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Camp Northfield, East Northfield, Mass

(c) Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, Deerfield MA. All rights reserved.
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Dwight L. Moody (1837-1899) was a well-known evangelical preacher in the Social Gospel movement, a Christian, mostly Protestant crusade to save society and souls. Moody believed that providing educational opportunities to talented boys and girls, regardless of background or economic conditions, would help to make them better Christian citizens. Moody founded the Northfield Seminary for Young Ladies in 1879 in Northfield, Massachusetts, and the Mount Hermon school for boys in 1881. (The schools merged in 1971 to become Northfield-Mount Hermon.) Moody began hosting annual ten-day Bible study conferences on the Northfield campus in 1880. Those attending could pay $15 to board in one of the schools' dormitories. For $7.50, they could stay in a tent provided by the school. About 350 people attended the first conference. By the 1920s, more than 12,000 people attended the Northfield conferences. Attendance began to decline in the 1930s, and the campus eventually stopped hosting the conferences. This postcard of "Camp Northfield" was made during the 1904 conference.

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