May Titus’ Interests

 

Topic: CRS Version
Claire Lennon’s suggestion that she was the source for the CRS version of “Come by Here” [1] assumes May Titus had the ability and opportunity to teach it to others.  Unfortunately, any interest or aptitude Titus had in music or singing is hidden behind the Methodist church’s definition of the life well lived.

In the nineteenth century, Phoebe Palmer had argued one needed some religious experience to know one was saved, and that, after that experience, one was obliged to live a life of Holiness.  After denouncing her theology, the Methodist church hierarchy eliminated the first demand, and turned the second into a more rigid version of John Wesley’s list of “Do Nots.” [2]

Individuals existed in every congregation who scrutinized the behavior of others.  Families of clergymen and single women, especially school teachers, were most carefully monitored.  There was a reason preacher’s kids formed their own club at Syracuse University. [3]

During the two years Titus was attending Syracuse, her photograph did not appear with the women’s glee club. [4]  She later enrolled at the Hartford Seminary in Connecticut.  The registrar there could find no “mention of extracurricular or club activity” for her. [5]

When Titus was attending the Hartford Seminary in the fall of 1932, she took a class titled “Play, Recreation and Leisure Time Activities.”  At the time, church recreation leaders still were stressing games as alternatives to dancing, and it promised “a study of play, games, folk dances, and their leadership.”  Music was not mentioned. [6]

The Methodist hierarchy provided a positive program to complement the list of actions to foreswear, like swearing and dancing.  It subsumed Palmer’s work with the Five Points Mission [7] into the Social Gospel of Washington Gladden. [8]  Individuals, especially women, were expected to support social outreach programs.

Employment by the Women’s Division of Christian Service probably was inevitable since Titus bachelor’s degree was in religious education. [9]  Her supervisor on the Division’s committee for missionary education was a man.  Another man was responsible for adult programs, while she was responsible for activities for youth, and a woman was in charge of the children’s section. [10]

During the 1950s, songbooks were produced by the denomination’s Youth Department, but not by the one in the women’s division.  The post for 9 February 2020 mentions the work of Larry Eisenberg and Wallace Chappell.  Titus went to meetings with both on chartered buses, [11] so she probably was exposed to the songs then being taught to young people.

Titus maintained the persona of the good Methodist woman when she sent a Christmas letter in 1965 to her family and friends.  She was responding to a request from a friend the previous year who said she’d “like to hear about you and your work and your sister’s too.” [12]

She devoted two paragraphs to her job.  She then mentioned her roommate was teaching in a large, segregated, secondary school in Nashville where she was teaching remedial reading under a program sponsored by the Ford Foundation.  She mentioned her sister Julia’s job with the African-American Allen School, before closing “I want to echo what an oversea’s missionary wrote recently--‘my single wish for you all is the happiness of a life with a mission.’” [13]

It’s difficult, in these post-liberation years, to understand the range of possibilities implied by the words the woman “with whom I live in Nashville.” [14]  In those years, single women often roomed together as a shield against the gossip that could get them fired.  Titus was 56 years old in 1965.

Lucille Bovet was born in Schenectady, New York, in 1912, [15] three years after Titus.  Her father died in 1915, and was buried in the German Methodist section of the local cemetery. [16]  Lucille was living with her 61-year-old mother in 1940, [17] but the next year they moved to the small town where her brother was the school doctor. [18]  She had been hired to teach first grade. [19]

Lucille’s mother died in 1946, [20] the same year Titus moved to Nashville.  The two met when Titus was working for the Methodist church in Schenectady in the early 1940s, and Lucille moved to be her roommate. [21]  In 1955, Lucille was working with children with cerebral palsy. [22]

In her 1965 epistle, Titus said the she and Lucille had spent Thanksgiving with Julia and Josephine Litchfield in Asheville, North Carolina.  Julia’s housemate was raised in Bay City, Michigan, [23] and pledged Chi Omega when she was at the Methodist’s college in Albion. [24]

The year after she graduated, 1921, she was teaching English at the Allen School. [25]  She wasn’t on the faculty in the 1930s, [26] but was teaching junior high English, religious education, and piano in 1946. [27]  By 1953, the 64-year-old woman was librarian and closely associated with Julia. [28]

Music is one interest that draws strangers to one another, and, among family and friends, can be played or sung at get-togethers.  Lucille’s brother and sister were talented musicians, although a relative said Lucille only played the piano a little. [29]  Unfortunately, this is as close as I’ve gotten to Titus having enough of an affinity for music for Lennon to teach her a song.

