ABSTRACT
A fount of reliable amusement, religion was also an elemental conspiracy against human happiness, and Mencken's rude burlesque was part of the larger "modern revolt" against the dead hand of civilization. The modern insurgency, in turn, owed much to the "progress" already wrested from fate by Darwinian revelation and the storm of material achievement that had capped the nineteenth century. The first and only director of the Sage Foundation's industrial studies program, for more than fifty years van Kleeck operated seamlessly between the Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA) Industrial Work program and the Scientific Management movement, between Vida Scudder's quasi-ascetic sisterhood, the Companions of the Holy Cross, and the hidden-in-plain-sight subterfuge that was Communist fellow-travelling. Mary van Kleeck's commitment to living "the Christlife" meant engagement with these brothers and sisters, the sweated bookbinders, milliners, and artificial flower makers of New York City.
