Christian Foundations

CHRISTIAN FOUNDATIONS
Something was going on as I was growing up on the homestead of which I was not even aware. Our parents, especially our mother, were laying a foundation of Christian principles which would serve as a sort of bed-rock for our later lives. But being by nature rather shallow and unthinking, I was quite unaware of the process.
Mom had been very active in the Methodist Church as a girl in Wisconsin. When she and Dad were married, and came out to the wild west, settling on the homestead a minimum of fifteen miles from the nearest Methodist Church, it must have seemed to her that she was terribly alone and isolated from Christian things. But as I have indicated before, Mom was an organizer, and the communitywas not without some church influence for long.
There were, of course, other people in the area who were interested in Christian values. Mrs. Roy Richter, whom we knew affectionately as Aunt Addie, was a fervent member of the Reformed Church of Latter Day Saints--a split-off group from the Mormon Church. South of the Richters, at that time, lived old Mrs. Ellsworth, who was an enthusiastic member of the Mormon Church. I can remember that she was one of the few women in the neighborhood who had time to visit much. She used to come to our place to visit with our mother. On one such visit, she had brought the Book of Mormon, and persuaded Mom to read it. She promised that if Mom read that book with an open mind, she would be persuaded that it was true. Mom tried it, she told us, but it didn't work for her, and she stuck with her trust in the Bible alone.
I'm glad to say that didn't break her friendship with Mrs. Ellsworth. I had mixed feelings even then, as a very small boy, about the Ellsworths. Once Mrs. Ellsworth brought a boy with her, probably a grandson, whose name was Jack John Ellsworth, or at least that was what she called him. (Once or twice when I was small some of the neighbors tried to call me by that name,"Jack John," which I hated fiercely!) Jack John was two or three years older than I. On one visit, when he had been brought along, he talked me into trying to lick the frost off the rim of our wagon wheel. It was a very cold morning, and I decided to try it. Of course, my tongue immediately was frozen to the steel rim. I sent out what you might call an alarm call (!), and it wasn't long before Mom came out with some warm water and rescued me. But I lost a lot of skin off my tongue, and couldn't taste things well for some time.That did not endear Jack John to me.
I think it was on that same day that Jack John and I were playing around at the back of the house, where Dad stored the drum of kerosene which we used for the lamps, lantern, the kerosene cooking stove (in summer), and so on. There was a little tin cup there, with a pouring spout, which we used for filling the lamps. Jack John had the nerve to partly fill that cup and take a swallow of kerosene! (He may have been just pretending.) That did it! I ran in to tattle, not concerned about the possible difficulty he might be in, but to get him in trouble for stealing some of our kerosene! I really don't remember that he was even sick from that, but I was disappointed that no drastic action was taken to punish him. Like I say, we weren't the best of friends then or later.
Sometime in those years before I was old enough to even remember anything, a missionary from the American Sunday School Union started a Sunday School at the Richter School. His name was Reverend Lewis. The main thing I do remember about him was that he drove one of the first cars in our neighborhood--a Model T Ford touring car, with a black canvas top. I can still recall seeing that Ford parked out in front of our house. He didn't bother to drive it up into our front yard, but stopped out across the lane in front of the house. He was a tall, rather gangly man, and in my memory was always dressed in black. More than that I can't remember, but I know that my folks thought very highly of him, and were happy whenever he came to Sunday School or to our house for a visit.
Also during those early years, occasionally a minister would come out from Glasgow to conduct a worship service at Richter School. One of these visiting preachers was a Reverend Pippy (I'm not sure of that spelling), from the Methodist Church in Glasgow. Mom made arrangements with him that he would come to our house to baptize us kids! We had nothing to say about it! On the appointed day he came, and the baptismal service proceeded. I'm not certain, but I think my brother, Robert, and sister, Jean, accepted the sacrament (sprinkling, of course) without protest. But I was having none of it! When my turn was coming, I crawled under our big semi-grand piano, and wound my arms around one of the big carved back legs. They had to drag me out by "main strength and awkwardness," as the old saying goes. Despite my strong objections, both verbal and physical, I was baptized then and there. I know my mother meant well, but it just didn't appeal to me! And I don't think it "took."
