A CASE OF COÖPERATION
The M. E. Church at Blunt, S. D., which being pastorless joined with the Presbyterian Church for preaching services.
Evangelism
A greater portion of the evangelistic work is done through revival meetings, although less than half of the churches hold them. Of all the members admitted on confession of faith by all the churches during the year, 76 per cent. were converted in revival meetings, and joined one of the churches holding such a revival. Thirty-one of the seventy churches held or united in thirty such meetings, one being a union meeting of two churches. Pastors conducted fifteen meetings, in three of which a neighboring pastor or evangelist assisted. Fourteen meetings were held by visiting clergymen. The meetings were well attended, extending from seven to thirty-five days, the average meeting lasting thirteen days.Eighty-seven per cent. of the 385 converts and the thirteen who were reclaimed joined the churches holding the revival. This gain amounted to 72 per cent. of the total gain in membership made by these same thirty-one churches during the entire year. Forty-four per cent. of all the churches held revivals, and while they represent only 45 per cent. of the total harvest by confession and letter, yet three-fourths of all the gain made by confession of faith were obtained by these churches.
The country churches held seventeen meetings, averaged four new members each, and made 20 per cent. of the total gain. The village churches held five meetings and the town churches held four meetings, both averaging five new members each, the village churches making 8 per cent. of the total gain and the town churches 6 per cent. The city churches held only four meetings, averaged about fifty-seven new members each and realized one-third of the total gain made.
Children and the Churches
Sunday schools are the big hope of this country. Young people and older people are not so much interested in the Church and religion because so many have grown up without it, but the children have had more chance to know the Church. Sunday schools are to-day the most frequent form of church work in these Western counties. They are especially hopeful because so many of them over-ride denominational lines and unionize; also because they persist when all other church spirit seems to be dead.
Fifty-six churches have Sunday schools of their own, and one city church has a mission Sunday school in addition to its own. Two groups of two churches each combine their Sunday schools. Only three churches neither maintain their own Sunday schools nor help with a union school.
Thirty-seven union Sunday schools are being carried on in the four counties, nine of which have the assistance of church organizations meeting in the same building. Three are located in mining camp villages, the rest in small hamlets or open country. These union schools have a fourth of the total Sunday school enrollment. People on ranches and far from town start Sunday schools under local leadership without waiting for churches to be organized. When a newcomer sends his children to Sunday school it is often the only contact made with religious activity in the new country. The independent Sunday school has, therefore, in a sense, a greater responsibility than the church Sunday school.
The importance of the Sunday school is brought out in a comparison between Sunday school enrollment and resident church membership.
The enrollment of church Sunday schools is larger than the total church membership in Union County, and larger than resident church membership in Beaverhead, Hughes or Union. The total enrollment of all Sunday schools is 23 per cent. higher than the total resident church membership. Without the Union County Sunday schools this enrollment equals only 91 per cent. of the resident church membership. Thirty-five churches have a larger Sunday school enrollment than resident church membership; all nine churches helping with Union Sunday schools have a smaller membership than the Union school enrollment. This discrepancy is high in some churches. For example, a country church has thirty-five enrolled in the Sunday school and only eight church members; a village church with sixty-five enrolled in its Sunday school has seven church members; a town church has fifteen church members and 150 enrolled in its Sunday school.
Country and village Sunday schools show the best record. The total enrollment of all country Sunday schools, including the Union schools, is more than three times as high as church membership. The enrollment of all village Sunday schools is about 47 per cent. higher than village church enrollment. There are no Union Sunday schools in the towns or city. Except in the city the average Sunday school enrollment exceeds average resident church membership, the advantage being twenty-two for the country schools, nineteen for the village, and twelve for the town schools. The average city church membership, however, exceeds average Sunday school enrollment by 105.
When Sunday school enrollment is higher than church membership, it is ordinarily encouraging as a promise of future growth. But the large discrepancies between village and open country church membership and Sunday school enrollment, coupled with the lowpercentage of young people in their church memberships, show that these churches are not recruiting new members from their Sunday schools as they might. Nor are the churches relating themselves to any extent to the separate Sunday schools in outlying sections. Thiscanbe done, and is most successful in a few cases. For example, the Apache Valley Sunday School, which meets on Sunday afternoons at a schoolhouse in Union County, is being “fathered” by two ministers from Clayton, six miles away, who go out on alternate Sundays. This Sunday school is live and flourishing. It maintains a high percentage of attendance and carries on various activities.
