled high with frosting. A l l present agreed there was art in the kitchen, as well as on the grounds. T h e r e had not been one in the entire group who did not definitely express with conviction the idea that art in work is important, as important indeed as corn and hogs; as important, indeed, as the new grass program. T h e s e farmers of Webster County, Iowa, have a growing belief that continued effort to find beauty in common things develops it "on the j o b " in the best way possible. T h e opening phrase in a piece of music used by the seven-hundred-voice chorus of Iowa farmers comes again to mind. A t the first rehearsal of the chorus it was noted. T h e selection was "Glory" by Cadman, and the line read, "In

168

Hobbies

dignity but with spirit." T h a t seems to be the way Middle West farm people go about their cultural program. T h e line fits folk dancing, their plays, their well-informed manner of talking things over, their singing, their methods of farming, and the way they live.

XVIII

Arts and Crafts Art celebrates with peculiar intensity the moments which the past reenforces the present and in which future is a quickening of what now is.1

in the

I T IS significant that the handicrafts were discussed during the International Congress of Rural W o m e n at Washington, D.C., in June, 1936, among "Roads to Peace." In her presidential report, Mrs. Alfred Watt, of Canada, said, " T h e country woman running her home as it should be run, can create a model to which national housekeeping can conform—and given national housekeeping on the

right

lines, international understanding will not be far away." Mrs. Charles Russell, chairman of the Handicraft Committee, declared, "Surely the real history of civilization lies more truly in the cultural contribution which each country has made to world progress." Referring to American quiltpattern designs, Mrs. Russell said, " T h e r e is probably n o craft in the world linked so internationally to the social and even political life of a people." W i t h a project under way to develop an international exchange for handicraft in London, with groups of intelligent rural women discussing "Roads to Peace" through rural handicrafts, with women of many nations exchanging designs, learning new applications of old ones, and creating 1 John Dewey, Art as Experience,

Minton, Balch & Company, p. 18.

\ηο

Arts and Crafts

new ones together, it cannot be denied that here is adequate food for thought in these troublous times. At any rate, there is more than meets the eye in the hooked rug over which we walk so nonchalantly upon entering the average farmhouse. R u r a l America, in general, looks upon its crafts program realistically. Farm women have as much of a stake in their husbands' business as the husbands themselves. T h e y are truly business and professional women with careers. Farm incomes have been low; but in few cases, except in one or two areas, have they been so low that farm women have been obliged to contribute to them financially through outside enterprise. Farm wives are as busy at one season as another. When they have leisure, they want relaxation. During the depression, however, many have known fear, insecurity, and the possibility of losing a farm; and in some communities groups have become interested in handiwork that might be turned into cash if necessary. Homemakers' groups in Agricultural Extension work have made quilts and rugs by the hundreds; and in them are stories of hardship, tragedy, and romance. Home Demonstration agents have encouraged creative design and careful use of color and have urged women to weave patterns out of their own experience. O n e woman used as a quilt square pattern the first cut-out paper her little son brought home from school. Another included in her pattern the flowers that grew in her garden. All through the country are to be found quilts and rugs full of memories; and housewives can tell stories by the h o u r of the romance in their patchwork quilts. Not many of these quilts are for sale. T h e y have furnished a way of expressing beauty, as well as of making farm homes more attractive and colorful. One

Arts and Crafts

171

woman said, "At an exhibit we can always tell which of the women made the different quilts. They have put so much of themselves into their patterns." There are few white elephants among the hand-made articles in farm homes. Wherever experienced, trained leadership was present in the laying of educational foundations for craft-group projects, there home-made articles are prized possessions in farm homes. Little by little closer relationship is developing between crafts and the other arts. In one area one finds the play, The Patch-Work Quilt, being produced by a group in a community with no crafts program in evidence. In another area one finds a quilt project in full swing and a member of the group writing for Achievement Day an original skit called, " T h e Story of the Rag Bag." She would be surprised indeed to be called a pioneer in progressive education in her township. Closer integration of the arts program is needed at every point and very evidently will be the next step in program building in Homemakers' groups. Home Demonstration agents tell of new appreciation of fine woods developed through the refinishing of old furniture. Skills of different nationality groups are being exchanged. German women are showing other women different kinds of knitting. Swedish women are teaching designs which only Swedish women have hitherto known and which American women are now using for the first time. T h e idea that one must be known as "all American," an idea which was strong during war time, is passing. Now the idea is growing that "we are of many nationalities, all making a contribution to American life in as many ways as we have skills." And for this America gives thanks. Old designs with

Arts and Crafts modern applications and a sharing of old-world and newworld skills are adding color and artistic achievement to the American scene. M A T E R I A L S A T HAND USED IN C R A F T

WORK

In Alabama handicraft plays an important röle in the Extension Service program along four lines: for the homemaker in her home, as a county industry, for recreation at camp, and for the development of crafts as a business—with emphasis on the finished article. Baskets, bedspreads, rugs, afghans, leather goods, toys, fans, and handkerchiefs are among articles made. T h e annual report of Extension Service work in Kansas says, "One sees burlap doing strange things in strange places —sometimes in lovely rugs, in table mats, in swagger coats and jumper outfits, shopping and laundry bags." Christmas wreaths and Japanese dish-gardens are interesting products of farm women's and 4-H groups in Berkshire County, Massachusetts. In Barnstable County, Massachusetts, block printing, stencil and crayon craft, tie-dyeing, silhouette painting, leather tooling, carving, pottery, and the making of lamp shades are listed as interests. More and more commonly groups are using materials indigenous to their environment. For example, negro groups in Jackson County, Mississippi, are making baskets of honeysuckle vine and serving trays of old picture frames. Montana women are making unique rugs by using dyed wool for part of their design and leaving the borders and parts of their designs in the natural wool from the black lambs. In one county in Nebraska leather tooling is popular. Eighteen calf hides and fourteen hundred yards of lacing were used in 1936 for tooled articles. Gogebec County, Michigan, re-