Also during those years Mom followed her practice of reading to us when we went to bed at night. Instead of reading Mother Goose or similar stuff, she read to us from Hurlbut's Stories of the Bible. One story a night, no more, no less. When she had read all through the book, she would ask us what we wanted her to read next. We always asked for the Bible stories, and so heard them over and over again. Although they weren't direct quotes from the Bible, we all remembered the stories, and understood most of the relationships of the heroes and heroines of the Bible. Years later, when I came to know Jesus as my Savior and Lord, that basic knowledge of the Bible stories helped me a great deal to quickly become acquainted with the Bible itself. When I was old enough to understand a bit more, I really enjoyed and looked forward to Sunday School and church services at Richter School. Another Methodist minister used to come out several times during the summer months, when the roads were open. His name was Will LeDrew Bennett. He had become a minister sometime in middle life. He had been born and reared in Nova Scotia, or in that area of Canada, and had been a sailor on the open seas. He could tell such stories of storms and waves, I could literally see them. One story he told was of a time when in a terrible storm his sister had been swept overboard, but was rescued by someone catching her by her long hair just as she was sinking beneath the waves.
If the truth were known, though, my greatest fascination with Rev. Bennett was his English wife. She was a rather thin, tense looking woman, with large bulging eyes, probably due to some thyroid trouble. We kids thought that was funny, little beasts that we were. But what was funniest about Mrs. Bennett was her pronunciation of common words. Early on we discovered this odd pronunciation when she was singing the hymn "Oh Happy Day." She sang loud and clear "Oh hoppy die, oh hoppy die," and it would send us kids into fits of giggling. Thus when we were given a choice of songs to sing, if Mrs. Bennett was there, we kids chose "Oh Happy Day," every time.
The first Sunday School teacher that I can remember was John Betz, an old time rancher who lived about five miles south of our place. He and Mrs. Betz, and two youths, their son, Paul, and a nephew whose name I can't recall, would all come to Sunday School in good weather in their beautiful Whippet sedan car. It was by far the fanciest car in the whole area. Paul also owned, or at least drove, a Chevrolet "bug." A "bug" was a cut-down car, stripped of fenders and the normal running boards, etc., designed to look like the racing cars of that time in history. Needless to say, the owning of a bug became the dream of all of us boys.
Most of the rest of us drove teams to church; some came in buggies, pulled by one horse. The lane in front of the school house would be full, sometimes, of horses and wagons, and a few cars. This was in the late 1920's, when only a few folks could afford to have a car. Our family often walked to Sunday School, if the weather was good and the ground dry. When at last we acquired a Ford, we usually went to Sunday School and church in it.
I can remember one very special Sunday--it was April lst, my little sister Mary's birthday, and also Easter Sunday. Dad drove the team that day, fortunately. As we came over the hill down to John Goodmanson's, we saw that there was a prairie fire burning across the section of open prairie south-east of John Goodmanson's. It had started, we learned later, from the burning of an old straw stack on the Richter place, and had jumped the road and was running wild. By the time we got there and got into the business of fighting the fire, quite a few folks had arrived. All were dressed in their Sunday best, and, believe me, that is not the right dress for fighting prairie fire. Someone, I think it was the Roy Richter's, brought a wagon with a barrel of water and a bunch of burlap feed sacks. Most of us fought the fire with sacks dipped in the water. We got it out alright, but you should have seen the folks in Sunday School that morning! We were not fit for an Easter parade, for sure.
Another man who helped a good deal with that little Sunday School was Ben See, a farmer-rancher who lived about eight or ten miles away, down towards Hinsdale, and who drove up each Sunday. He was "Superintendent," I guess--he led the singing and all. He had a big Dodge touring car, and one time took all of us Cummings to their place for Sunday dinner. The weather was cold and windy, so he put up the top and side curtains. The latter were made of celluloid, or maybe something called eisenglass--a sort of flexible imitation glass, one of the forerunners of modern plastics. I remember that I was riding in the back seat, and it was very cold and drafty back there.