Attendance in general is good. The percentage of enrollment represented in the attendance on a typical Sunday varies from 66.7 per cent. for the town to 70.8 per cent. for the city schools. Yet only twenty-five schools make definite efforts to increase their attendance. The various methods used are contests such as a competitive Boys’ and Girls’ day, a fall Rally Day, cards, rewards and prizes, a Banner Class, a Look-out Committee and the Cross and Crown System.
During the year preceding the survey, 168 pupils joined the churches from the Sunday schools, and there were seven probationers at the time the survey was made. Decision Day was held in four country, one village, five town and four city schools. The results were meager. Only thirty-five declared for church membership. Nine town and city schools have classes to prepare for church membership, eight schools have sent twenty scholars into some kind of Christian work during the last ten years. A country Sunday school in Hughes County has shown what can be done in this respect. It has sent five young people into Christian service during the last ten years, and five more in the whole history of the school. It is significant that one consecrated pastor has served this Sunday school and church during this entire time.
Cradle Rolls are another excellent method of enlistment. Yet these are kept in only twenty-six schools. The total enrollment is 473. One of the greatest needs of this country is more local and better trained leadership, not only for Sunday schools but for the community at large. The only definite training for leadership is eight Teacher Training classes, held in two city, four town, one village and one country school.
Mission study is carried on in seventeen schools more or less frequently, several additional schools annually presenting the cause of missions. One city school has a four-day institute for the studyof Sunday school methods and missions. Twenty-nine schools make regular missionary offerings, and seven take them once a year. Twelve schools have libraries with an average of seventy-three volumes each. Eighty-three schools give out Sunday school papers. There are 507 classes, an average of about twelve per class.
Proper preparation is one of the greatest needs of the Sunday schools in these counties. Much of the instruction is haphazard and indifferent. Men teach 123 classes and 26.6 per cent. of the total enrollment. Ordinarily, the man teacher, if there is one, takes the adult class at the expense of the growing boy who needs him more than the adults. Graded lessons are used exclusively in ten schools and twenty others use them in some classes. Seventeen schools have organized classes. Sixty-six schools are open throughout the year. The pastor is superintendent in six schools, teacher in fifteen, substitute teacher in one, “helps” in nineteen, is a student in two, and in one reports his job as “superintendent; teacher and janitor.”
Social events for the Sunday schools mean picnics, class parties, and sometimes a real ice cream sociable. About one-third of the schools have a reasonable amount of social activity, while sixteen report a great deal. Fifty-seven schools have picnics, and great events they are, too, with more cakes and pies and goodies of all sorts than the community is likely to see again for another year. One or more classes have socials, parties and “hikes” in seventeen schools (four village, nine town and four city). The “Anti-Kants” is an interesting class of young women. Every time one of the class becomes engaged, there is a party and a shower, called a graduation. Twenty graduations have taken place in the history of the class. About half of the schools have programs for special days, especially for Children’s Day, Christmas and Easter. One Union school has an Easter picnic and egg-hunt. Nineteen schools have mixed socials, such as parties, indoor picnics, ice cream suppers and entertainments. One town school has a weekly social. The only special Sunday school organizations are a Choir Association and Sunday school athletic teams in three town churches which play competitive games. Twenty report no social life of any sort in connection with their schools. They do not even have a picnic to liven things up.
HAPPY LITTLE PICNICKERS
The Baptist Mission at Kleenburg, Wyoming, does good work for the kiddies.
A GOOD TIME WAS HAD BY ALL
A Sunday School class picnic in Union County.
Other Church Organizations
Various other organizations have been developed within the churches for business, educational and social purposes. Women have a great many, men have very few. Fifty-six women’s organizations are carried on in thirty-seven churches, of which nine are village and nine country churches. There are twenty-eight Ladies’ Aids, thirteen Missionary Societies and various Guilds, Circles, Auxiliaries, a Manse Society, a King’s Daughters, an Adelphian and a Dorcas. The total enrollment is 1,682, or about 70 per cent. of the total female resident church membership over twenty-one, and 17 per cent. of the total female population aged from eighteen to forty-four, in the four counties. The attendance averages about twenty-one to each organization.
