Just like it happened in many other places in America (the Leggets and Mrs Bull on the East Coast, the Hale family in Chicago) the blessed privilege of playing a very special role in Swamiji’s work in California went to three women who were in attendance at this first lecture at Blanchard Hall on December 8th. They were the Mead sisters of Pasadena, a northern suburb of Los Angeles – Carrie (Mrs Wycoff), Alice (Mrs. Hansborough) and Ms Helen Mead. Of them, the middle sister – Alice – was with Swamiji almost like a shadow during the entire period of six months he was in California. Its quite possible that Swamiji’s stay and work in California would have not been on the same lines without Alice Hansborough and no story of his stay and work in the region can be told by not having this simple but highly dedicated lady as a key character.
Alice Hansborough, was then a young widow of 36, almost exactly Swamiji’s age then, had a 4 year old daughter Dorothy, and lived in her parental home with an elderly father, an elder widowed sister Carrie, the latter’s seventeen year old son Ralph, and a younger unmarried sister Helen. Alice was of small height and reticent by nature. The Meads were a family of modest means living in a rented cottage in Lincoln Park, in South Pasadena, about ten miles from what is now downtown Los Angeles. The circumstances under which Alice and the Mead family came in touch with the Vivekananda phenomenon were themselves very interesting.
She first learnt of Swamiji in 1897 at a lecture in San Francisco on a metaphysical theme by Mrs Annie Rix Militz, a prominent spiritual leader of the New Thought Movement on the West Coast and founder of the Metaphysical Bureau and ‘Homes of Truth”. There she first heard of the references to Swamiji’s already published book ‘Raja Yoga’. She was to go to Alaska soon after and when asked for a present for the voyage by friends she readily asked for ‘Raja Yoga’. The friends happily gave Swamiji’s ‘Karma Yoga’ too knowing both as parts of a set. The captain of the steamer was not a very seasoned campaigner and en route he lost the way finally reaching Alaska in four weeks, giving Mrs Hansborough ample time to read the books she had. In Alaska she re-read the books many times over. While reading she often wondered about the person in whose mind such exalting ideas had come and tried to picture what kind of a person he would be.
She returned to California on 23rd November 1899 knowing not that the person she had been marvelling upon would cross her path in just about two weeks from then.
Her memoirs – narrated some four decades later to Swami Ashokananda, Head of the Vedanta Society of North Calirornia, with remarkable recall – are one of the key sources of first-hand information we have about Swamiji’s sojourn on the American West Coast.
On December 8, 1899 her sister Helen came home from work in the evening and said, “Who do you think is going to speak in Los Angeles tonight? Swami Vivekananda.” And Alice later recounted in her memoirs : “All during the two years I had been reading his books in Alaska I had never expected to see him.”. They quickly had the dinner and went for the lecture at the Blanchart Hall.
At the lecture Alice got the same impression she had previously had of him; that he was a most impressive personality. When it was over, the sisters went up on the platform where a number of people had collected to speak to Swamiiji. She sought out Professor Baumgardt, the organizer of the lecture, and inquired when and where was Swamiiji going to lecture again. He asked her in return if she was interested in the Swami’s teachings. She told him that she had been studying his works for two years. Mr Baumgardt then introduced her to Miss MacLeod, who upon getting to know that she had been studying Swamiji’s works for quite some time, suggested her to call on the Swami at his place of residence. But it was only after his second lecture that they met him.
Swamiji’s second lecture was also organized by Dr Baumgardt and his forum, the Academy of Sciences, but the venue had been shifted to the Unity Church. This lecture, unlike the first one was kept free of charge. The subject was ‘Cosmos’ where he spoke about Indian view of cosmology. There were about one thousand people in attendance.
It was on the morning of December 13 that the Mead sisters – Alice and Helen – went to meet Swamiji as set up by Ms. MacLeod at Mrs Blodgett’s house. Alice’s recalled the details of that first meeting :
“He was dressed to receive us in the long, knee-length coat. He wore a kind of minister’s collar with what must have been a clerical vest; and his hair was covered by a black turban, which rolled back something like those the women wear here now. This was the dress he always wore on the street.”
