Give 5
Frank Laubach was a man on a mission. A God-loving man, after receiving his doctorate from Union Theological Seminary in 1915 he was assigned to the Phillipines. After working among Christian Phillipinos establishing churches and teaching, he found himself working with the Muslim Maranao tribe in the Southern part of this vast island chain. At first the tribe was suspicious of him so he lived among them, listened to them, and learned their language.
They seemed a sad people, and he learned that their sadness was, at least in part, due to the fact that when a loved one moved to another village there was no way to keep in touch: they had no written language. Dr. Laubach’s mission became to devise a written language for them, training his staff to become reading teachers. Then, the Great Depression struck and his funding dried up. He did not think he was going to be able to keep the program going. He called a meeting to tell all the bad news. His journal entry from that day reads as follows:
“Kaka Dagalangit, a tall chieftan with fierce black eyes, stood up. He has 13 wives and all he has to do is look at them and they behave. He looked at me with those fierce eyes and said, ‘This campaign shall not stop. It’s our only hope. Then he looked at those teachers with his fierce eyes and said, ‘I’ll make everybody who knows how to read teach somebody else, or I’ll kill him.’
Everybody taught. Nobody died. Everybody liked it.
I did not like the motto ‘teach or die’ and so changed it to ‘Each One Teach One.’”
Frank Laubach, Journal
And so Frank Laubach began a great literacy mission to teach people throughout the world how to read and write their own language. He established a global literacy association
Dr. Laubach’s mission came to South Carolina in the late 60s as Frank addressed adult literacy in the Greenville-Spartanburg area with his unique method.
Fortunately, some churched ladies from West Columbia attended those meetings and brought adult literacy to Columbia, South Carolina, where they founded the Greater Columbia Literacy Council in 1968.
In the 1980s, Dr. Laubach, the “Apostle of Literacy”, was celebrated by the US Government with his image on a US stamp.
Over a half century since our founding, our council, now called Turning Pages, continues to nurture Frank Laubach’s vision and compassionate spirit in all we do.