My own connection with the Young Men's Christian Association began in New York when I joined the association there in the second year of its existence, 1854.

We met in a room in Stuyvesant Institute and the heroic Howard Crosby was our president.

We had no library, or reading room, or gymnasium, or any of the appliances that belong to the institutions of these days.

After several migrations, our association found its permanent home in the spacious building on Twenty-third Street, to which Morris K.Jesup and William E.Dodge were among the foremost contributors.

The master spirit in the operations of the New York Association for thirty years was Mr.Robert McBurney, who, when he landed from Ireland, was only seventeen years of age.