J. Smith Damron: educational art entertainment

              SMITH DAMRON The Potter Craftsman

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The Evolution of A Piece of Clay

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What Kind of a Pottery Is Your Community?

COMMITTEEMAN:—Come, Lyceum and Chautauqua, come and help us crowd this wrong workman from the clay.  No matter what it costs, we are determined that our children shall be modeled right and good and beautiful inside and out.


This cartoon by New Woodman, and article by Ralph Parlett, appeared in the February, 1917 issue of the Lyceum Magazine.  While it was not intended that this article should in any way refer to J. Smith Damron's lecture The Potter and the Clay, yet it so beautifully tells the story and real purpose of Mr. Damron's lecture, we reproduce it here for your careful consideration.

SHALL THE LYCEUM AND chautauqua be brought to our town?  Shall we go on with them?

Were you ever in a pottery?

There you see the start of every earthenware vessel is a lump of soft clay upon a whirling potter's wheel.  You will see rows of these whirling potter's wheels.

The potter decides what form the clay is to take.  The clay is soft and every touch of the potter shapes it.  The skilled potter makes each touch shape the clay into usefulness, symmetry and beauty.

The unskilled potter can shape the clay into uselessness, unsymmetry and ugliness.

The soft clay becomes harder and harder.  It becomes harder and harder to shape.  It is baked, decorated, fired, glazed, perhaps.  It comes from the kilns in permanent form.  It may be a wonderful, beautiful, useful creation, or it may be a cull, a shapeless, useless thing to be thrown upon the waste pile.

YOUR COMMUNITY IS A POTtery.  The clay is the most precious in the world—human clay.  Each life is at first a shapeless lump of soft, sensitive clay upon the whirling wheel of growth.  Look around you; you see hundreds, thousands of these clay lumps whirling up through life.

So many are young, sensitive to the slightest touch.  Many are partly shaped and hardening.  Many are receiving the decorations now, getting baked and glazed.  You can't change them pretty soon unless you break them.

They are very careful in the potteries what kind of skilled workmen work upon the clay.  How careful are you in your community pottery?

A few preachers and teachers are working with good fathers and mothers to shape these hundreds, or thousands, of clay masses.  And in every community a hundred, a thousand, wrong influences are at work on the sensitive clay.  See the marred forms taking shape.  See the hardening going on.  See the masses of shapelessness that might have been beautiful, symmetrical lives.  See the crude, shallow, malformed characters.  See the short-sightedness, the selfishness, the evil.

See the crowds on the street pursuing cheap amusements, reading trashy, tainted, feverish news-stand fodder, filling their minds with rubbish and weeds.  See the crowds being fashioned into mere rattling receptacles for dollars.  Or booze-jugs!

Day by day every life hardening, baking, glazing, right or wrong!

When you see all this you do not ask if we shall bring the lyceum and chautauqua to our town, or keep it there.

The Lyceum and Chautauqua Movement is a movement that brings the Master Potters to town.

The lecturers, the readers, the musicians, the entertainers (if they are truly lycenm) come to strengthen the hands of the preacher, teacher, father, mother, to transform the community clay into beautiful, useful, symmetrical, successful, happy lives.

This year there are long rows of the sensitive clay masses—your own and your neighbors' children—to be shaped aright.  Next year there are more beginners.  And every year all ages to be shaped and beautified.

You lost money last year?  You can't afford master potters?

Yes!  you reply, I see it right now.  No matter what it costs, bring us all we can get—bring us the best in the world, for nothing is too good for the precious clay of our community.

And you add, Hurry it, the clay is hardening every day.





Chautauqua and Lyceum audiences gather about J. Smith Damron at the close of his great lecture THE POTTER AND THE CLAY to ask questions, examine his potter's wheel, and wonderful display of American China and Art Pottery.




SOME COMMITTEE REPORTS
Smith Damron recently gave his lecture entitled, The Potter and the Clay on our lyceum course.  We were more than pleased.  It is the general concensus of opinion that his was the best number of our course.

PROF. C. M. MILLER, Altamont, Kans.

Smith Damron gave us a strong number.  Our people know much more about pottery and have higher moral ideals now than they had before.  Damron is all right and delivers a vital message.

AUGUST DAESCHNER, Supt. of Schools, Del Norte, Colo.

Mr. J. Smith Damron The Ceramic Art Club of Cleveland wish to extend their thanks and appreciation to you, for the enjoyable entertainment, and hope we may have the pleasure of having you with us again.

I can say all were delighted, saying it was the best lecture of our season.

BLANCHE REED, Secretary Ceramic Art Club, Cleveland, O.

J. Smith Damron was one of the very best numbers that I have ever had the privilege to hear.  It was entertaining, instructive and uplifting.

REV. V. M. PATTERSON, Burley, S. D.

The impression of J. Smith Damron, who was here Dec. 10th, seems to be very good indeed.  Words of highest praise come from many.  It was an entertainment full of the very thing that is needed in this land of ours to make life worth living.