Arts and Crafts

173

ports 4"H boys engrossed in making feeding scoops, reed stands, rustic furniture, and ironing boards. Nassau County, New York, develops its craft program on a rather professional plan, with training in form, color, and design. Inexpensive accessories and gifts are made. There are elementary and advanced classes in ceramics and demonstrations in molding, decorating, glazing, and firing pottery. In Arkansas a rug-makers' association was formed in 1923 in Benton County, and it is still functioning. In Lenoke County a craftsman has been making wooden jewelry; and a farm woman who has developed a corn-shuck industry is making purses and hats from the inside shucks. T h e Norfolk Woodcraft Club, in Connecticut, makes tabarets, magazine racks, birdhouses and feeding shelves. In Georgia scrap-bags yield touches of charm and color in many a 4-H girl's room. Corncribs furnished shucks for caning more than 1,000 chairs. Reports of 1934 tell of 15,000 bedspreads, 11,000 quilts, 7,500 curtains, 9,493 covers for dressers and tables, and 3,000 crocheted table mats made by the women and girls of 68 counties of the state. Georgia goes in for handwork in a big way. In Columbia County, Oregon, local grasses, ferns, and limbs from certain trees were used in a basket project. T h e history of basketry was studied, as well as the methods used and the principles followed. Hobbies in West Virginia include a wide variety of subjects: rugs, quilts, articles made from feed sacks, hobby books, woodwork, flowers, antiques, hand-made gloves, leather work, and stools. Lewis County, West Virginia, works on a "Know Your State Plan." Women have become vitally interested in the wealth of native material. They have made collections of West Virginia poetry, flowers, and books; and programs have been made vivid with reviews of

174

Arts and

Crafts

books by West Virginia authors and with exhibits of native crafts. A Wisconsin clothing specialist in Extension Service says: O n e h a t e s to d e s i g n a t e a p r o j e c t as a m a j o r o r m i n o r a f t e r t h e e x p e r i e n c e h e r e this past year. T h e s u b j e c t of h o b b i e s was l o o k e d u p o n as a m i n o r w h i c h w e t h o u g h t a f e w c o u n t i e s m i g h t e n j o y . M o r e r e q u e s t s c a m e in f o r this p r o j e c t t h a n handle.

When

the

women

began

telling

the s p e c i a l i s t

what

it

had

could

done

for

t h e m , o n e w o n d e r s , if d u r i n g these t r y i n g t i m e s , t h e p l a c i n g of bright spot in the rather d r a b least as i m p o r t a n t

as h e l p i n g

lives isn't m o r e them

to m a k e

important

or

over their old

a at

gar-

ments.

In Marathon County, Wisconsin, women are spinning their own wool just as their grandmothers did two generations ago. A few have their own looms and have woven lovely table mats and wall hangings. CO-ORDINATING

THE

FOLK

ARTS

2

In North Carolina the Dogwood Festival has been held each year as a means of co-ordinating the folk arts with other arts through the co-operation of artists, craftsmen, musicians, and the Playmakers. From everywhere come fiddlers, folk dancers, mountain-ballad singers, bands, and exhibitors of crafts such as the making of pottery, rugs, quilts, and baskets. It has made possible an expression by rural community folk who have had something to say and an opportunity for them to say it in their own way through actual demonstration of an amazing variety of skills. T h e 1935 list of group exhibitors in this festival tells the story. It included: 2 N o funds are now available to continue this unique and valuable event.

Arts and Crafts

175 Agricultural Extension Service (Home Demonstration Work), State College, Raleigh, N.C. The Allanstand Industries, Asheville, N.C. The Camp Fire Girls, Inc., New York City. John C. Campbell Folk School, Brasstown, N.C. Catawba Indians, Catawba, S.C. Cherokee Indian Reservation, Cherokee, N.C. J. B. Cole Pottery, Steeds, N.C. Crossnore School, Crossnore, N.C. Emergency Relief in Education Classes for Adults, N.C. Fireside Industries, Berea, Ken. Guilford County Association for the Blind, Greensboro, S.C. The Handicraft Guild, Dante, Va. Junior American Red Cross, Washington, D.C. Lees-McRae College, Banners Elk, N.C. Mclver Grammar School, Sanford, N.C. National Park Service (State Park Division), Richmond, Va. Penland Weavers and Potters, Penland, N.C. State College of Agriculture and Engineering (Department of Ceramics), Raleigh, N.C. State Hospital (Therapy Department), Raleigh, N.C. State School for the Blind and Deaf, Raleigh, N.C. The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, N.C. Veterans' Administration Facility: Oteen; Johnson City, Tennessee, Outwood, Kentucky; Hampton, Virginia; Columbia, S.C. Wootten-Moulton, Chapel Hill, N.C. T h e festival lasted four days. On the folk-music program were fiddlers, dulcimer players, string bands, old hymn and ballad singers, square dances, and Cherokee Indian music. There were plays in the Playmakers' Theatre, demonstrations of rock-garden construction, a jubilee pageant and exhibitions and demonstrations of arts and crafts. THE FOLK

INSTITUTE

North Carolina has also the Folk Institute, which will continue next year as the Folk Lore Council, embracing all of the cultural aspects of folk life.