In sorry contrast to this array, men’s organizations number only seven, and all are connected with city or town churches in Pierre, the county seat of Hughes County. The enrollment is 300, or 27 per cent. of the total resident church membership in city and town of males over twenty-one years of age, and only 3 per cent. of the total male population between the ages of eighteen and forty-four in the four counties. Men and women have two organizations in common. One is a missionary society which, contrary to custom, shares its endeavors with men, the other is a dramatic club for any one old or young who has dramatic ability. This interesting organization gives a splendid amateur show every year. A former professional actor, who also coaches dramatics in the high school, is the coach.
Boys Left Out
There are only eight organizations for girls in seven town or city churches. Two hundred and twenty-two, or 42 per cent., of all the girls under twenty-one in the town and city resident membership are enrolled. One is a Friendly Society, and the rest are various kinds of guilds. But boys are the most shabbily treated of all. There are only four organizations especially for them, all in town churches and two in one church, so that only three churches have special clubs for their boys. The enrollment is sixty-nine, or about 21 per cent. of all the boys under twenty-one enrolled in city and town church membership. Boys and girls together have two organizations in two town churches with a membership of seventy-three. One is a Junior League, and the other a JuniorBaptist Young People’s Union. Young people have twenty-eight organizations in ten country, three village, nine town and six city churches. Eight of them are Epworth Leagues, eight are Christian Endeavors and the rest are various Young People’s Societies, Baptist Young People’s Unions, Mission Volunteers, Young People’s Alliances, two Choir Organizations and one Purely for Fun Club. Their total enrollment of 834, together with the membership of the mixed boys’ and girls’ organizations, equals 84 per cent. of the total church resident membership under twenty-one.[7]
More people in the community are reached through the meetings of these organizations than by any other single church activity, with the exception of the celebration of special days. These meetings are often community affairs, especially in the case of the women’s organizations. In twenty organizations, the attendance exceeds the enrollment. The men’s clubs work for the church, and several do practical community work. Their programs in all but two cases include dinners, either at every meeting or at special banquets during the year. One club puts on a Father and Son banquet every year.
Men’s Forum and Ladies’ Aids
The most interesting outcome of the work of any of the men’s organizations is the Men’s Forum, recently developed in Sheridan by the combined Men’s Clubs of the Congregational and Protestant churches. This was the first open forum held in Wyoming. The attendance at the meetings averaged 400. The principles of the forum are as follows:
The complete development of democracy in America.A common meeting ground for all the people in the interest of truth and mutual understanding, and for the cultivation of community spirit.The freest and fullest open discussion of all vital questions affecting human welfare.Participation on the part of the audience from the Forum Floor whether by questions or discussion.The freedom of the Forum management from responsibility for utterances by speakers from the platform or floor.
The complete development of democracy in America.
A common meeting ground for all the people in the interest of truth and mutual understanding, and for the cultivation of community spirit.
The freest and fullest open discussion of all vital questions affecting human welfare.
Participation on the part of the audience from the Forum Floor whether by questions or discussion.
The freedom of the Forum management from responsibility for utterances by speakers from the platform or floor.
Among the subjects presented have been “Community Problems,” “The Church and Industrial Conflict,” “The Golden Rule in Business: Is It Practicable?” “The Farmers’ Movement in America,” “Bolshevism,” “Feeding the World: Is It America’s Job?” Thereis no more encouraging sign of community interest in public questions, and a conscious effort on the part of the Church to develop a public opinion on social, economic and religious problems.
