Juvenile Temperance Manual

Juvenile Temperance Manual

The Juvenile Temperance Manual is a guidebook for adults seeking to provide temperance instruction for children in day schools, Sunday schools, and youth groups. In the introduction, Colman outlined methods and literature suitable for various age groups and educational settings. The rest of the manual is devoted to instructing teachers in the negative physical and social effects of alcohol and tobacco, as well as in the history of temperance work. In contrast to the editors of juvenile “reciters,” Colman criticized teachers who “spend the time in songs, recitations, addresses, and other ‘performances,’ some of which are related to Temperance topics and some are not.” She believed that youth groups and classes that resorted to such activities were doomed to fail, because an overemphasis on performance drew attention away from “Temperance teaching” and “soon cloys like cake and candy, and is at best admissible only as dessert, after a good, hearty, wholesome meal.” Ironically, the inside front cover of the manual contains an advertisement for the second volume of Lizzie Penney’s Readings and Recitations, which features selections in prose and verse for “Declamation, Recitation, and Public and Parlor Readings” that were “Adapted for the use of Schools, all Temperance Organizations, Lodges, Divisions, Reform Clubs, Bands of Hope, etc.”

As revealed by a note on the front cover, this copy of the Juvenile Temperance Manual was given to Anna Gordon, Frances Willard’s personal secretary and future president of the WCTU, who was especially involved in temperance work with children and young people.

Julia Colman

Julia Colman, Juvenile Temperance Manual (New York: National Temperance Society and Publication House, 1878).

National Temperance Society and Publication House

1878