The only personal information in May’s letter was the report that Julia and Jo owned a dog, Topsy. [30]  Lucille’s relative remembered Lucille and May used to housesit when her family went on vacation.  “May loved cats, so our’s got loving care when she was there.” [31]

By the 1970s, events overtook the Titus sisters.  May turned 65 in late 1974, and probably retired.  After a “ federal judge ordered the integration of public high schools in Asheville” in 1973, the church closed the Allen School in 1974. [32]  Julia moved to Brooks-Howell home for retired Methodist deaconesses the next year. [33]

Life in institutions is temporary, no longer how long it lasts.  Titus’ father, Homer, had responded to his peripatetic life by acquiring a summer home in Moriah township, New York, in the 1920s. [34]  Lucille’s relative told me, Lucille bought Julia’s interest in the house, and “she and May would spend time there in the summer.” [35]

The two sold their place in Nashville in 1995, [36] and moved to the Brooks-Howell Home.  Lucille died in 2002, [37] and May a year later. [38]  May, like Julia [39] and many of their ancestors, was buried in the South Moriah cemetery. [40]

In the post for 1 November 2020, I observed the discoverable facts about the backgrounds of Lennon and May Titus revealed differences that existed between Blacks in the South and whites in New England.  Ironically, Lennon was the one more willing to reveal things about herself to Lynn Rohrbough in 1956, albeit cautiously, after living some fifteen years in the security of the African-American community of Asheville.  The Methodist-reared Titus never felt free, even when writing to members of her family.

As result, no doubt exists that Lennon knew a version of “Come by Here” and that she taught it to Titus.  It isn’t known if that occurred before the summer of 1952, when Melvin Blake had to have heard the song in Nashville.  It seems more likely Lennon would remember something more recent in 1956.

Even if Titus learned the song early enough to be Blake’s source, the question remains: would she have taught it to others?

Even though the Lennon-Titus-Blake link remains hypothetical, the fact Lennon knew the song before 1915 is important.  The fact she taught it to a white also is important as an example of how an African-American religious song crossed the color line in the segregated South.

Graphics
May Titus, right, with her sister, Julia, and father, Homer.  Original in Mission Photograph Album.  Copy courtesy of The United Methodist Church’s General Commission on Archives and History.  My thanks to Frances Lyons of the archives at Drew University for helping me gain permission.

A photograph of May Titus in college appears on the Photos K tab.  This is dated “1950s.”  A later picture appears in the “Legends” article.

End Notes
1.  Claire Lennon is discussed in the posts from 14 October 2020 through 28 October 2020.

2.  This is discussed in the post for 9 February 2020.

3.  The post for 1 November 2020 mentions Titus joined the Preacher’s Kids Club when she was a student at Syracuse University.

4.  Onondagan.  Syracuse University yearbook, 1929.  Edited by William A. Swallow.  62.

Onondagan.  Syracuse University yearbook, 1930.  Edited by Edward C. Reifenstein Jr.  255.

5.  Registrar, Hartford Seminary.  Email.  22 August 2018.

6.  “May L. Titus.  Summary of her courses, 1931–1933.”  Hartford Seminary.  Compiled 10 November 1964.  Copy provided by the registrar.  I don’t know if the course was a requirement or an elective.  If it were an elective, it could have been a positive choice, or the least bad of the offerings.

7.  Palmer’s Five Points Mission is mentioned in the posts for 25 November 2017 and 14 July 2019.

8.  Wikipedia.  “Social Gospel” and “Washington Gladden.”
9.  Hartford Seminary, letter.

10.  Horace Williams was executive secretary for the department.  Edwin Tewksbury handled “Adult Work” and E. Mae Young was responsible for “Children’s Work.”  The makeup of the group didn’t vary under the Women’s Division. [41]

11.  See End Notes for post for 1 November 2020.

12.  May Titus.  Letter to Family and Friends.  Christmas 1965.  Typed, mimeographed.  Copy from one in the files of Hartford Seminary provided by the registrar.