PROGRAM OF A COMMUNITY RALLY
The Ladies’ Aid is often the only woman’s organization in the community. Most of these clubs meet once or twice a month, with regular programs for Bible study or missions, organize sewing and quilting bees, and bazaars, etc. The help they give in church finances has already been appreciated. Any such common interest and responsibility holds many an organization together. Several promote social welfare work. One organized a Teachers’ Training Class to improve material for Sunday school teachers. One village has a community Ladies’ Aid which works for the church, althoughonly a few are church members. The community woman’s club in a small hamlet is studying missions as a part of its program. In one community, the Ladies’ Aid of the only church, which is pastorless, meets regularly and holds a yearly bazaar to pay the occasional supply preacher and keep the church in repair. At the “Frontier Day” given by a Dude Ranch, the Ladies’ Aid from a nearby hamlet had a booth for selling hamburgers and lemonade. In one of the mining camps, the Ladies’ Aid of the Mission church sent out invitations for an afternoon tea to raise money for a new piano for the Kindergarten. It turned out to be a great social event attended by women, many of them foreign, from all the camps in the vicinity. Here is another Ladies’ Aid, the only organization in all that part of a sparsely settled country, and many miles from town which holds eight socials a year and every social is a supper. Those suppers bring out whole families, and are the biggest annual events. Is it any wonder? The woman on the Range has a lonesome time of it. Ranches are far apart. She rarely sees her neighbors and less frequently goes to town. This woman needs social activities more than her town sister. Yet only nine out of thirty-four country churches have women’s organizations.
Young People’s Meetings are generally held Sunday nights, and the majority hold an occasional social. One town Young People’s organization has a successful Bible Study Class. The Purely for Fun Club, as its name implies, is purely social and meets twice a month. It has a special garden party once a year. This club is one of the activities of a M. E. community church located in a new dry-farming community which is having a struggle to make both ends meet, but is doing good work in that community. The people are loyal, even enthusiastic. There is not, however, even a church building, let alone any equipment for social activities. A building is desperately needed for church and community center, nor can the members provide it themselves. Cases of this kind represent possibilities for the most effective sort of home mission aid.
The Preachers’ Goings and Comings
Thisis a field that challenges a preacher. The love of a new world has drawn his potential flocks and with them a pastor may come to new pastures where the satisfaction of creative pioneer work is not its least attraction. Settlements have grown up almost over night. People have come from all over the East, Middle West and Southwest. Many families live far from their neighbors. Leadership is the challenging need and it is primarily the task of the Church to furnish and develop it. The initial handicap is that here people, from a matter of habit, do not yearn for church ministry as they do in other parts of the country. Their traditions do not include it. It is the preacher who must “sell” the idea of religion and the Church. No one else will do it. He must be a “builder of something out of nothing—a pioneer of the Gospel, creator as well as evangelist.”
The Vagrant Minister
One of the most startling facts brought out by this survey is the degree to which the ministers have been transient. Always a detriment to effective work, this lack of permanency is especially unfortunate in a country of such rapid growth and so transient a population. It takes more than average time to win people’s confidence because they do not accept the Churchper se. There are problems enough to be met when a preacher “hog-ties,” as the Western slang puts it, meaning when he stays on the job. But the preachers have come and gone along with the rest. Three of the forty-five churches organized for ten years or more have had the same preacher throughout the period, and five more churches have had only two pastors. But seven churches have changed pastors three times, ten have changed four, seven have changed five, six have changed six, five have changed seven, one has changed eight and one has changed nine times during this period. About half of the country and village churches, 38 per cent. of the town, and one-fourth of the city churches have had five or more pastorsduring the last ten years. Of the churches organized within the last ten years, ten have had one pastor, eight have had two, one has had three, three have had four, one has had six, one has had seven and two have had no regular pastors during the entire time. These men have indeed had the spirit of wanderlust. They have scarcely stayed long enough to get acquainted with their task.
CHART VIII
Lapses between pastors are revealed. The changing has meant loss of time to three-fourths of the churches. Thus, of the group of churches organized ten years or more, city churches have been vacant 2.5 per cent. of the ten years, town churches 6 per cent. of the time, village churches 11 per cent. and country churches 17 per cent. of the time. The churches organized in the last ten years, of which the majority are in small hamlets and the open country, have been vacant 20 per cent. of the time. Again the churches in the larger centers fare better.
