“It looks to me absurd on the face of it,” continued the young editor, “because you see it gives two ‘agents of book companies,’ and that is preposterous. No agent of a book company could be a delegate to the N. E. A.”
“I will look into that,” I promised; and we chatted for a while about other aspects of the class struggle in education. Mr. Morgan gave me a file of his publication for the past year, in order that I might see what excellent material they were using; then I took my departure, and sought out Miss Harden and her bunch of “Bolsheviks,” who had come on to attend this Oakland convention. We had dinner in a little “dago” restaurant, and I told them of Mr. Morgan’s objection, and it would have done you good to hear Miss Harden laugh. “Why,” she said, “that tabulation was made from the official list in his own paper, the Journal of the N. E. A.; and Mr. Morgan was managing editor at the time the list was published! When I get back to Chicago I’ll send you a copy of that issue; they listed all the delegates at the Des Moines convention, giving the occupation of each, and all I had to do was to go through the list and check the number of superintendents, the number of principals, and so on. We made the tabulation and published it, and it’s interesting to notice that next year the list of delegates as published in the Journal no longer states the occupations of the delegates, but merely the organizations they represent. You may take it from me, it will be many a long year before the Journal again makes the blunder of revealing the make-up of one of its annual conventions!”
“What about the matter of the book company agent?” I asked; and Miss Harden and her “Bolshevik” friends laughed more merrily than ever.
“Why, one of those two agents is Major Clancy, and Mr. Morgan knows him as well as he knows anybody at the convention. He’s here at Oakland—one of the first sights that is pointed out to a new delegate. He’s a kind of unofficial host to all of us.”
“But is he here as a book company agent?” I asked, in bewilderment.
“Why, of course,” said the teachers; and Miss Ethel Gardner explained that he had got up some kind of club or association of the agents in his locality, and got himself named as their representative.
In case you should find all this as incredible as I found it, let me add that Miss Harden faithfully carried out her promise; when she got back to Chicago she sent me two issues of the “Journal of the National Education Association.” The first is the issue for December, 1921, and I note the name of Joy Elmer Morgan, managing editor. Beginning at page 199, and continuing to page 205, I find a list headed, “The First Representative Assembly; delegates who attended the 59th annual meeting of the National Educational Association in Des Moines, July 5-8, 1921.” There I find the delegates by state, with the occupation of each one given; on page 203 I find “Robertson, W. W., agent for Charles E. Merrill Co., 19 West Main St., Oklahoma City.” And on page 202 the name “Clancy, Major A. W., 502 Globe Building, Minneapolis.”
The second issue of the Journal is that for September, 1922, and again I find Joy Elmer Morgan, managing editor. From pages 291 to 298 I find the list of the second representative assembly, with the occupations of the delegates not given. On page 295 I find as follows: “Clancy, A. W., Bookmen’s Department of Minnesota, 2516 Humboldt Avenue, South, Minneapolis.” And then, as I complete this manuscript, the Journal of October, 1923, appears, and gives the list for the third representative assembly, at Oakland, California—and again the occupations are not given, and again Major Clancy is given!
Yes, you may count upon Major Clancy to attend all N. E. A. conventions! Turn back to our Minneapolis chapters, and read about this one-armed old veteran of the threshing machine. And come to Oakland, and see him in the luxurious parlors of the Oakland Hotel; come to San Francisco and see him in the parlors of the Fairmont. He is the lord of motor cars and of boat-rides; never does he sit down at table except it is crowded with guests. The editor of the “Journal of Education”—not the official N. E. A. Journal, but an independent weekly, published in Boston—portrays this aspect of the Salt Lake convention of 1920 in a playful paragraph. Says the witty editor Winship: “No one in the association at summer and winter meetings, has in fifty years had as many men and women to as many feasts as has Major Clancy.”
Perhaps all this hospitality is poured out from the Major’s own generous heart; perhaps again, it is his employers, the book companies, who fill the cornucopia. However it may be, the major is the idol of the schoolmarms; he chats with them jovially in the lobbies, and now and then you see him jump up and run across the floor—some superintendent has entered, and he must shake the hand of all superintendents. Presently you see him button-holing one of the great leaders of the gang, and there is a whispered conversation; it is by these little chats in lobbies that we get our business done—the gentlemen’s[gentlemen’s] agreements whereby votes and influence are traded for contracts involving your money and mine.