New World Society in Action

[jwhess]

This week we would have had a brief video review of the 1953-1954 Video recording (movie film) of our world-wide work and the 1953 International Assembly in New York.

The original part was "black & white" film but the last half was done in color.  Br. Lyman Swingle narrates the review and it is about 10 minutes long.  That review is well worth the time to watch.

 

The original video was about 1 hour and 20 minutes long and was rereleased in 1995.  If you have never watched it, it is monumental in our effort to show ordinary publishers around the work how massive and organized our work is.  In this rerelease, some publishers are interviewed.  One of these was a 50 year-old David Splane.  I clipped his picture from the interview.

 

Did anyone see this film in its original release in 1954 or shortly thereafter?  Or perhaps the rerelease in 1995?

 

 

[Old]

I saw it on it's first release. Contained a brief glimps of my grandmother playing the  organ for WBBR. The first take she played a kingdom song. They said they needed more animation so what you see is her playing the Basin Street Blues.

[Thesauron]

This is the full film. https://www.jw.org/finder?srcid=share&wtlocale=E&lank=pub-ivsy_x_VIDEO

[jwhess]

Many of the millions of witnesses today never experienced the "tent cities" or cafeteria lines with food trays.  There are millions of witnesses who never had a chance to volunteer for the Convention (Assembly) setup or "behind-the-scenes" operations.  There are reasons we do it the way we do now, but there are memories of young ones (myself included) who treasured those moments when we could sacrifice our strength in service to Jehovah, even though we were youths.

[Dustparticle]

Marley Cole wrote a book on this in 1956. It was a lot of pushing to get the movie out. And it was a lot of pushing to get the book out too. 
 

Lyman Swingle was an awesome brother. He was a tough one too. I told him that I saw an older picture of him with his thick eyebrows and he look like a mobster. He just stand there and laugh. He told me Rutherford was not the only one was tough. Others was too. I know Swingle was one of them. 
 

I ask Swingle how to get old publications. I told with a smile on his face just ask the older ones, they be glad to give it to you. Believe me, it work with Jehovah’s help. Before this one old sister died in my congregation, I ask her for the older publications and news clippings. She gave it me. I believe it was from her mother and was pass down to her. 
 

When she died her daughter took over the house. If those older publications and clippings were around at that time, it would been toss out in the trash. WHEW!!!

[Doug]

3 hours ago, jwhess said:

Many of the millions of witnesses today never experienced the cafeteria lines with food trays.  

I did!  I did!  (He says excitingly)

 

During my time at Watchtower Farm, our convention was in Connecticut.  I remember on the way, we drove past a concert venue and on the marquis was Elvis Presley.

 

At the convention, in line with my cafeteria tray, standing right next to me in line was Bro. Knorr.   

[Tortuga]

3 hours ago, jwhess said:

cafeteria lines with food trays. 

... standing up while eating, waving your hand over your food while saying prayer...

[jwhess]

41 minutes ago, Doug said:

I did!  I did!  (He says excitingly)

At the convention, in line with my cafeteria tray, standing right next to me in line was Bro. Knorr.   

18 minutes ago, Tortuga said:

... standing up while eating, waving your hand over your food while saying prayer...

Many of the publishers in the last 40 years might not know why our break time for lunch at our conventions is so long.  It took hours to get 150,000 people out of the stadium, into the parking lot arear where we set up many (4-6) tents for serving food and even more for the brothers to eat it (yes, standing up at  long rows of homemade tables).  The tables were meant to be about waist high to an adult. But as a kid, I always had them up about my chin.  I usually could not clearly see what I was eating.  Many times there were a dozen lines of thousands of people filing in to pick up a metal "army-style" food tray and push it down the line as hundreds of brothers and sisters loaded it with wrapped silverware, spoonsful of various kinds of food, then added an open glass of punch and a dessert.  The progress was relentless for an hour or more.

 

Then we tried to get the whole family through the crowd to a tent and table while the parents carried two or more trays each.  When we were done, we loaded up the dirty trays, silverware and cups and took them back through the long lines to the cleaning station (more tents).  As I recall, the trayful breakfast was 35 cents and the lunch AND SUPPER (yes the sessions lasted until after 9pm) were 50 cents and Pioneers ate for free.

 

For those who never experienced it, here are a couple of clips from the video.

[Thomas Walker]

You laugh, but we could easily go back to that one day after the New World starts. Six days sitting on a hillside, while we get instructions, meals delivered as we go.

