Charles L. Ficklin

              Figure
Charles L.Ficklin
REDPATH





CHARLES L. FICKLIN
EDITOR-LECTURER

C
HARLES L. FICKLIN is a Missouri newspaper man and a United States lecturer.  He speaks on great subjects and his lectures plow into the living center of great living issues, but at the same time they are within the easy grasp of the average listener.  Mr. Ficklin is bold in the licks that he hits, and yet he radiates fine sentiment and the old fashioned human touch.  What he says is shot through with life.  He has the happy art of pulling big truth down out of abstract places, dressing it up with life and making it run along on the ground in front of you.  He believes intensely what he says and he has a big faith in the everlasting importance of People and Principles.




J. Breckenridge Ellis, widely known author, and President of the Missouri Writers' Guild, says of Mr. Ficklin, that he 
has the freshest outlook on life and the youngest heart in that part of the country
 in which he lives.




The St. Louis Times, in a two and a half column survey of Mr. Ficklin, written by Fred R. Barkhurst, says: 
It is declare that Editor Ficklin writes more original matter for his newspaper, addresses a greater number of gatherings, and goes into more states of the Union in achieving both the other tasks than any other Missouri newspaper man.  Indeed there are those who assert that he has traveled farther in his speechmaking tours than any other Missourian save Senator James A. Reed and Bishop William A. Quayle.




Here are some of his Lyceum and Chautauqua lecture subjects:

Keeping Top Things on Top



Figure

He Stood on His Head and Worked His Feet




W
HICH would you prefer to do—watch a man stand on his head and work his feet, or stand on his feet and work his head?  The man on the left is a lusty kicker, and he hits high.  The trouble is that he is upside down.  He has the wrong things at the top and the wrong things at the bottom of his life.  This lecture on 
Keeping Top Things on Top
 is an intense appeal for a correct sensing of values, and is a high-hearted call to every man to keep the rubbish out of the tower room of his life and put the best things there.




Figure


He Stood on His Feet and Worked His Head





Big Men of tomorrow



T
HIS is a lecture that deals with big problems that confront our democracy, and that rise up to challenge the very souls of the men of today, and the coming day.  Yesterday is gone.  Today is passing.  Tomorrow is about to arrive with all its big question marks, and all its changed conditions, and all its new issues, and all its high calls upon all that is best and biggest in men.  What kind of a man will that man be who will be fit to be called big—Tomorrow?



Figure

This Man Knocked People Down




Here is a lecture that takes the big man of tomorrow, puts him out into the great, big jostling, hurrying, mixed crowd that we have here in America, and just goes along with him, lives with him, suffers with him, rejoices with him, conquers with him, draws his picture.  And it puts a throbbing tapeline on the man of tomorrow in three attitudes:



As he faces the crowd.


As he faces himself.


As he faces his Maker.



Figure

This Man Lifted People Up




Into this lecture Mr. Ficklin is putting the finest and best fires of his life.  And it is in this lecture that he presents in living picture and in gripping, dramatic contrast the two great warring deals of manhood—one standing for the glorification of the outside of the man, and the iother[sic other] standing for the glorification of the inside of the man.




Men and Machinery



O
NCE upon a time a man went forth to roll a roller, but he fell down in front of it, and the roller rolled him—and flattened him out.  And the result was a bad perversion of the right relation between the man and the machine.  Another man went out, and he rolled the roller.  And the re-result was a fine exhibit of the right relation between the man and the machine.



Figure

The Roller Rolled Him




How much does the man of this time roll and run and boss the organized machinery of society, politics, industry?




And how much does it roll and run and boss him?




This lecture is a searching, human interest analysis of men in contact with the higher machinery of today



Figure

He Rolled the Roller






What Some People Say
FROM HIS OWN STATE

Mr. Ficklin has brought to the rostrum a power of speech and a mastery of constructive statement that places him in the front rank of the speakers of the day.
—John M. Atkinson.