Arts and Crafts T h e p l a n of w o r k i n c l u d e s : ι. School Programs: T h e teaching of traditional songs, singing games, and dances, in schools of North Carolina; and the arrangement of programs made up of these things. These programs to be held at the end of one week, and to work toward 2. County Conventions of "Old T i m e Music" a. T h e organization of conventions to which all local "fiddlers," string bands, square-dance teams, banjo-players, and ballad-singers are invited; and b. T h e organization of conventions for singers of "folk hymns" (white spirituals), singing from oral tradition or from The Sacred Harp, Christian Harmony—or other shape-note books. These conventions to be held one week after each School Program, and to work toward 3. T h e Annual Dogwood Festival at Chapel Hill: T h e State Folk Festival, founded in 1933, "to give expression to the life of the people of the state by means of music, dancing, games, craft exhibitions, and other activities that might be considered germane to a people's festival." T h e above Convention and this Festival to work toward 4. T h e National Folk Festival: headquarters in St. Louis. (The T h i r d National Folk Festival to be held possibly at Washington, D.C.) T h e work of discovering and recording Southern folk-songs and folk-dances (of white folk only) will be a major part of this plan, but will be incidental to the above work of preserving them socially and nationally.

XIX

Art Exhibits in Rural Galleries Art requires character and comprehension from those who would enjoy it, and it therefore contributes to that progressive development which is one of the perpetual reasons for the fascination of life.1

D U R I N G National Art Week, November 3 - 1 0 , 1935, a campaign was launched by Iowa's Woman's Clubs to place an original work of art on display in each of the ninetynine counties in the state and in every clubhouse during that week. T h e Iowa City Woman's Club gave added impetus to the movement by sponsoring the first state-wide "Nail Show" in the United States. Twenty-six nails on which pictures could be hung on the mezzanine floor of Hotel Jefferson in Iowa City were assigned to young artists of Iowa. Each of the twenty-six artists was given a nail on which to hang his work during the entire year, and he could replace the picture hanging there by another of his own as often as he wished. In this way club women hope to establish a permanent art center. Several clubs have arranged to visit this state exhibit, which is appropriately near the University of Iowa, where a comprehensive fine arts program is under way in a group of new buildings. Iowa City has already become an art center through the 1 Paul H . Douglas quoted in We Are Builders Association Press, p. 1 1 3 .

of a S'ew

World,

The

178

Art Exhibits in Rural Galleries

work of G r a n t W o o d , well-known regional painter, in conducting free " a r t clinics" twice a month f o r constructive criticism of the sketches which beginning artists bring to him from all parts of the Middle West. E x h i b i t i n g and studying the work of young

regional

painters is not the only art project of the Federation of Women's Clubs. A t Christmas time members are urged to buy original paintings of Iowa artists. Said the State Art C h a i r m a n , " I o w a is in a discovery mood." (Christian Science Monitor.) In the basement of a little library in the county seat of Carroll County there is another " N a i l S h o w . " T h e r e the walls are hung with paintings of Iowa scenes and New England scenes. T h e r e are two paintings by a Danish resident: one, of his Iowa home; the other, of his last view of Denmark as he sailed away some forty years ago. T h e r e are religious subjects painted by students at the local academy; schoolboys have entered their pencil sketches; farm women have contributed flower, animal, and farm paintings. A letter from the librarian who has helped Carroll

County

painters in this project reads, "Interest continues in the art exhibit. In fact, I feel another kind coming on, as two boys have been in, asking to display their mounted birds; and other women have asked for an exhibit of their rugs and pictures. So you see exhibits may come and exhibits may go, but the show goes on forever." Picture-memory tests are almost as p o p u l a r as tests for good music in 4-H programs. Boys and girls are acquainted with the lives of great artists and with their paintings. T h e y know how to enjoy pictures; they have learned how to select pictures carefully and have studied pictures of different countries, types, and moods.

Art Exhibits in Rural Galleries

17g

R a d i o talks, exhibits, home-management projects, group» in sketching and painting are all emphasized in Extension Service programs. Picture study is a normal part of homefurnishing projects. Still-life pageants have included reproductions of great paintings and the stories of noted artists. A R u r a l Day at the Arts Institute was held in Montgomery County, Ohio, for sociability, as well as to cultivate new interest in good pictures. T h e program opened with a formal hour of music, dances, and discussion of pictures. T h e audience was then conducted through the galleries, and

the

program ended with tea and a social hour. Demonstrations of pictures have led to the purchase of better pictures for the home and to the reframing or rehanging of many of the pictures which have been long cherished but poorly treated. T h r o u g h picture study new appreciation of native landscapes has developed.

