Conservative Values: Morality

Coinciding with perceived social crises, McGuffeyites wished to instill a 19th century Victorian morality into youth of the 20th century. At the 1934 memorial dedication at McGuffey's birthplace, several speakers addressed the issue of morality.

• Ralph Hutchinson, Superintendent of Lima schools, rhymed, "It would be well if America, now supercilious and clever and distraught, might return to those simple unchanged virtues which McGuffey taught." (1)
  
• William Cameron, Henry Ford's representative, said, "Honor, truthfulness, obedience, consideration of the weak, kindness, respect of conscience, a firm reliance on the right to justify itself always and everywhere - these were the tonic iron he distilled for the soul of young America. It gave us three generations of strong and moral citizenship in our most critical times." (2)
  
• At the same dedication, McGuffey's granddaughter, Katherine Stewart, said, "In those days a teacher was not afraid to point a moral, as well as to adorn a tale. We children were not left in doubt as to what was right or wrong... It is, I think, the definite religious teaching and the spirit of patriotism and love of country which as made the McGuffey Readers live, and has made them wield such a wide influence for good over one hundred years." (3)
  
• A primary motivator for Harvey Minnich's crusade to revitalize the McGuffey Readers was the morality they contained. At the 1934 memorial dedication Minnich said, "McGuffey never muddied the waters with sex stories; not even a Cinderella married a prince." (4)
  
• Speaking in 1937 of the possibility of reprinting the Readers for the public schools, the superintendent of Lima, Ohio schools wrote to Harvey Minnich: "My best advice was that if the book companies would publish a reader incorporating the moral principles and many of the stories in which these principles were taught, I thought it would be in harmony with the tremendous revolt against the attitude of the high-brow magazine, Hollywood, and many other forces toward the fundamental principles of the social order." (5)
  
• In eulogizing Harvey Minnich in 1952, Rev. Robert Thorias said, "One who was closely associated with him for many years says that Dean Minnich's interest in McGuffey grew out of his own sense of need to find ways and means by which the character-traits and more and social virtues of the McGuffey readers could be made meaningful in modern educational process." (6)