Distribution of Pastors
The churches in the four counties are at present being served by forty ministers who have been a long time in church service, but only a short time in their present fields. Their average length of time in their present charge is only two and one-third years. Twelve of the forty-one present pastors have been in their parishes less than a year, and fourteen more have been serving from oneto two years inclusive. Thirty-two ministers give their entire time to the ministry. Eight have some other occupation in addition to their church work. One is a student, and the rest are ranchers. These eight men serve eleven churches in the four counties and eight churches outside. Thirteen churches were without regular pastors at the time of the survey, but five churches were only temporarily pastorless—transiency caught in the act! Four of the thirteen were being supplied by local or travelling preachers, one a woman homesteader. The remaining fifty-seven churches, therefore, were being served by forty regular ministers, and two resident social workers who take care of a Baptist Mission at a mining village in Sheridan County. The regular ministers also serve twenty churches in other counties, making a total of seventy-seven churches, or 1.87 churches per man. This is a slightly lower proportion of ministers per church than the region averages.
How the ministers are divided up so that they will go around is shown in the following table. The sixteen preaching points and missions which these same men also serve are not included because in general they do not take the same amount of time as a regular church.[8]
The denominational basis of church organization, as a preceding chapter shows, leads to an uneven distribution of churches and ministers. If it were not for denominational lines, it would be possible to make a better distribution of the ministers so as to give a larger proportion of the communities a resident minister. The centers have an abundance of ministers, but outside the centers there are too few. Thus, thirty-three of the churches have resident preachers, but twenty-two, ortwo-thirds, of these churches are located in centers which have other resident ministers. More than half of the churches with resident pastors are town or city churches. Onlyninecommunities have one or more resident ministers serving a single church on full time. One of these communities is the city,three are the towns, one is a village community in Beaverhead, one the mining town with the two social workers, and three are country communities. Only eighteen communities have such full-time resident pastors. Ten other churches have pastors living adjacent to their buildings, but in each case the pastor also serves other churches, or has other occupation. Fourteen churches have pastors living from five to eighteen miles distant, four have ministers living from eighteen to thirty-five miles distant. One has its pastor living fifty miles away, one sixty-five and one 120 miles. Four pastors live outside their counties.
CHART IX
An adequate parsonage is one means of keeping a resident pastor. About half of the churches have parsonages. Of the forty churches with buildings, thirty-four have parsonages and one country pastor has a parsonage and no church building. Three parsonages were not being used at the time of the survey.
The residence of pastors and the distribution of pastoral service have a clear relation to growth. The pastor is ordinarily responsible for the evangelistic success of the church. If a pastor is non-resident or has too large a territory to serve, his personal contribution is lessened. Of the churches having resident pastors, two-thirds made a net gain. Of those with non-resident pastors, only one-third gained.
Pastors’ Salaries.
The question of ministers’ salaries is important. Inadequate salaries have undoubtedly caused some of the restlessness among the ministry. Salaries vary as the minister is on full or on part time, as shown in the following table. The full-time one-church man commands a wage higher than the man with more churches, or the man with another occupation.
A PARSONAGE BUT NO CHURCH
The M. E. pastor shown here with his wife and baby has a house but no church building on his circuit. He preaches in three school houses.
These average salary figures may be compared with the average salary of the Y. M. C. A. county secretaries for the entire United States which was $2,265 in 1920.
Training of Ministers
Standards of the various denominations as to the educational qualifications of the ministers vary. Eighteen of the forty-onepastors are graduates of colleges and theological seminaries; six others are college graduates, three are graduates of seminaries or Bible Schools, but have no college training. One minister is going to seminary. Ten ministers have had no special training for the ministry.
Negro and Indian Work
Racial Cordiality
Inthis Range country, there are not many negroes in proportion to the white settlers, and the relations between the races are cordial. Beaverhead County has twenty-eight negroes in Dillon and Lima communities. Sheridan County has a total of about 295. A small neighborhood, Cat Creek, six miles west of the city of Sheridan has about 250 negroes. There are six negro farm owners at Cat Creek with farms of 320 acres each. Considerable community spirit has been developed, which is manifested by increased friendliness and by pride in the farms. The Plum Grove Club has sixteen members, and meets twice a month for discussions on crop welfare and for social times. There is a Sunday school, with an enrollment of fifteen and an average attendance of ten, which is kept going for eight months of the year. Preaching services are held occasionally.