XX

Radio Has Its Place in the Program Radio should be and is a means of uniting a big nation in thought and feeling, which means that it is tremendously important to have a constructive leadership on the air.1

O N E of the reasons why rural America is so well informed about music is the National 4-H Club radio broadcast conducted for the last seven years by the United States Department of Agriculture in co-operation with state agricultural colleges, the United States Marine Band, and the National Broadcasting Company. T h i s broadcast is under the personal direction of R . A. T u r n e r of the National Agricultural Extension staff. T h e program has been presented on the first Saturday of each month during Farm and Home Hour on a coast-tocoast hook-up. T h e theme used in 1930-31 was "Music from Many Lands." After it came "Learning to Know America's Music," " T h e World's Great Composers," "Music We Should Know," and " T h e World's Best-Known Operas." This year's theme is "Songs T h a t Live." Leaders of 4-H groups in many states have taken advantage of this mammoth program as a basis for their music development; leaders of other organizations everywhere have tuned in with the 1 Julia E. Brekke, Extension Specialist, North Dakota.

Radio

181

idea; and through their state radio hook-up and material used in leadership training schools and special programs have followed the themes and made one use or another of die far-reaching information service rendered through this national project. In addition to listening to the radio broadcasts, groups in some states use special lists of compositions for special study and identification. By the use of phonographic records, orchestras, bands, pianos, 01 other helps these selections have been used frequently at meetings of 4-H Clubs. At the close of the series of radio programs there is sometimes a final check-up, or 4-H music-achievement test. State, county, and local music-identification tests are held in connection with the National 4-H Club Radio Program. T h e annual 4-H Club Week at the agricultural college, the county or local Achievement Day, the state or county fair, and the 4-H Club camp have offered excellent opportunities for such final tests. Any recognition given to individuals, to clubs, or to counties as a reward for meritorious work in the test is determined by the state, county, or locality. N o awards are provided by those in charge of the National 4-H Music Achievement Test. Many suggested themes are being considered for the 1937 program. Whether it will be "American Composers" or " T h e World's Music in Review," or "Twentieth-century Composers," or "Youth's Contribution to Music," or some theme such as "Music of the Seasons," "Symphonies and Their Meaning," or "Music, the World's Universal Language" is not decided. T h e decision rests with the radio audience. Whichever subject is chosen will do much to stimulate an already nation-wide enthusiasm for good music.

Radio

I82 RADIO P R O G R A M

The

FROM

radio music-shop

COLLEGE

CAMPUS

program

broadcast

by

station

W. Ο. I. from the campus at Ames, Iowa, has brought more than 18,000 fan-mail letters of appreciation. T h e workshop hour was started in 1925 by Andrew Wolfrees, radio announcer, and it is still going strong under his inimitable broadcasting. " A n d y " is known throughout the state as a headliner. T h e r e is no jazz permitted in these programs, but an effort is being m a d e to present the world's greatest music. " A n d y " has contributed much to the fine appreciation of music in thousands of homes by his intelligent, chatty descriptions

of

music,

and

his

interesting

introductory

human-interest stories about composers and their selections. A story is told of what happened in one f a r m home where it had long been the custom to tune in for this music hour. It happened that " A n d y " decided to resign his position with the radio, but such a tempest arose over his departure that he returned. On the morning of his return a farmer was f a r down in a pasture mending fences, when he heard his w i f e calling to him at the top of her voice. H e looked u p the hill and saw her waving her arms; and as he ran toward her, fearful that something terrible had happened, he was surprised and pleased to hear her shouting " A n d y ' s back!" A n d again they settled down to that half hour they had missed so much. " A n d y " is back, and Iowa is satisfied. W . Ο. I. is also one of the first radio stations to send out descriptive material concerning art. T h e r e is branch broadcasting equipment in a little room in the Home Economics Building, and from it each morning an artist on the staff broadcasts stories of artists and great pictures. Mrs. Ness, from her little studio, is now giving a series on "Better De-

Radio

183

sign for Better American Homes," featuring the home of the bride, the parents' home, the "House T h a t Jack Built" and the "Color Wheel." In March, 1936, Mrs. Ness reported that more than 160,000 copies of these talks had been distributed by request during 1935 and more than 200,000 in 1936. Over half these requests came from rural people.

XXI

Some of the Problems T H E stories in this volume have told of successful arts projects in the program of the Agricultural Extension Service; projects as varied as are the needs and inclinations of the rural folk of the different regions in which they were developed. T h e stories have shown also that success has been achieved by different methods and by different kinds of organization and leadership. The

widely-aroused interest in the drama

throughout

rural Wisconsin and the high standards attained by the farm people there in the presentation of plays have been made possible by co-operation, not only with the agricultural college, but with the university, in a plan that enables the Agricultural Extension Service to augment its staff with members of the university's speech department at certain periods of the year. T h e plan is not entirely satisfactory because of the fact that the specialists from the university cannot devote sufficient time to the program's projects to insure their permanence; but much has been accomplished by the experiment, which now has special significance because interest is so great at present in the problem of integrating state-wide programs. In North Dakota the truly astonishing results achieved by a wholly different procedure reach far into the isolated prairie neighborhoods of the state. Here Fargo's

Little

Country T h e a t r e , long directed by the same devoted leader,

Some of the P r o b l e m s

185

has exerted a p o w e r f u l influence by its constant demonstration of the importance of the drama in the general program and of ways to provide e q u i p m e n t and material in the rural field. In C o l o r a d o no active effort has yet been made to develop a state-wide integrated arts program. Here there are cultural centers aplenty: Fort Collins, with its A g r i c u l t u r a l College; Greeley, with its State T e a c h e r s ' C o l l e g e ; B o u l d e r , with its state university; Denver, w i t h its university, its art center, its museums, and its state headquarters for many organizations related to an arts program; and C o l o r a d o Springs, w i t h its new,

b e a u t i f u l art center and

its C o l o r a d o

College.

