.

HomePort

Search HomePort

.

A Sons of England Benefit Society (S.O.E.) Outing in Newfoundland, July 1898.

Methodist Guards' Brigade, was uniformed young group which operated in Newfoundland. The Newfoundland Encyclopedia entry states:

Formed in 1900, the Methodist Guards' Brigade was modelled closely on the three church-related, paramilitary brigades for teen-age boys and young men already active in St. John's: the Church Lads' Brigade, the Catholic Cadet Corps, and the Boys' Brigade (later called the Highlanders). Attempts had been made earlier by groups of young Methodist men in St. John's to organize a Methodist Brigade, but without success. In 1900, however, a further attempt, mounted by Cluny Macpherson, C.H. Hutchings, J.S. Pitts and several others, succeeded in launching the Methodist Guards' Brigade.The Brigade was organized and functioned on regular British army lines. Its uniforms and regalia, too, while bearing certain distinctive features, followed closely regular Imperial Army fashions. The Brigade met two evenings a week, initially for mostly military training, its stated object being ``mental, moral, and physical improvement through military drill.'' But as it grew, other activities were added, chiefly a general gymnastics and organized sports program. In its latter years, sports became its dominant interest, the Brigade competing regularly with the other city brigades in such sporting events as shooting, rowing (including the annual Regatta), football and hockey. It also maintained a military band, which accompanied its public parades, and held an annual camp under canvas, usually at Topsail, where recruits engaged in drill and manoeuvres. In 1909-10, branches were organized at Burin and Grand Bank, but these were short-lived.

At first the Brigade in St. John's used a succession of temporary quarters, but in 1903 it opened its own new armoury near the head of Springdale Street. A capacious building, having a drill hall, gymnasium, reading-room, offices, and officers' quarters, it served the Guards admirably, but unhappily not for long. On June 1, 1912 it was destroyed by fire. Shortly thereafter the Brigade became defunct, to be revived as the Guards' Athletic Association in the 1920s.

Frank W. Graham (interview, March 1991),
Guards' Trumpeter (Christmas 1911).

The Methodist College Literary Institute (M.C.L.I.)  had its beginnings in 1866, when alumni of the Wesleyan Academy held meetings to consider the formation of a society to foster organized debate on literary topics and current events. The Wesleyan Academy was the scene of the inaugural lecture, on ``the necessity of possessing a good Moral Character in order to render Education a Blessing.'' In February 1867 the Wesleyan Academy Literary Institute adopted a constitution and elected its first executive, which included John Bemister, H.J.B. Woods, Alexander Reid and John Reid, with Stephen Rendell as president. At first the M.C.L.I.'s discussions and lectures were decidedly low key. However, with the emergence of newspaper publishing in St. John's in the late 1870s and early 1880s a keen interest in the Institute was sparked and its proceedings were regularly reported in the press. In April 1885 Robert E. Holloway was elected president. His scientific mind, coupled with a keen interest in the Institute, guided the M.C.L.I. into new channels and membership became more broadly based. Lectures and debates came to include a variety of historical, literary, scientific, even political and economic questions. Lively debates were held between the M.C.L.I. and other city organizations. By the 1920s debates with visiting teams from universities in Canada and the United Kingdom, held at Pitts Memorial Hall, were both influential and popular entertainment.

In the 1950s the M.C.L.I. began sponsoring television programs for schools, in the form of debates and panel discussions. In 1965 this interest evolved into the regular program "We Want an Answer,'' where a panel of students quizzed a prominent Newfoundlander on items of current interest. The Institute also sponsored an adult program "Analysis'' in the 1960s.

Though never officially declared defunct, the M.C.L.I. gradually ceased to function as a debating society. There were few debates held in the 1970s and none in the 1980s and the organization was merely kept going by the executive for a number of years. In 1990 the M.C.L.I. still existed on paper, but had not been active for more than a decade.

Arthur Fox (1975; n.d.),
Rev. Hollis Hiscock (interview, June 1990),
E.G. White (1937),
A.C. Wornell (interview, June 1990).

Note: M.C.L.I. (Methodist College Literary Institute) served as a key Newfoundland institution, in promoting debating during the period of the Commission of Government (1934-1949) when no elected assembly governed Newfoundland (aside from City Council), and the debates of the MCLI were a key place where public policy and international affairs could be openly debated.