Our Periodical Work and Workers
By A. J. S. Bourdeau
ELDER M. C. ISRAEL, over seventy years of age, is still actively engaged in the sale of our ten-cent magazines and in other house-to-house work. The September number of Watson's Jeffersonian Magazine contains three illustrations taken from Life and Health, and mentions our magazine editorially in a very complimentary manner. A young sister in Idaho recently sold nineteen of our ten-cent magazines in the city of Boise, in twenty-five minutes. Her parents bitterly oppose the truth, but she writes: “I am doing all the missionary work I can at home, with good courage. How I love this beautiful message!” Brother D. K. Royer, secretary of the New Jersey Tract Society, writes that two young men, both from Elizabeth, N. J., have just finished earning their scholarships, and are now on their way to the Foreign Mission Seminary, Washington, D. C. In conclusion he says: “These brethren have sold over six thousand magazines, including the Signs of the Times Monthly and the Watchman.” Scores of others have also been successful in earning their scholarships through the sale of our ten-cent magazines. The physician in charge of one of our large sanitariums informs us that the nurses and helpers are planning to go out with large quantities of Life and Health and sell them in adjoining towns and cities. Incidentally they will mention the principles of the sanitarium in connection with their canvass, and leave in each home visited a neat booklet telling more about the institution and our health principles. This would be a wise plan for all of our sanitariums to follow, as it gives publicity to our principles in both a dignified and an effective manner. Try to get your newsdealer interested in one or two or more of our attractive ten-cent magazines. He can sell them if he will, and make a handsome profit of fifty per cent on his sales. By ordering twenty-five copies you can secure them at four cents each, and sell to him at five cents. If you can not interest him in any other way, subscribe through him for as many of our magazines as you would care to take, and call around once each month or (if it be Liberty or the Protestant Magazine) once a quarter, for your copy. In this way he will become well acquainted with the publication, and have it on display with his other magazines until you call for it. This plan works well, and at the same time accomplishes a double missionary work,—for the newsdealer, and for his buying public who see the magazines. Try it. One dear old sister up in Maine, over seventy years of age, has just finished selling one thousand copies of Life and Health. She writes: “I sold the last copy in the forenoon of the fourteenth. Sold them all in this city. I am now laid up with rheumatism, but hope it will not be long before I can send in another order.” She is, indeed, entitled to subscribe herself, “Yours in the work.” God often chooses the weakest instruments to accomplish his mighty work. Speaking of the work of selling our magazines, Mrs. S. N. Haskell, of the California Conference, writes: “It is the work for the cities, and will be more and more from now on.” She reports a sale of 2,587 ten-cent magazines during the small Santa Cruz camp-meeting, valued at $258.75, besides $104 worth of Bibles, $602.85 worth of subscription books, $94.50 worth of trade books, $117.50 worth of tracts and other literature, the total sale of literature amounting to $1,188.10. One reason for the heavy camp-meeting sales of literature in that conference is that the tract society department always maintains an attractive and well-equipped book tent. We predict a large sale for the beautiful October Capital and Labor number of the Signs of the Times Monthly. One sister who has just completed the sale of twenty-two hundred copies of this magazine in Sacramento, Cal., writes: “I sold one to the mayor, and he persuaded two other men standing near to buy also. He told them the paper would do them good. Have just gone through the capitol building the third time, and sold thirty copies, about half of the men being away on their vacations. Some of the men at the capitol seem quite interested, and have asked me questions. I sold one copy at the governor’s home, and quite a few at the court-house.” The very title of this magazine has become almost a household phrase throughout America. A rather curious coincidence is related by one of our ministers who was holding a missionary meeting in Nova Scotia. He had been telling the church about a family that had accepted the truth through reading pages of the Signs of the Times that had been pasted on the walls of their dwelling by the previous occupants. As soon as he had finished the story, a brother arose and said: “I too accepted the truth in a very similar manner,—through reading the pages of the Signs that had been pasted upon the walls of our milk-house.” What part are you taking in the special effort now being made to secure a large list of subscribers for the twenty-five special numbers of the Signs of the Times—the “Home Bible Study Series”? Have you not at least five or ten friends to whom you would like to have these twenty-five papers sent, week by week, for the small sum of sixty cents each? Order through your tract society. The writer recalls another incident almost exactly like the two just mentioned,—of a lone farmer living in the Soledad Mountains, in California, who read pages of the Signs that had been used as wallpaper by the previous occupants of his house. These papers had been left with the family by a brother who was leaving the neighborhood after an effort of six years to show them the truth. We little know