The YMCA organisation and its physical education and sports activities in Europe during the First World War
Abstract
The following paper looks at the history of the YMCA in Europe at the time of the First World War. During the period in question, this international organisation spent a large amount of money on voluntary aid for soldiers and prisoners of war.
Of all National YMCA groups, most financial support for its activities came from the United States of America, where this organisation had also reached its peak in terms of physical education and sports development. Even before the United States of America had entered the First World War, American YMCA secretaries had been involved in European battlefields and prisoner of war camps, despite having first been rejected by local military leaders.
These functionaries offered soldiers and prisoners of war a number of ways to spend their free time, including physical education and sport. The American YMCA's efforts were to multiply after the United States of America had entered the war.
There followed the transfer of a huge amount of sports material and sports functionaries from the United States of America to Europe. After the war had ended, the YMCA in France initiated the Inter-Allied Games and subsequently attempted to spread its program into other countries around the world.