T h e s e places are strung o u t within easy access to one another by adequate train service and bus service; yet there seems to be no concerted effort at present to create an arts program for the state as a whole. Iowa has probably g o n e further than most other states toward an integrated arts program. Meetings have already been held to discuss possibilities for joint p l a n n i n g ; a n d in the university and the agricultural college, in State T e a c h e r s ' C o l l e g e and in other educational agencies there is talk of an integrated program for adult education. W i l l i a m H . Stacy, R u r a l Sociologist on the A g r i c u l t u r a l Extension staff, has written a comprehensive v o l u m e on integration in a d u l t education; the idea is basic in the p r o g r a m of the Agricultural Extension Service. T h e homogeneity of Iowa's people, the geography of the state, and the splendid organizational set-up have added to the success of the effort toward state-wide integration of program and p l a n . A field m e m b e r of the Extension Service of the University of N o r t h C a r o l i n a gives considerable time to work a m o n g farm a n d m o u n t a i n communities in co-operation with the

186

Some of the Problems

State Agricultural College, at Raleigh. Neither agency has yet found it possible to make adequate financial provision for this service; but funds from the Rockefeller Foundation, added to a small amount in the University Extension budget, enable the drama specialist to give some much called-for help. T h e tie-up between university and W. P. A. in the Federal Drama project in this state is unique and worthy of note. Ohio and New York have much the same set-up with regard to an arts program in Agricultural Extension Service. Both have trained specialists in drama, recreation,

and

community organization; but although there is in each of these states an agricultural college and a university on the same campus, little evidence is apparent of any co-operative planning for a satisfactory development of an arts program. An interesting study is being made of the drama in rural New York with funds from the Rockefeller Foundation in connection with the Cornell University Drama Department. S. Darkes Albright, in charge of the study, is a graduate of Cornell and is working closely with the specialist in drama on the staff of Agricultural Extension Service. West Virginia has built strong centers for the training of rural leadership; and for these it is noted especially. T h e rural sociologist and the state recreation specialist

have

headquarters away from the campus of the agricultural college and live among the rural folk to build leadership as resident members of the groups which they serve. In this way special emphasis is given to informal organization and to the development of a home-spun variety of program, which is significant. In fact the plans originating in West Virginia have echoes in several of the other states in the area studied. In listing the main problems that stand in the way of sue-

Some of the Problems

187

cessful achievement it is necessary to set apart those relating to the development of a comprehensive program for a state from those encountered in an effort to provide a program and leadership for a local community. PROBLEMS WITH THE

OF

SPECIAL

AGRICULTURAL REFERENCE

A R T S IN A S T A T E - W I D E

Need

for clear definition

EXTENSION

TO AN

SERVICE

EMPHASIS

ON

PROGRAM

of function.—Some

rural so-

ciologists were of the opinion that there is a need for a more clearly-defined plan of work in community organization so that departments aside from departments of sociology and agriculture in colleges and universities may better understand the philosophy underlying the need for work in the fields of drama, music, and the fine arts. It was believed that the scope of work is not fully understood; and that there is a good deal of misconception as to where the rural sociological program, with all its ramifications, begins and ends. T h e r e appeared to be a need for skilled leaders to have more time to devote to the kind of work for which they are trained. T h e program, here and, there, is now necessarily cluttered with administrative work which takes u p the time of specialists w h o should be free to answer calls for help from the field. Adequate

budget— T h e r e was a reiterated request for

adequate budget to make permanent progress possible in the arts program; which despite its amazing vitality and growing strength has so far received only shoe-string financing. Economic necessity gave it new impetus; but little assistance has since been given to insure its permanence. Naturally it is easier for the public to see the need for the

188

Some of the Problems

spending of money for the replanting of grass in a dustbowl area than for building a satisfactory leisure-time program. What, indeed, have markets and prices to do with a gypsy dance, a Cadman selection, or an original play? However, many believe that there is a place for all these in the program today. One hears often such statements as this: "Training for leisure is no peripheral problem; nor is it an incidental task. It is rather a fundamental problem affecting the welfare of the state and its perpetuity; and as such it should receive major consideration." Adequate trained, leadership.—There is a definite growing need throughout the country for more trained leaders, for greater emphasis on long-time goals, and for adequate budgets to make these possible. Reduced incomes have created greater need for home recreation. In some instances recreation seems to have been forced to come into the Extension program through a back door, to keep itself out of sight as much as possible, and to be served after all others are served. It was amazing to hear from one rural sociologist after another that the main problem at present is not so much concerned with the plan for work as with making the rest of the specialists on agricultural-college staffs believe in it. Directors of Extension, rural sociological staffs, and groups working in rural-community organization stand solidly behind the entire program; but there are whole departments whose specialists still see little need for including in it anything but farm economics and farm business. Then, too, many club leaders and others working in rural communities, although they may be college graduates, have never studied rural sociology. They have been trained to teach; but few have been trained to live among rural people.