[Tortuga]

14 minutes ago, jwhess said:

metal "army-style" food tray

My father noticed how difficult it was to empty and stack the used trays so he took a push broom head and clamped it bristle side up at an angle to a trash barrel, so the brothers at the end of the line could quickly scrape the trays before stacking them.

[jwhess]

10 minutes ago, Tortuga said:

My father noticed how difficult it was to empty and stack the used trays so he took a push broom head and clamped it bristle side up at an angle to a trash barrel, so the brothers at the end of the line could quickly scrape the trays before stacking them.

When I was old enough to volunteer at the International Assembly in 1963, I was in the cleaning tent.  The brothers would bring their trays and garbage to us and set them on a row like we had to serve the food.   The first volunteer would remove the cups and glasses, the 2nd one would remove the silverware, the 3rd one would turn the try over a trash barrel (old metal 50-gallon oil drum), the 4th one would bang the the tray on the edge of another barrel, then the 5th one would dunk the tray in a barrel of very soapy water and use a stiff bristle brush to give it a quick scrub, then the 6th one would dunk it in another barrel of rinse water.

 

Then they would send it down to the end of the table (really "throw" it) and i and another brother would grab them and stack them in two piles.  A brother with a pickup truck would come by and take our stacks and go to a tent with a steam cleaning machine to sterilize them.  If you were going to eat, you had to be first in line because you would be needed at your assignment in just a few minutes.  We cleaned for a couple of hours every day (morning, noon and night) for 8 days...🙂

 

[Old]

1 hour ago, jwhess said:

Many of the publishers in the last 40 years might not know why our break time for lunch at our conventions is so long.  It took hours to get 150,000 people out of the stadium, into the parking lot arear where we set up many (4-6) tents for serving food and even more for the brothers to eat it (yes, standing up at  long rows of homemade tables).  The tables were meant to be about waist high to an adult. But as a kid, I always had them up about my chin.  I usually could not clearly see what I was eating.  Many times there were a dozen lines of thousands of people filing in to pick up a metal "army-style" food tray and push it down the line as hundreds of brothers and sisters loaded it with wrapped silverware, spoonsful of various kinds of food, then added an open glass of punch and a dessert.  The progress was relentless for an hour or more.

 

Then we tried to get the whole family through the crowd to a tent and table while the parents carried two or more trays each.  When we were done, we loaded up the dirty trays, silverware and cups and took them back through the long lines to the cleaning station (more tents).  As I recall, the trayful breakfast was 35 cents and the lunch AND SUPPER (yes the sessions lasted until after 9pm) were 50 cents and Pioneers ate for free.

 

For those who never experienced it, here are a couple of clips from the video.

Amen

[Old]

44 minutes ago, jwhess said:

When I was old enough to volunteer at the International Assembly in 1963, I was in the cleaning tent.  The brothers would bring their trays and garbage to us and set them on a row like we had to serve the food.   The first volunteer would remove the cups and glasses, the 2nd one would remove the silverware, the 3rd one would turn the try over a trash barrel (old metal 50-gallon oil drum), the 4th one would bang the the tray on the edge of another barrel, then the 5th one would dunk the tray in a barrel of very soapy water and use a stiff bristle brush to give it a quick scrub, then the 6th one would dunk it in another barrel of rinse water.

 

Then they would send it down to the end of the table (really "throw" it) and i and another brother would grab them and stack them in two piles.  A brother with a pickup truck would come by and take our stacks and go to a tent with a steam cleaning machine to sterilize them.  If you were going to eat, you had to be first in line because you would be needed at your assignment in just a few minutes.  We cleaned for a couple of hours every day (morning, noon and night) for 8 days...🙂

 

"Those were the days my friend...." 

Edited December 9, 2021 by Old

[Doug]

At the Circuit level, it was a similar arrangement.  We would buy our food tickets at our KH and use them for breakfast and lunch.  One difference:  They offered ethnic food options. You could choose between Mexican, Asian or American.  Kind of like today's food court at the mall.

 

At one of these Circuit Assemblies, Woodland Hills Assembly Hall, Michael Jackson paid a visit.  All I could see was the red shirt  .

 

Live orchestra too.

[Tortuga]

20 minutes ago, Doug said:

Woodland Hills Assembly Hall,

Is that the one that had the rotating center stage? It has quite a history.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valley_Music_Theater

Edited December 9, 2021 by Tortuga

[jwhess]

26 minutes ago, Doug said:

At the Circuit level, it was a similar arrangement.  We would buy our food tickets at our KH and use them for breakfast and lunch.  One difference:  They offered ethnic food options. You could choose between Mexican, Asian or American.  Kind of like today's food court at the mall.