what God can do through even one torn page of his truth.19 During the recent Christian Citizenship Institute held at Winona Lake, Ind. (August 9-20), one of the prominent speakers quoted at length from the Protestant Magazine, to substantiate statements made in his public address. Our magazines are truly wielding a large influence among thinking people everywhere. “Being eighty-one years of age,” writes a brother in the West, “I occupy not more than four hours a day in selling, and four or five days a week. My sales from January 1 to August 1, if maintained at the present rate, will amount to two thousand copies.” This aged ex-soldier of the Civil War sells the Signs of the Times Monthly and the Protestant Magazine. One dear old sister who attended the late General Conference and was a regular attendant at our daily meeting of the periodical workers, is now selling our magazines in the State of New York. She writes: “I am sixty-four years old, and although God gives me wonderful strength for my age, I can not do as much as if I were younger. But my heart is all in the message.” She says that she worked six and one-half hours, made twenty-nine calls, and sold fifteen magazines. On another occasion she worked four and one-half hours, and sold twelve copies. She recently raised a club of fourteen subscriptions for Liberty, and another for one hundred copies of the Signs of the Times. Her orders generally call for fifty copies of Life and Health at a time. Surely the Lord blesses such missionary efforts. We very much desire to publish in this department the many interesting stories and experiences connected with the summer’s work of our magazine agents. Did you succeed in earning a half-year’s or a year’s scholarship? If so, you met many people, answered many questions, had some new experiences, and enjoyed many rich blessings. We want you to pass these interesting stories, through these columns, to others, for their profit and encouragement. You do not know how to write, you say? Never mind! Just tell the simple story of your experiences, the discouraging ones along with the others. It may be that we can be of help to you. We can at least help you to be a help to others who shall read your interesting experiences. Please address your letter to A. J. S. Bourdeau, Takoma Park, Washington, D. C. We trust that all our periodical agents will consecrate their labors during the Harvest Ingathering campaign week (November 1-6) to the cause of foreign missions. The experience you have gained in selling our magazines fits you for most efficient service in soliciting gifts for our foreign missions as you give the people copies of the beautiful and instructive Harvest Ingathering number of the REVIEW AND HERALD. Order a liberal supply of the papers from your conference tract society secretary to-day, and plan to do aggressive work for the needy mission fields during campaign week and longer, if possible. Please be on hand, at the special preparation meeting to be held in your church, Sunday, October 31. Co-operate with your church officers in the assignment of territory, drilling on the printed canvass, and the giving of other needed instruction to the members to make them more efficient in the campaign work. During our recent camp-meeting at Santa Cruz, Cal., a brother testified that he had accepted present truth through reading Our Little Friend several years ago. This is a clean little weekly to place in the hands of your children, or your neighbor’s. Brother S. B. Horton, circulation manager of the Watchman magazine, reports an increase in the number of agents selling that excellent monthly. We have seldom seen a better-edited magazine than the Watchman, and judging from the October number, just received, it should prove an easy number to sell. Are there not scores of our people who could dispose of thousands of copies in the large cities of the Southland and elsewhere? Tuesday, September 7, Miss N. Rosella Smith sold two hundred fifty copies of one of our ten-cent magazines in one of the large cities of the Central States. She writes: “I earned my Union College scholarship in a short time, and have made a good start on a second one. With the exception of one day, my work has all been done in ——. My experiences have been many, and the Lord has blessed me wonderfully.” This breaks all previous records for one day’s sale, and we shall now gladly revise the first item on page 3 of our little leaflet entitled “How to Sell Our Magazines,” which reads as follows: “Largest sale in one single day, made by a tall, bashful girl in the city of San Jose, Cal. Copies sold, 230. Street sales. Worked some after supper. First week’s work. Day’s profit, $16.10.” The Minnesota REVIEW campaign is still on. Brother C. M. Everest, the missionary secretary of that conference, is actively engaged in an effort to place our church paper in every Sabbath-keeping family in the State. In a recent communication he states: “The campaign is going steadily forward. The missionary secretary of the Crow Wing church sent in five subscriptions a few days ago. He wrote that all resident members of the church are provided with the REVIEW except one sister, who reads the Swedish paper. This makes five churches in the State whose members are provided with the REVIEW. The elder from one church reports that he has secured subscriptions until all but two families are supplied. Another church has also been fully supplied, with the exception of two members, and they are to be arranged for soon. Thus far about seventy subscriptions have been taken for the REVIEW since July 1.” May this good work go on, and its influence spread to other conferences. A. J. S. B.