Some of the Problems

189

State leadership in the recreation field today

demands

ability to discover and to work with community-project leaders in songs, games, play-production, and stage-craft; to teach leaders how to share their k n o w l e d g e with local groups; to organize and handle details of organization for festivals, contests, and demonstration events; to organize and promote state-wide programs; to develop better standards; a n d

to

stimulate interest in good recreation by m a k i n g suitable material available for use by both volunteer and trained leaders in the field. It requires a love for the open country, boundless enthusiasm, ability to adjust oneself to surprise and disappointment, and a willingness to begin with people where they are. A clearinghouse

for program material.—The

program ma-

terial used in various states and the pamphlets a n d news sheets issued regularly for use in special groups make one wish for some one general clearinghouse, where suggestions for outstanding developments, novel plans, and new methods of procedure might p o u r in and be digested a n d prepared for distribution into the hands of those responsible for programs. In this way specialists could be freed for more intensive field work. M u c h time is of necessity now given to the preparation of material for use in each of the states. If this time might be used in d o i n g that w h i c h is meant to be accomplished by this material, how great w o u l d be the saving of energy, time, and money! For example, examine the material on drama. In each state, whether there is a field specialist on the subject or not, it is necessary that players and directors be informed concerning certain technical material, lists of plays, and plans for organization. From the Playmakers of N o r t h C a r o l i n a to the groups trying out their first purely amateur skill in

igo

Some of the Problems

plays, all need program help; but now the material used in one state is little different from that used in another. It seems to the author that if some basic material could be used in all states its use would result in great national economy. Principles, fundamentals, elementary information concerning the staging of a play are the same, whether the setting be in Ohio or in North Dakota. Individual leaders in various areas would wish to inform their groups in ways of their own concerning the latest drama news, happenings of special significance, and plans for the future; but for each and all of them to face the necessity of preparing informational booklets on drama, though all the booklets must deal with exactly the same basic material, needlessly adds a vast amount of mimeographing and other time-consuming work to an already overloaded program schedule; and there is no reason why they should not be relieved of this necessity. Music-festival material, song contests, and plans for musicappreciation projects also show duplication of effort. T h e r e are here and there different methods of work, different ways of approaching the subject; but in general the plan is the same. T h e material used in each state makes one wish every other state might have access to it. T o study the material from Iowa alone is an education; and although it must be noted that a generation of experience in the field of music gives Iowa special advantage, the question persists: Why need that special genius be for Iowa alone? How rich the resources of music groups everywhere would become if through a general clearinghouse Iowa's material were sifted and distributed, as well as the music material of other statesl During the course of this study, pages and pages of folk music was collected. A sifting of all the best in this field

Some of the Problems

191

would also save much time and energy. T h e material collected during the study filled filing cases with literally thousands of one-act plays, long plays, pageants, and religious plays; plays for women, men, mixed groups, boys, girls, and little children. It brought together long lists of plays of the soil, of the mountains, and of the plains; plays that have been successful as Achievement Day events; pageants that have grown out of the history of little places as well as those which have been based on the history of big places; student plays; plays for little theaters; and royalty and non-royalty plays. Another filing case is crammed with music that is being sung and played the nation over and with plans for musicappreciation programs. W h e n one remembers how many were the folk w h o said, "It's so hard to know where to secure material," one wishes that the whole list might be catalogued and sent broadcast into the hands of all w h o are interested. The need for more news of demonstration

projects.—The

demonstration idea is the keynote in all Extension Service work; and it is perfectly at home in the field of arts, as well as in the field of home economics. It is important that people far away should learn what happens in Alexandria, O h i o ; at the Gallagher Farm on the Canaan R o a d in Slaterville, New York; at the folk festival of Marathon County, Wisconsin; and at the Folk Institute of Chapel Hill, North Carolina. T h e plays in the Little Country Theatre, in Fargo, North Dakota, and the folk plays of the Playmakers, in North Carolina, not only mark progress, but also offer inspiration for future projects in other localities. T h e y will be different, and so they should be; but some of the same spirit may be awakened many miles distant in other counties and other states because they were produced in their particular locali-

192

Some of the

Problems

ties. Many a community has found its own tools and discovered distinctive ways of using them because of a story read in a farm journal, or a news editorial, or a radio talk, or a traveler's story about some distant occurrence told in the spirit of the event. Demonstrations and some way of spreading

publicity

about them would be of value. A national clearinghouse for feature stories of successful events would be of great advantage, both as reports and as popularly-written stories. T h e story of the production of The Bohemian

Girl was discussed

wherever the author visited: in Washington, D.C.; in the office of the Christian

Science

Monitor,

in Boston; and in

that of The Farmers' Wife Magazine, in St. Paul, Minnesota; and it should have been discussed. More should be told of the triumphs in rural communities. Weeding

the loan library.—There

is need for a careful,

continual weeding out of all poor plays from the Loan Library Service. Only in this way can the standards in play production be raised. It takes a wise person w h o knows rural life to carry the responsibility of sending packets of plays throughout a state. N o t enough care is taken sometimes to see that the plays sent out suit the age of those w h o receive them or the kind of group or community that made the request for play material. Exchange

of ideas

through

leadership

conferences—

In

every area studied, there was expression of need for more frequent conferences of leaders; meetings at which state experts in the various fields might get together to thrash out common problems, gain inspiration, and help one another by an exchange of ideas that have proven successful in the fields of drama, music, folk events, community festivals, and so forth.