J. S. ELKINS, Way Cross, Ga.

Damron surely delivered the goods and we were more than pleased with him.  His style of entertainment is surely to be commended.

SUPT. RAY A. BECK, Canistota, S. D.

Mr. Damron did fine.  He is a very pleasant man to meet courteous and obliging.  His heart is in his work.

REV. FATHER JACOBSMEIR, Riverside, Ia.

J. Smith Damron appeared here last evening, and we wish that we had more like him to offer to our people.  His lecture is excellent; his moral points well driven home, and his work with the potter's wheel is instructive and enjoyable.  The whole makes a very profitable evening.

CHARLES SMITH, Clarence, Iowa.

Damron has been the hit of the season so far.  He held his audience better and gave more general satisfaction than even the Band.

SUPT. J. A. ROBERTS, Beresford, S. D.



A FEW PRESS COMMENTS

DAMRON MAKES POTTERY—No entertainment of the course was more entertaining to all ages and conditions than that of Smith Damron in his unique lecture, The Potter and the Clay.  He wrought several pieces of clayware while speaking.  His lecture was full of the brightest and best thought and was all too short.—
The Champaign, Ill., Daily News


Mr. Damron's lecture was one of the most unique ever delivered in Duluth and was very well received.—
Duluth, Minn., News-Tribune.


THE POTTER AND THE CLAY—Smith Damron, the potter, gave his lecture, The Potter and the Clay, at the Y. M. C. A., yesterday afternoon.  Mr. Damron's lecture was interesting and instructive and one of the most unique given at the association for some time.—
The Register and Leader, Des Moines, Ia.


Mr. J. Smith Damron gave one of the most unique and interesting addresses at the Opera House yesterday that was ever heard in this city.—
The Evening Democrat, Kankakee, Ill.



FROM Y. M. C. A. SECRETARIES
Milwaukee Young Men's Christian Assn. December 12, 1917.

Dear Mr. Damron:—Our men thoroughly enjoyed your lecture The Potter and the Clay last Sunday.

You have a unique way of illustrating life's lessons, as you mould your clay before the audience, that will not be soon forgotten.

We are looking forward to having you with us again next year.

Sincerely yours,
R. L. CUSHING, Religious Work Secretary.

Y. M. C. A., Indianapolis, Ind. Nov. 20, 1917

It gives me pleasure to state that J. Smith Damron has delivered his lecture, The Potter and The Clay before two of our Big Meetings and the impression was very favorable.  His story is most interesting and very helpful to men.

A. H. GODDARD, General Secretary.

Detroit Y. M. C. A. November 26, 1917 Smith Damron, the Master Potter, here again Sunday and as good as ever.  He has a unique address which with his Potter's Turning Wheel never fails to make its appeal to men and get results.

Very truly yours,
WELLINGTON M. LOGAN, Executive Secy.





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J. SMITH DAMRON, THE POTTER CRAFTSMAN
Presenting his demonstrated art lecture on character building called



THE POTTER AND THE CLAY
Mr. Damron is a practical potter, having worked at the trade for years; he is an expert with his potters' wheel and in full view of his audience he makes several vessels of clay on an old fashioned potters' turning wheel.



The Work He Does is Most Fascinating and Instructive
This may be your last opportunity to witness an exhibition of this wonderful art, the oldest handcraft known to man, which is fast becoming a lost art in America.

He describes the preparation of the clay, glazing, decorating and burning, giving a brief history of the art of the potter.



Presenting a Remarkable Display of American Art Pottery and China Ware
As he gives much valuable information regarding the manufacture of the same.



He Is Not Only a Moulder of Clay, But a Moulder of Character
The splendid lessons on character building found in this lecture cannot be surpassed.  He is also an Entertainer of the Choicest Type, presenting much wit, humor and philosophy.

He Quotes Many Real Gems of Literature
demonstrating the authors' thoughts through the evolution of a piece of clay.

Here is a lecture with actual demonstration, a discourse with tangible illustrations, an entertainment with happy action.  It is all of these forcible public vehicles of instruction with more forcible emphases.



THE FEDERATED LYCEUM BUREAUS
EVERYWHERE EAST OF THE ROCKIES


SCORER LYCEUM BUREAU, John G. Scoret, Mgr.,
Philadelphia, La.


EDWARDS LYCEUM CIRCUH, Thos. L. Edwards, Mgr.,
Grand Cane, La.


CO-OPERATIVE LYCEUM BUREAU, A. D. Ferrer, Mgr.,
Springfield, Mass.


JAMES-CURTIS LYCEUM EXCHANGE, Elliott James, Mgr.,
Paducah, Ky.


UNITED LYCEUM BUREAU, Robert F. Ferrante, Mgr.,
Columbus, Ohio


PIEDMONT LYCEUM ASSOCIATION, Solon H. Bryen, Mgr.,
Charlotte, N. C.


DENNIS LYCEUM BUREAU, Lcroy Denais, Mgr.,
Webash, Indiana


WESTERN ENTERTAINMENT BUREAU, W. I. Atkinson, Mgr.,
Waterloo, Iowa