The negroes in the city of Sheridan are hard-working and industrious. They are mainly laborers, but some have small businesses. Organizations include a Mutual Aid Society with fifty members and three lodges which are all inactive at present. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People has a local branch with 100 members. A recently organized Athletic Club of fifteen members hopes to branch out into a regular athletic association.
Colored Churches
There are two colored churches—a Methodist Episcopal and a Baptist North. The Methodist Episcopal was organized in 1908; the Baptist in the following year. Both churches have resident pastors, serving but one point each. Each denomination has a church building and a parsonage. The combined value of the church buildings is $3,500, of the parsonages $500. The Baptist church has recently been rebuilt. Both churches use weekly envelopes forraising their money which amounted to $2,887.14 last year, $1,164.25 of which was by subscription, and $680 by collection. There was no surplus or deficit. From this fund $938.79 was spent for salaries, $142.17 for missions and benevolences, and $1,500.04 for rebuilding and repairs. The Baptist church receives home mission aid of $600.
The Methodist church has thirty-six members, having made a net gain of seven in the year preceding the survey. The Baptist church has twenty-six members whose membership has remained constant. The total net active membership of the two churches is fifty-one.
Each church holds eight Sunday preaching services a month. Both have Sunday schools. The Methodist Sunday school, with an enrollment of sixteen, is kept going the year round; the Baptist Sunday school, with an enrollment of twelve, meets for only seven months. The Methodist church has three other organizations—a Woman’s Missionary Society, a Willing Workers and Ladies’ Aid, and a Literary Society for both sexes with a membership of fifty. The Baptists have one organization, a Christian Aid, with a membership of twelve, to which both men and women belong.
One church has had six, the other five, pastors in the last ten years. The present pastors are graduates of both college and seminary.
A friendly feeling exists between the white and colored people in Sheridan, which is manifested by a willingness on the part of the white churches to help the colored. The colored ministers are included in the Sheridan Ministerial Union.
Indian Missions
Part of the Crow Creek Indian Reservation extends into the southeastern part of Hughes County, and about 70 per cent. of the people living in this section of Hughes are Indians. All are farmers owning their own land.
An Episcopal Indian Mission was established here in 1892. The pastor, who lives in Fort Thompson, conducts one morning service a month. There are twenty-six members, of whom twenty-one are active. There is no Sunday school, but a Ladies’ Aid with five members meets every week and has twice as large an attendance as it has enrollment.
There is also a Catholic Mission located near the Episcopal Mission, which was started about 1911. The priest comes from outside the county and holds one mass each month. There are about fifteen families in the membership.
Non-Protestant Work
Roman Catholic
TheRoman Catholic work is the strongest non-Protestant religious activity in all the four counties and naturally has a large number of foreign-born and Spanish-American communicants in its parishes. There is a total of twenty-four organized Catholic churches. Beaverhead County has two, Hughes three, Sheridan five and Union fourteen. The city of Sheridan, and each of the towns supports a Catholic church; eight are located in villages, two of which are in Sheridan mining camps, and twelve in small hamlets. Nine priests, seven of whom live in these counties, serve the twenty-four churches. Four churches, two in villages and two in small hamlets, are served by priests living outside the county.
AN OASIS IN THE DESERT
The grounds in which this Catholic Church and parsonage stand make this the only spot of verdure in a barren waste extending for miles on every side.
Each of the twenty-four churches has a building. There are six priests’ houses, valued at $21,000, and two parochial school buildings. The value of church buildings is estimated at a total value of $98,800. The total value of church property, includingland, is $211,025. None of the churches have any social equipment. The total receipts of all the churches last year amounted to $23,157.56 and this amount was spent largely on salaries and church upkeep. The only churches receiving aid are two in Union, each of which received $500. The average salary is $892.
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ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCHES AND PARISHES, UNION COUNTY, NEW MEXICO
The total membership is about 5,152, which is within 668 of the total Protestant figure for seventy churches. The average total membership is 215 per church. Only three of the twenty-four churches have as few as fifty members or less.
Thirteen churches have Catechism and Confirmation classes, with a total enrollment of 416. Attendance is high; it equals 77 per cent. of the enrollment. There are seventeen other organizations, three for men, ten for women, one for boys, one for girls and two for young people. The total enrollment is 771. The church in Sheridan has a parochial school.
