1993
Channing R. Tobias

Channing Tobias worked to create strong YMCAs in African American communities throughout his career. He served twelve years as a national Student Secretary, and in 1923 was appointed the Senior Secretary of the Colored Men’s Department of the YMCA. He traveled extensively in the U.S. working to provide better YMCA services for African Americans. His work also brought him overseas as a member of the Student Deputation that visited Euro- pean relief areas and as a delegate and speaker at the World YMCA Conference in Finland. He provided training in places such as Estonia, Latvia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Palestine and the Congo. Tobias’ efforts also reached outside his YMCA work. As a well-known champion for civil rights, he was an unofficial advisor for Presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman. He was successful in helping to change discriminating policies in the U.S. Government, including in the Military. His influence extended beyond America. On the eve of WWII, Mahatma Gandhi broke his custom of silence every Monday to talk with Tobias about race relations during a trip to India.

1993
Edmund R. Tomb

Edmund R. Tomb started his forty-three year career in the Monmouth County (NJ) YMCA. Like many other YMCA professionals, he traveled and worked at several YMCAs in his career. He started two YMCA camps that have grown and flourished to become among the most recognized Y camps in the country: Camp Speers-Eljabar in Pennsylvania and Frost Valley YMCA in New York’s Catskill region. Tomb was also active on the national level, recruiting many YMCA volunteers who became national leaders. He promoted the development of YMCAs in Puerto Rico, vigorously supported the growth of Youth and Government programs and gave leadership to interracial activities. For the last twenty-three years of his career, until his retirement in 1967, Tomb served as the Executive of the Central Atlantic Council.

1993
Willis D. Weatherford

In the first decades of the 1900s, publicly addressing the social and economic problems faced by blacks in the South was uncommon. But Willis Weatherford argued that the ethics of Christianity obligated Southerners to improve race relations. He developed strategies to educate whites and promote economic support for blacks. His determination to work for social change stemmed from his early experiences as a YMCA Student Secretary. Weatherford founded and served as President of the Southern YMCA College in Nashville. He also founded the Blue Ridge Assembly in North Carolina as a Southern YMCA training center. His work related to race relations included the publication of five books that drew national recognition. His book, Race Relations, was used as a common text book in college courses following its publication in 1934. He also organized numerous conferences and meetings to bring blacks and whites together to discuss integration during a time of legally mandated segregation.

1994
Paul B. Anderson

Paul Anderson spent his forty-eight year career working with the YMCAs International Committee. He lived in Russia during the overthrow of the Czar and subsequent attempts to establish a democratic government. He spent four years in Germany before moving to Paris in 1921, where he provided leadership to the Russian language YMCA Press for twenty-six years. The Press published over 400 titles, including Russian Orthodox theologians, scholarly works related to Communism and the original Russian text of three of Alexander Solzhenitzyn’s novels. Anderson returned to New York in 1947 to serve as the Associate Executive Secretary for World Service until his retirement in 1961. He was awarded the French Legion of Honor with Palms and the Officer of the British Empire in recognition of his WWII service in Europe.

1994
Earl W. Brandenburg

Earl Brandenburg began his lifetime affiliation with the YMCA as a teen member of the Lacrosse (WI) YMCA. As a twenty year old, he was employed as the Boys’ Work Secretary in Wausau, Wisconsin. He was involved in YMCA War Work in San Antonio and Michigan before enlisting in the Navy. After the war, he served as the Town and Country Secretary for the Wisconsin State Committee and later as the Chicago-based Regional Boys’ Work Secretary on the national staff. In 1927, Brandenburg was named Regional Executive in Chicago and organized the system of Area Councils to coordinate the work of National Council and State Committees. Six years later, as the Associate General Secretary of the National Council, he supported the continued development of area organizations throughout the U.S. and implemented a new percentage financing formula. From 1936 to 1940, Brandenburg served as General Secretary of the St. Louis County YMCA. He was appointed Director of the YMCA Retirement Fund in 1940, and was responsible for revamping the operations and increasing the investments of the Fund, which had suffered in the Great Depression. Under his leadership the Fund gained stability and its assets grew from $18 million to $103 million. Brandenburg was a trustee of both Springfield and George Williams Colleges.

1994
Thomas S. Caldwell

Moving from Ontario as a child, Thomas Caldwell began his association in 1902 with the YMCA in Riverside California. He was employed by the Y in Oakland, and subsequently joined the Los Angeles YMCA as the citywide Boys’ Secretary. Beginning in 1926, he served thirteen years as General Secretary of the Riverside YMCA. In 1914 Caldwell was leading camping programs when he created the YMCA Rag Society as a means of rewarding positive behavior among the boys in the program. Ceremonies were held to give “rags” (bandanas) to youth as a challenge to live up to Christian ideals of spiritual and physical health. The Rag program spread along the West coast and eventually to camps across the country. The YMCA Rag Society, with its seven levels of increasingly higher commitment to values has had an impact on generations of YMCA campers. Many former and current Y staff, along with thousands of YMCA campers have personally been inspired by their participation in the Rag Society.