Miss MacLeod, after greeting the sisters and introducing Swamiji to them, left, as she usually did when someone met Swamiji for the first time, so that they could have a free interaction. Swamiji expressed his gladness that they were interested in his lectures. When asked how long he expected to stay in Los Angeles, he replied that he did not know, but that if a class were to be set up, he would be glad to take that up. This gave the sisters a concrete action item to work on, the first of the many acts of service they would perform for the Vedanta work in California.
The sisters, enthused by the possibility of classes, eagerly went about getting a group of interested people for the class. And in this way a second stream of Vedanta propagation – in addition to the public lectures started. Classes, unlike public lectures, were part of a course, and were aimed at more focused students who would want to undergo a more systematic study.
The Los Angeles work expands
Around mid-December, a course of three classes on Applied Psychology was announced and notices and adverts of the same were also carried on by some local newspapers like Los Angeles Herald and Los Angeles Times. The three classes of this first course were on December 19, 21, and 22, for which each person paid a dollar for every class. The classes were charged for the main reason that one of the aims of Swamiji during the second visit to America was to raise funds for his Indian work. The finances of the fledgling Ramakrishna Mission were in dire state. Also was his financial requirement towards expenses of a lawsuit his mother and brothers were having with relatives who had denied them their rightful share of the common property. As a matter of fact, Vivekananda had always acutely felt the pain of the hardships and penury his mother had to bear ever since death of his father, and his own long years of inability even, while being the eldest son, to have done anything for her.
The first class of this series was held in the studio rooms of the Blanchard Building. Since the number of attendees was between 150 and 20ù, the venue was not found to be satisfactory. It was around then that one Mr. J Ransome Bransby, the Director of the ‘Home of truth’ at Georgia Street, offered his institution as an alternate venue. Accordingly, the next two classes in the course were conducted there. Swamiji followed this by giving six morning lectures at the same venue on successive days from 25th to 30th December.
On 23rd December, a reception was given to Swamiji at the house of a prominent social figure – Mrs Caroline Severance – a lady of considerable repute, also called the ‘Mother of Women’s Clubs’, as she had been the founder of a number of such clubs. Long years back, Mrs. Severance had founded the New England Women’s Club in Boston, and had officiated as its President till 1872. People like Ralph Waldo Emerson, Wendell Philips, and Bronson Alcott were frequent guests in her home. There is now a Severance Street in Los Angeles named after her. She was known to have socially progressive views and had a reputation of being a suffragist and pacifist. She had attended one of Swamiji’s lectures in Massachusetts even before he went on to become a celebrated figure at the Chicago Parliament of Religions.
At the reception given by Mrs. Severance, Swamiji probably spoke about plans for his Indian work. That Mrs. Severance was a highly celebrated figure in the town also became clear from the fact that this reception, even though a completely private affair, was reported by the Los Angeles Herald in the following words :
“The Swami is preparing to inaugurate a system of itinerant teaching whereby the people may be reached in the fields and at their work wherever it may be. His talk was highly interesting to the guests.”
The reference above is to his plans regarding promoting education among poor Indian masses.
It was on Christmas day that Swamiji gave his lecture, ‘Christ’s Message to the World’, at the ‘Home of Truth’. Josephine Macleod, in her reminiscences, refers to this particular lecture by telling a very interesting story which surely must make its way to the top Vivekananda legends, revealing how great spiritual power, child-like simplicity and innocent inquisitiveness were at once present in that extraordinary man. She writes, “Perhaps the most outstanding lecture I ever heard was his talk on “Jesus of Nazareth”, when he seemed to radiate a white light from head to foot, so lost was he in the wonder and power of Christ. I was so impressed with the obvious halo that I did not speak to him on the way back for fear of interrupting, as I thought, the great thoughts were still in his mind. Suddenly he said to me, “I know how it is done.” I said, “How what is done?” “How they make mulligatawny soup! They put a bay leaf in it,” he told me. That utter lack of self-consciousness, self-importance was perhaps one of his outstanding characteristics.”
Clearly, Vivekananda neither needed to warm up to raise his mind to a lofty level to hand over something sublime and concrete to his listeners through a lecture, nor did he need to unwind to bring his mind to a normal state to make a conversation or reflect on so-called ordinary matters of the world. He did not have to feel ‘spiritual’, he was ‘Spirituality’ itself, his first and only nature.
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