Catholic church membership increased more rapidly than the Protestant in Beaverhead and Hughes and less rapidly in Sheridan from 1890 to 1916, according to the United States religious census. In Union, from 1906 to 1916, the Protestant membership increased more rapidly than the Catholic. Catholic membership is greater than Protestant membership in every county but Hughes. There are a total of nineteen Catholic mission centers in Union and Beaverhead.
Penitentes
There are about five groups of Penitentes in Union County, with an average of twenty-five members each. No women belong. The Penitentes are all Spanish-Americans and are largely sheep and cattle herders. Their small adobe and stone buildings are called “morada.” Meetings are held in Lent, on the last three days of Holy Week. During the ceremonies, members inflict personal punishment, often carrying it to an extreme. This sect, which was at one time distributed over the whole territory of New Mexico, since 1850 has retreated towards the north. As to their origin, Twitchell in his “History of New Mexico” says: “It is possible that the Penitentes, particularly by their scourging themselves with whips made of cactus, come from the order of Flagellants which was a body of religious persons who believed by whipping and scourging themselves for religious discipline they could appease the divine wrath against their sins and the sins of the age.” The Penitentes are not recognized by the Catholic Church.
Latter Day Saints
Dillon, in Beaverhead, and the city of Sheridan, each have a Mormon church. There is a church building in Dillon, and the one in Sheridan is now being erected. There is also an inactive church at Lima, organized in 1900. The Mormon membership is eighty-five in Dillon and thirty-six in Sheridan. Both churches have Sunday schools, with a total enrollment of seventy and relief societies with a total membership of thirty-five.
Christian Science
There are two Christian Science churches, located in Dillon and in the city of Sheridan, both organized in 1919. The Dillon church meets in an office, but the Sheridan church has a building valued at $2,500. The church membership is about 170. Both churches have Sunday schools, with an enrollment of about thirty in Dillon and about fifty in Sheridan.
Theosophical
The city of Sheridan has a Theosophical Society which meets in a real estate office. The membership is seventeen. Six new members were taken in last year. Meetings are held every Friday night. Two meetings a month are for members only, and two are public lectures.
Seeing It Whole
TheRange, our last real frontier, has grown up. Round-ups are miniature and staged. All the land is fenced. The cowboy is passing, if not gone. Even “chaps” and a sombrero are rare, unless worn by a “Dude” from the East. The last 100 years have seen a remarkable growth and change in this country. The cattleman and the cowboy have largely given way to the homesteader, and he in turn has become a regular farmer or, as he prefers it, “rancher.”
The Land of the Homesteader
The cowman used to insist that no one could make a living on the semi-arid Range. For many years “there was no sign of permanent settlement on the Plains and no one thought of this region as frontier.” Then the Homesteader came. “And always, just back of the frontier,” says Emerson Hough in “The Passing of the Frontier,” “advancing, receding, crossing it this way and that, succeeding and failing, hoping and despairing, but steadily advancing in the net result—has come that portion of the population which builds homes and lives in them, and which is not content with a blanket for a bed and the sky for a roof above.”
Homesteaders are good stock upon which to build a civilization. Many of them are sturdy folk who have come to the West to establish homes and with determination are doing so. Of course, there are the habitual drifters who have always been failures because they never stayed long enough anywhere to succeed. But they prove up on their claims and then go elsewhere, drifting still. Others leave, holding their land as an investment, because they have not found the land or the circumstances up to their expectations. The free land has gradually been taken up, so that there is very little of it left in any one of these counties. The population is becoming less transient on this account. More people are staying because there is no more free land, and no other newer frontier.
What, then, has the survey shown of the Range? How has it fared in its 100 years of growth? What are its assets as well asits needs? In a word, what has it made of itself? The very presence of real farm-houses on dry farming land and mesas speaks in itself of a small world conquered. Of course, there are farm-houses in the valleys. But sheer grit is all that achieves a house and a barn and a wind-shield of trees out on the mesa. Lumber is expensive and must be hauled from the nearest market. Trees, so wary of growing there, must be watched, watered and carefully tended every day for the first five years. A home on the plains means more sweat and toil and effort than a home anywhere else in our country.