13.  May Titus, letter.
14.  May Titus, letter.
15.  Extract from the 1940 Census posted on Roots Point website.
16.  Thomas Dunne.  "Warren P Bovet."  Find a Grave website.  23 June 2011.
17.  Extract from the 1940 Census posted on Ancestry website.

18.  Obituary for Donald W. Bovet.  “New York Obituary and Death Notice Archive.”  2076.  Posted by Gen Lookups website.  11 May 2017.

19.   “Faculty Members Named for 1941-42 At Marion School.”  Newark [New York] Courier-Gazette.  3 July 1941.  1.

20.  Thomas Dunne.  "Jessie E Pepper Bovet."  Find a Grave website.  23 June 2011.

21.  “Mrs. Homer F. Titus.”  Obituary.  The [Troy, New York] Times Record.  4 August 1958.  Posted by Stephen Payne to “Cora Powlesland Titus.”  Find a Grave website.  11 November 2012.

Jeanne Marie Bovet Beecher.  Letter.  2 November 2020.  Handwritten.

22.  Item.  International Council for Exceptional Children.  Bulletin.  1 October 1955.

23.  “History of the Class of 1916.  The Orient yearbook for Bay City, Michigan, Eastern High School.  Reprinted on Mi Family website.

24.  Alpha Chi Omega.  The Lyre 27:281:January 1924.  Litchfield was back in Michigan attending the homecoming game.

25.  Muriel Day.  “Message from a Veteran and a New Recruit.”  Women’s Home Missions 38:12:May 1921.

26.  “Allen Home and School.”  43 in Methodist Episcopal Church, The Women’s Home Missionary Society.  Annual Report for 1932–1933.  Cincinnati, Ohio: The Women’s Home Missionary Society.

27.  “Allen High School.”  67 in Look on the Fields, White Unto Harvest.  New York: The Methodist Church.  Woman’s Division of Christian Service of the Board of Missions and Church Extension.  Annual Report for 1945-1946.

28.  “Allen High School.”  54 in Where Your Treasure Is...  New York: The Methodist Church. Woman’s Division of Christian Service of the Board of Missions and Church Extension.  Annual Report for 1 June 1953 to 31 May 1954.  In 1953, a Durham newspaper reported Litchfield “has been granted a semester’s leave of absence in order that she might join the school’s principal, Miss Julia Titus in Southern Rhodesia, Africa.  Miss Titus has been in Africa since November of last year.” [42]

29.  Jeanne Beecher.  Letter.  17 September 2018.  Handwritten.  “Lucille & May I’m sure enjoyed music as all my family did.  I don’t know if they had any special skill on any special instrument.  I think Lucille could play the piano a bit but it was her sister [name] who had a special ability there.”  She then discusses the musical interests of Lucille’s brother before adding “I don’t know if Lucille or May sang in any groups such as a church choir??”

30.  May Titus, letter.
31.  Jeanne Beecher.  Letter.  18 October 2018.  Handwritten.

32.  Jackie R. Booker.  “Allen High School (Asheville, North Carolina): 1884–1974.”  Oxford University Press, Oxford African American Studies Center website.

33.  Julia P. Titus.  Obituary.  Asheville [North Carolina] Citizen-Times.  29 July 1990.  20.  Brooks-Howell is mentioned in the post for 25 October 2020.

34.  W. B. Osborne.  “Rev. Homer F. Titus.”  Prominent People of the Capital District.  Albany, New York: Fort Orange Recording Bureau, 1923.  165.

35.  Beecher, 18 October 2018.
36.  Item.  The [Nashville] Tennessean.  22 November 1995.  68.
37.  Beecher, 18 October 2018.
38.  Stephen Payne.  “May T Titus.”  Find a Grave website.  11 November 2012.
39.  Stephen Payne.  “Julia Pauline Titus.”  Find a Grave website.  11 November 2012.
40.  Payne, May Titus.

41.  “Section of Education and Cultivation.”  7 in The Fruits of Discipleship.  New York: The Methodist Church.  Woman’s Division of Christian Service of the Board of Missions.  Annual Report for 1954-1955.

42.  Item.  The [Durham, North Carolina] Carolina Times.  23 September 1953.  4.