 

At one of these Circuit Assemblies, Woodland Hills Assembly Hall, Michael Jackson paid a visit.  All I could see was the red shirt  .

 

Live orchestra too.

Our food "tickets" changed a lot over the years.  the ones for Circuit Assemblies sometimes differed from District Assemblies (now Regional conventions).  When we first started using box lunches instead of trays, my wife and I were sitting in some bleachers at a college ice-skating rink in New York state.  When lunch time came, we saw an older brother sitting a row or two above us.  He was staring at the tickets and looked confused.  We offered to go get him a lunch and he gave us his pad of tickets.  We had an announcement from the stage that the tickets were only good at the convention cafeteria.  Some publishers were trying to buy food at restaurants using our tickets.

 

Our Assembly Hall in Holt, Michigan eventually started using plastic tickets about an inch wide and 2 1/2 inches long and then reusing them as they were collected for food.

 

here are some samples from the 1970s.

[minister159]

19 hours ago, Dustparticle said:

Lyman Swingle was an awesome brother. He was a tough one too. I told him that I saw an older picture of him with his thick eyebrows and he look like a mobster. He just stand there and laugh. He told me Rutherford was not the only one was tough. Others was too. I know Swingle was one of them. 

Off topic, but since you mentioned it ... 

I was assigned a talk in the Bethel TMS on the subject of the great tribulation. I chose the theme: "Are you ready for the great tribulation?" The school counselor that evening was brother Swingle. He introduced me and announced my theme, and as I walked by him, he looked me right in the eye and asked out loud, "Are you?" Sometime later, I was assigned to offer the prayer over the evening meal and he was the chairman, so we sat next to each other and there was very little conversation during the meal while we ate. I had the distinct impression he didn't care too much for me!

 

On the other hand, I think he was a very loving and humble brother. He worked at the factory back in a small corner in the ink department for 25 years before he was invited to serve on the Governing Body. This is what a Watchtower article said about him, "Brother Swingle was a frank, warmhearted man who endeared himself to those who came to know him."

[Doug]

8 hours ago, Tortuga said:

Is that the one that had the rotating center stage? It has quite a history.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valley_Music_Theater

That's the one!  I was surprised that the Watchtower asked for the release of funds as recently as 2017 ?!?   There was talk of selling it all the way back to the mid-1980's.

 

There was speculation the brothers could have a west-coast distribution center built out in the Lancaster/Palmdale area with the proceeds from the sale.  It was thought of as a west-coast Bethel by some of the friends.  But that never happened.

[Tortuga]

5 minutes ago, Doug said:

It was thought of as a west-coast Bethel by some of the friends.  But that never happened.

In 2014 I heard they were looking for property in the Midwest for Central Bethel, but that didn't happen.

[rocket]

 

This $1.00 book of tickets would equal $5.14 in 2021 money.

https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1975?amount=10&endYear=2021

[jwhess]

We used to have to buy "Parking Tickets" or "Parking Passes" to get into the parking lots at the convention sites (usually sports stadiums).  Someone mentioned the live orchestras.  So I included a couple of photos of each.

 

The parking passes are dated but the orchestras are 1947 and 1953 (sister at the piano.

 

 

[jwhess]

Previously mentioned were the cafeteria eating tables.  They were long wooden home=made tables about 3 feet wide and stood about 4 foot high.  Everyone just found a spot and put their tray down and stood there to eat.  The tables often had the salt & pepper and napkins on the table.

 

I finally found one of the pictures.  Note how the young publishers had to eat "chest-high" and if you were smaller, you couldn't even see the food...🙂

[Tortuga]

When we were at Dodger Stadium in southern California I remember there was a variety of food available. There were separate lines for each one. If you wanted chicken, you had to wait in a long line. If you were in a hurry, then you had to wait in a short line and get something less popular..

 

Does anyone remember what entrees were available?

[Old]

 

At our DCs there was no varity in the menu until just before the end of cafeteria service. As I remember it the first  time we had a choice there was a meat loaf gravy and potatoes line, a Mexican line, a Chinese line and possibly a spagetti line.  The next year we switched over to well stocked food booths and printed tickets.

 

[Tortuga]

18 minutes ago, Old said:

 

As I remember it the first  time we had a choice there was a meat loaf gravy and potatoes line, a Mexican line, a Chinese line and possibly a spagetti line. 

 

I seem to remember the same choices at Dodger Stadium. Although I seem to remember there was chili available and it was the shortest line. Having chili at a crowded convention doesn't seem to be the best idea but at least it was an outdoor venue.