Watches

A month after the Methodist month of religious carnival at Springfield, Mass., the Executive Committee of the Methodist Board of Foreign Missions assembled in Manhattan to fight the grim reality of a deficit. The Board was $2,225,000 in debt. The proposal to reduce its missionary work by 25% was promptly rejected. What to do? Up stood Dr. L. O. Hartman, Editor of the onetime Zion's Herald. He proposed that every member of the Board should give his gold watch to the cause. Luther B. Wilson, famed Bishop, at once saw the point. He took out his watch, went to the table, laid it down. In the pocket of Bishop Grose ticked the timepiece of the late James W. Bashford,* Bishop of Peking, who put Methodism on the Oriental side of the map. That, too, went on the table. It was a good idea. C. E. Welch,/- grape juice man, took his watch to the table. He was followed by a Vice President of the Pennsylvania R. R., A. M. Shoyer; by a lawyer, W. H. Van Benschoten; by a glovemaker, W. J. Stitt; by other Bishops, Lowe and Badley. Announcement of this watch-giving was sent to all Methodism. The Treasurer said he would operate the biggest pawnbroking business in the country. Every member of the Church was asked to send his watch to the Treasurer and later to redeem it at its sales value. It will take 222,500 watches of an average value of $10 to wipe out the debt.

*James Whitford Bashford; pastor, educator, author, M. E. Bishop of Peking, China. Born Fayette, Wis., 1849--died 1919. President of Ohio Wesleyan College, 1889-1904. Characterized by his students as "What-can-I-do-for-you" Bashford; by the Chinese, among whom he numbered many distinguished friends, as "the man with the shining face." A tremendous worker; carried a case of books with him when travelling and wrote many books himself. Among other strong views he held women should be admitted to the ministry.

/-Dr. Charles Edgar Welch. Born Watertown, N. Y., 1852. Public School Education. Practising and manufacturing dentist with his father, 1877-1886. Grape juice man since 1869 at Vineland, N. J. Nominated by the Prohibition Party in 1914 and 1916 for Governor of New York; withdrew in 1914 in favor of Democrat Sulzer and ran for Lieutenant Governor. Defeated both times.