In Search of The Roots

Extract from the relevant pages from souvenir published in connection with the centenary celebrations of THRISSUR YMCA presented by H.G MAR APREM Metropolitan Church of East India

Most. Rev. Dr. Mar Aprem
The Trichur YMCA is celebrating its centenary this year (1986) and Mr. C.D. Paul, the (then) President of Trichur YMCA, was trying to trace its origin. To his great disappointment he was not able to collect any documentary evidence relating to the year of its founding in Trichur. He could not find any information as to the names of its founding fathers. The approximate date was set at 1889-87, on the basis of the information he was able to gather from the office of the National Council of YMCA's in New Delhi. Their information is based on a brief reference to the founding of the YMCA's in Trichur and Kunnamkulam by the CMS missionaries and elsewhere by the LMS missionaries from the Book "The YMCA in India-100 years of service with youth" by J.H. Dunderdale which gives factual information about the establishment of YMCA in Trichur in 1886.

"During this same period YMCAs were also organized at a number of points on the West Coast; Trichur (1886), Cochin (1887), Tellicherry (1887), Kottayam (1888) and Kunnamkulam (1888). It is more than likely that other YMCAs were organized in the towns and villages of Travancore and Cochin but their officers never took the trouble to tell others of their existence nor to preserve their records. From what little we know of the early days of YMCAs in India, it would seem that an association that wants to assure itself a place in posterity is well advises to affiliate with the National Council and to spend some money on printing an annual report".

"As a student of Church History this writer took it up as a challenge to trace the beginning of the YMCA in Trichur and Kunnamkulam. Since no documents exist in Trichur, my only hope was to search for it in the records of the Church Missionary Society's correspondence during the period 1886-1900. There was no need to look up the records of the London Missionary Society, as their work was in Trivandrum area. Trichur-Kunnamkulam area was served by the CMS and not the LMS. If it were Calicut, Palghat or Mangalore my research should have been in the records of the Basel Mission.

"To get at the records of the Church Missionary Society, one has to go to London to do research in the archives of the CMS headquarters. That was not any easy task. Then it came to my memory that my professor of Church History at the United Theological College, Bangalore, had visited the CMS headquarters in London and microfilmed on 30 December, 1964 extracts from the letters which the CMS missionaries had written to their headquarters. These microfilms had been preserved in the archives of the U.T. College in Bangalore and I had made use of it in 1965. Although more than two decades have elapsed, my memory was focused on the slides of the microfilm in the archives of the U.T. College where I had read about my hometown, Trichur ".