Some of the Problems More

time for leadership

training

schools.—Most

193 of the

leaders felt that more time should be given to the training of local leaders. In many cases, training schools were of only one day duration, and specialists were so few that they could visit each locality only once a year. It is difficult to carry on well-organized programs, especially in areas where H o m e Demonstration agents are few, because so little follow-up work is possible. W i t h state leadership spread so thin over a great territory, demonstration projects are next to impossible; and the building u p of permanent leadership locally is almost out of the question. PROBLEMS OF LOCAL

COMMUNITIES

Local leaders and others listed the following among their outstanding problems in building local programs: Better play material.—In

local communities the need per-

sists for more emphasis on the choosing of plays suitable to the region and its resources and for greater effort to steer away from the trivial and build toward a more significant permanent drama. T h e r e might be great value in a closer contact of state play directors and local play directors and in an effort to spread the best local leadership over wider areas. Here and there in country places are directors w h o have more than a flare for putting on plays, directors w h o have had real dramatic training at one time or another. T h e y have done much in their own communities; and their influence might be spread so that whole areas might profit by their help. T h e r e should be opportunity for more discussion of what makes a good play, and more time should be devoted to the reading of plays. Greater efforts should be made to discover potential leaders and to make known the importance of drama intelligently

194

Some of the Problems

developed. This would work toward better selection and more careful preparation of plays. Plays dealing with experienced and inexperienced players. —When a project has been under way several years, groups that have participated in it year after year naturally become more skillful and approach professional standards. In Wisconsin there are nine counties which have been active in one-act play festivals for from seven to nine years. T h e situation presented a problem. How could interest be continued in those counties which must necessarily be excluded from competitions in annual festivals if new counties were to be developed? Last year the nine were excluded; and enthusiasm spread all through the state when the news came. It is noteworthy, however, that those nine counties were represented in the festival audience just the same and that in a friendly spirit of co-operation the professional actors of these groups met with the less-experienced actors from the new counties at the noon luncheon given for all participants and friends. They had not lost interest. Good sportsmanship is a strong point in Wisconsin. T h e players are willing to take criticism; and this good sportsmanship holds good for every region visited. There remains, however, the problem of how, in a statewide project, to afford every group, experienced or inexperienced, a fair opportunity for continued improvement. Should the more professional players be included on an equal basis with the first-year groups, thereby raising the standards of the program? Or should they be used in a demonstration role? Or should the more experienced be entirely excluded in order to encourage new talent to try its wings alone? More intensive

follow-up— Another problem arises from

Some of the Problems

195

the fact that not enough local follow-up is possible after a successful event. When groups are trying out a performance for the first time, they are often ultra-amateur, lacking in finish, and sadly devoid of technique. At the same time they may rightly be adjudged successful. But one event is bound to lead to another, and the second performance should achieve a higher level of proficiency. Too many examples are to be found of slovenly performance. Amateur groups are likely to get into the habit of rehearsing too little and of preparing their plays without heed to the correct lines. Not infrequently they add stage business that is slipshod. If a play is worth doing, it is worth doing well. A group of players may produce its first play without a director, rehearse only three times, and yet win honorable mention in a festival. This happened in 1936. The cast considered it possible to duplicate the experience another year. T h e leading lady said, "Oh, no, we didn't have a director, except a teacher who also played a part. We just met a couple of times. It wasn't hard to do." Undoubtedly, this group of players will enter the festival ranks next year. Unless they develop a more professional attitude before that time, their play is doomed. Their future success depends upon interested follow-up by someone who understands people, dramatics, group work, and the development of leadership. Town and country co-operation—There is also the need for closer relationship between the rural groups and the better-organized groups in the larger communities. Suppose that even one experienced person in a little-theater group could be found who would enjoy meeting from time to time with rural groups planning a play program. How many mistakes might be avoided in play selection and in casting, and how much both the little-theater group and the rural

ig6

Some of the Problems

group might gain from this friendly contactl As Mr. Arvold said, " T h e theatre is not limited to city, town or rural life. T h e theatre is universal." And the same idea of co-operation holds for many of the other subjects in the arts program. T h e future of the farmers' leisure-time program rests upon the kind of leadership it has and upon stable, adequate support for its development. T h e challenge is limitless, and "the celery is ripe and ready to cut."

XXII

Conclusion E X T E N S I O N SERVICE has built its program on a sound educational basis. In a handbook prepared by the Swarthmore Seminar, Edouard C. Lindeman says in the introduction: Each individual has an important contribution to make to the welfare of society and this contribution should be encouraged and respected. Beginning in immediate experience, education for the new social order constantly lays emphasis on the satisfaction of fundamental human needs. Not only is it essential that all members of society have adequate food, clothing and shelter, with opportunities for work and self-support; but each person also needs leisure, companionship, enjoyment of beauty, and opportunity to cultivate the life of the spirit on which all growth depends. Whether adult education deals with those who do the drudgery of the world or with those in positions of privilege and rank, the ideal is the same; to teach not only the great importance of an equitable distribution of the means of earning one's livelihood, but also social justice and new spiritual values. In all groups of society, people long for the chance to get out of their narrow ruts to live full, rich and varied lives. Adult education must show that each individual can fulfill his own personality only as he finds his place in relation to the common good. It is on the basis of such a philosophy that the rural drama, music, and folk events and the cultivation of the fine arts have been included in the Agricultural Extension program.

