f many a rural community have been surprised at the musical
works they have been able to produce under competent leadership.

The amount of music in a community and the public interest in its
musical entertainments are among the most significant indices of its
general culture and progressiveness. Where there is music there is life.

_The Fire Company._--One of the "most ancient and honorable" of the
organizations of the village is the volunteer fire company. The fire
company makes an appeal to the spirit of adventure and heroism common to
all red-blooded young men and furnishes something of Professor William
James' "moral equivalent of war." Its drills, exhibits and competitions
develop the finest type of team work among its members, while its
parties, festivals and entertainments for raising money are always
occasions of note in the social calendar of the community. In the older
parts of the country the firemen very frequently have a building with
clubrooms on the second floor, which form a rendezvous for its members.
Not infrequently many of the nearby farm boys belong to the fire company
and pay their dues for its support so that they may enjoy its social
advantages, although they may rarely have opportunity to do much actual
fire-fighting. In several cases community houses have been built with
one corner of the first floor constructed to house the fire equipment.
In one village I found that the fire company had taken over an old hall,
where it had clubrooms and was holding moving picture entertainments
every Saturday evening to finance the building.

_The Women's Christian Temperance Union_ is by all odds the strongest
non-sectarian organization of women in the rural communities of the
United States. In the past it has been chiefly a reform organization and
its persistent agitation was a large factor in the enactment of the
Eighteenth Amendment to the federal constitution making prohibition
national. Although prohibition is, as yet, by no means achieved, and
there is still need of upholding and encouraging those charged with its
enforcement, yet the primary purpose of the organization seems to be
largely realized. In the past it has been chiefly a militant
organization, although it has taken an active interest in problems of
child welfare, education, recreation, social hygiene, and similar topics
affecting home life. Its public speaking contests, picnics, suppers, and
sociables have done much for the social life of