The address delivered by Charles L. Ficklin was the best that has been heard in this section for years.  Mr. Ficklin held his audience captive for an hour and twenty minutes.
—Arthur Huff, County Clerk, Ironton, Missouri.




He takes undue advantage of his audience.  By the power of personal magnetism and charm of humor he gains complete control over his hearers; and then without a moment's warning he mauls them with sledge-hammer blows of stubborn facts.  His clear-cut sentences come with unaffected sincerity and dramatic power.  Maysville, the Mother of Chautauquas, is proud of Charles L. Ficklin, her representative on the Lyceum platform.
—D. H. Holloway, Superintendent of Schools and Schools and Secretary Lyceum Association.




We are pleased to learn that Hon.  C. L. Ficklin, the brilliant editor of the DeKalb County Herald, has invaded the Chautauqua-Lyceum field.  He has a splendid grasp of present day problems and can talk about them in a way that will be mighty interesting to the hearer.  For several years he has been much in demand as a speaker in political campaigns, and he will be just as popular in Chautauqua circles.—


Liberty, Missouri, Advance.




Ficklin makes big hit.—


St. Joseph Gazette.




A masterpiece.—
J. A. Dillinger, Minister Wyatt Park Christian Church, St. Joseph, Mo.




FROM OTHER STATES



A fluent orator.


—North Branch, Michigan, Gazette.




A fine orator.


—Rhodes, Iowa, Tribune.




Mr. Ficklin gave us one of the best lectures it has ever been the privilege of our people to hear.
 —Mrs. Robert Nelson, Blooming Prairie, Minnesota.




I have heard William J. Bryan, William A. Sunday and Charles L. Ficklin—these three.  I consider the three men in the same class.  They are the best I have ever heard.
—John H. Gearhart, Secretary School Board, Sunfield, Michigan.




Mr. Ficklin gave us his lecture, 
Men and Machinery,
 and I will say that he is a man your Lyceum should be proud of.  He certainly held his audience at all times, and his lecture was the best I have ever heard.
—A. G. Shupe, Superintendent of Schools, Oakville, Iowa.




Mr. Charles L. Ficklin was with us Saturday night and all who heard him were well pleased.  He speaks along a different line from any other speaker I have heard, speaking on things as they are.  Every community in America should hear this lecture.
—R. W. McNie, Cashier Farmers Savings Bank, Atkins, Iowa.




Charles L. Ficklin is a dandy.  He had the house at his command from start to finish and every one I have seen this morning says it was the best lecture we have ever had presented to us in this town.
—C. C. Crawford, Mantorville, Minnesota.




His wonderful mastery of the English language will make a strong appeal with any audience, while his grasp of today's big problems is definite and strong.
—R. H. Martin, Principal High School, Juda, Wisconsin.




One of the best popular lectures heard here in recent years.—


Hawkeye, Iowa, Beacon.




Mr. Ficklin's address was great.  Words cannot express the greatness and magnificence of the address.  His wonderful command of English language in itself was a treasure for any man or woman to be able to comprehend or understand.  Anybody that failed hearing this man's lecture missed one of the rarest treats in a lifetime.—


Francesville, Indiana, Tribune.




From the familiar and the commonplace Ficklin constructs new mechanisms, erects new structures.  He gave us that miraculous thing—a new view of life, a new view of ourselves; the view the other fellow has, provided he is sufficiently wise.  The lecture is the finest, widest resume I have heard of the mechanism of modern industrial and social life.  It is 90 minutes long and much more than that too short.
—Dr. E. W. Gardner, Webster, Iowa.




It was an exceedingly interesting and helpful lecture, delivered in clear, forceful tones that gave echo and expression to fundamental truths deserving of most serious consideration.  It was a special privilege to listen to this true orator and to view with admiration the many word pictures portrayed.—


Richmond, Michigan, Review.





Other Subjects



The Pre-eminence of Jesus


Making E Plus in Life


The Meaning of Our Democracy