198

Conclusion

T h e rural arts are as varied as the flowers in an oldfashioned garden. T h e y appear in all the different moving patterns of rural life: now in acting, streaked and shot through with genius, on every kind of stage, from the make-shift platform on wheels to the beautifully-equipped laboratory on a campus; now in circles of dancing figures weaving in and out among the shadows in the brilliant costumes of many lands; now in music with great choruses gathered together from crossroads communities, some of them as far away as a day's journey in fast cars; in games and coverlets, in rugs and in paintings; in revivals of old folk art and music; in pageants bringing to life the whole vivid development of this country of ours. T h e program has come to stay, for it rests on something deep in the soul of rural America. Sometimes the program has grown naturally out of farm life, sometimes it has had nothing whatever to do with it, but always its objectives have been: sociability, clearer understanding of the agricultural neighborhood life, and new enthusiasm for it. More than this, these common celebrations, mingled with the deliberations concerning crops and markets, are making a contribution to American culture that cannot be expressed in words. Indeed they have in them the essence of the spirit men are seeking the world over in their efforts to build a satisfactory social order in which all shall have an equal chance at the good life. Not every performance is a professional triumph. Leadership trained for the task is pitifully lacking. Money for production is scarce. Equipment in many places is nil. One remembers the stages minus aprons, set upon rickety sawhorses with no attempt to hide the underpinning; the overpainted scenery with holes showing here and there; interior

Conclusion

ι gg

sets with too much furniture; and sagging, soiled stage drops with faulty pulleys. But always there is burlap at hand for those who are beginning to see the need to correct such rawness; little by little trained leadership is filtering into rural communities with a creative, enthusiastic vision of what may be achieved in spite of the inadequate equipment at hand. It is allimportant that in looking over the field one should never lose sight of the fact that the spirit of the program is right, that the multicolored, kaleidoscopic movement is in the right key and that a brave project is under way. Agricultural colleges have gone far in the development of the cultural life of rural America. Universities, through their direct connection with the schools of the various states, have done much in the arts field. Schools everywhere, even the most rural of them, are co-operating in one way or another with both agencies; and even teachers' colleges are becoming interested in training for leadership in the rural cultural movement. There are gaps in co-operative endeavor between the various agencies. Teachers and college students are often unaware of the assistance the Extension Service can give their local communities. Few states have yet seen their cultural program whole. With the improved school plants in our villages and the increasing integration of rural life around village and town centers there is an increasing opportunity for the development of various cultural activities centered in the schools. T h e Agricultural Extension Service and the universities would welcome calls for help of an advisory nature for leadership training and for program planning; and through this direct co-operation might come a solution, in part at

200

Conclusion

least, of problems arising from uncoordinated programs in the arts field. T o o much emphasis cannot be placed u p o n the amazing development of local leadership, which is, in the last analysis, responsible for the present virility of the rural-arts program. T h e rural leaders hold the key position in the whole enterprise. Edmund deS. Brunner, of the Adult Education Department, Teachers College, Columbia University, has said, "It seems to me that this division of training and utilization of local leadership is perhaps the greatest contribution of Agricultural Extension to adult education." T h e development of the present progressive program has been brought «about by the co-operative teamwork of state and local leadership in carrying the two-way enthusiasm, inspiration, and program help to local groups and individuals; by generous teamwork in relaying information and plans, in supporting the varied programs, and in carrying through details, as well as in keeping alert for new material, new ideas, and fresh plans. Through leadership in Extension Service projects, many local leaders have become county, state, and national leaders. They are among those most in demand as speakers on many subjects and as chairmen for varied projects. T h e i r states know them to be articulate and able to handle difficult situations. It is the genius of the organization of Extension Service that calls for local leadership to carry on; and the leadership-training conferences are the very life force behind the whole movement. Little more need be said here concerning the cultural contributions of the rural-arts program in Agricultural Extension Service. T h e stories speak for themselves. T h e people who have participated in the programs described in this

Conclusion

201

volume, as well as the local and state leaders who have helped to make those programs possible, would agree that if through drama people are able to develop new talents they never believed they possessed, if through it they can build a permanent, articulate leadership that reaches into every phase of the life of the community and even of the nation, if they can add variety and zest to lagging social programs, make for more neighborliness, and furnish wholesome satisfactory entertainment for township, county, and state, then drama should be accepted as the grass program is accepted, and should be developed on a permanent basis, with adequate trained leadership and adequate funds. If through music informality and friendliness, as well as a dignified, spirited state consciousness have developed, if singing together makes people aware of the values of group action and co-operative endeavor, if it gives new status to individuals, holds people together through depression and hard times, gives courage and new initiative and strengthens and develops a more solid-front agricultural program, then music should be of as important concern as rural electrification and adequate leadership should be furnished on a sound, permanent basis in order to keep songs on the lips of rural America. If folk music and folk dancing, and rhythmic and modern dancing can loosen up the joints of American conservatism, bring people of many nations to laugh and play together and thus make more and more individuals aware that a world community has already become a reality, then the place of the recreation specialists in the agricultural program should be as important as that of the specialists in animal husbandry, soil erosion, or the science of plants. Furthermore, if those arts which grow under our hands

202

Conclusion

add beauty to our surroundings and give soul satisfaction in the accomplishment of artistic ideals, then let there be in the field more artists free to help the rural people create more, dream more, live more—and so become equal to the task ahead of building the kind of rural America the farmers of the future will be glad to call their own.