To put Christian principles into practice through programs that build healthy Spirit, Mind, and Body for all.
When George Williams and 11 other young clerks formed the first Young Men's Christian Association in London in June 1844, they began a world movement. But Williams and his friends were unaware of the significance of their act. On that day, meeting in a room in the dry good firm of Hitchcock and Rogers, where most of them worked and lived, they were concerned simply with helping young men like themselves find God.
London in the mid-nineteenth century was indeed a place to imperil souls. Tens of thousands of young men had migrated there from the countryside to find employment. They worked 12 or 14 hours each day and in dry goods firms; most lived crowded together in small rooms above the shops. For six days each week, most of them could only go from their beds to the counter, and from the counter to their beds. On the seventh day, some attended religious services. Most went to taverns or brothels, any place that was warm, cheerful and well lighted.
Williams and his friends had, in John Wesley's words, felt their souls strangely warmed by God. The dangers of vice troubled them, but their purpose in organizing was not negative. They wanted to extend God's grace to unconverted young men so they could feel the warmth and glow that is ours.
In the United States, Thomas Valentine Sullivan, a retired sea captain and lay missionary for the Baptist Church, also worried about the temptations facing young men in large cities. In October 1851, he read an account of the London association in the Boston Watchman and Reflector. He visited the London association and then returned to Boston to convene a meeting, on December 15, to discuss forming an association in that city. He and six others drafted a constitution that was reviewed at a second meeting a week later. On December 29, in the chapel of the Old South Church in Spring Lane, they approved the constitution and began their work to improve the spiritual and mental condition of young men.
June 18, 2008, the YMCAs in Volusia & Flagler counties completed the final steps to operate as the Volusia Flagler Family YMCA. Merger talks have been in the works for months, and the final contract for the merger was approved. The YMCA continues to provide programs to more than 43,000 members and program participants at eight YMCAs, one resident camp and numerous after school sites throughout Volusia and Flagler counties.