Mrs. See had fixed a fine dinner, and we got acquainted with their two children, Calvin and Marian, that day. I don't think Mr. See's children usually came to our Sunday School, for some reason. Mr. See was a fine man, and I wish now that I had known him better. Mrs. See was a nurse, and was a good neighbor, and a big help to the doctor in Hinsdale, Dr. Cockrell.
When my brother, Robert, was ready to start high school, Mr. See offered to have Robert stay with them, to do chores for his board and room, and go in to Hinsdale to school from their place, about five miles out of town. I think maybe Robert wasn't too enthusiastic about the chores part of the deal, but it gave him a chance to go on to high school. Also, he became what was surely one of the youngest school bus drivers in history. Mr. See let him drive that big Dodge car, taking the See kids, and the youngsters from a near-by farm, back and forth each day. So far as I know, he never had an accident of any kind.
Some time later, maybe the following summer, Marian See came to our house to stay while we all were having Vacation Bible School. She was a spoiled sissy type, we came to think. One evening she and my two sisters were riding our patient old work horse, Babe, and they happened to pass under the clothesline. They were riding bareback, and the line swept them all off onto the hard ground. Marian landed on top of the others, so really didn't have as bad a fall as did Jean and Mary, but I remember she bawled half the night, and wanted to go home. In later years she became a nurse and a fine worker, and a good friend.
Vacation Bible School was a treat to us every summer. My older sister, Jean, and I were able to memorize Scripture verses very easily, and in the two week's duration of the school, would learn and could recite as many as one hundred verses. Of course, from year to year we kept track of the good short ones--"Jesus wept," "pray without ceasing," and so on, and would only need to review those to be ready to recite again. We enjoyed competing with each other, to see who could recite the most verses. We learned a lot of the Bible in that way, but not really in any connected fashion.
Usually at the end of VBS, we would put on some sort of play or program to show off our accomplishments. I remember that one year we had that program at the Betz' ranch. I had some sort of role as a mighty warrior-- maybe I was David, I don't really know--and in the little play had to drink a cup of wine. Now no one in that community drank wine (though some might have indulged at times in moon-shine, if they could get it!) and the ladies were hard pressed to come up with a red liquid. I expected something good to drink, maybe strawberry pop, and when the time came tipped up the glass and gulped away. Do you know what it was? It was the juice drained from home canned beets! Terrible stuff! I was sorely hurt and offended, and didn't forget that for a long time, as you can see!
We had another activity at home, which helped to lay the foundation for my later life as a Christian. We three older children had to help not only with the outside chores, but also take our turn at helping with dishes. Often one of us would read to the other two as they did dishes. But sometimes we sang together. Our mother was an excellent musician, and must have had what they call "perfect pitch," as she could sing any harmony part without reference to printed music--she could simply "hear it," she would say. Anyway, she taught us to sing Christmas songs and other hymns, in parts, while we were doing dishes. Both Robert and I seemed to have a natural inclination to the bass harmony (I'm sure because it is the easiest), Jean sang the soprano, and Mother the alto.
Later, when our little sister Mary was big enough to sing with us, she, too, could sing any harmony; in fact, she possibly had even greater natural musical talent than Mom. She could hear a tune on a phonograph (or later on the radio) once, and sit down and immediately be able to play it on the piano, using both hands. I have met other persons who could do this, but no one who could do it so well and so quickly as Mary could. Singing those songs, memorizing the words and tunes, has helped me all through life.
One summer, I think maybe in 1929 or so, we had a new teacher for our Vacation Bible School, a tall young lady from somewhere in Minnesota. Our American Sunday School missionary then was the Reverend Blythe H. McLean. He was the one who arranged for teachers to come out to conduct Bible schools all over his territory. This year was special, though, because Rev. McLean seemed to come by every day or so, to help, see how things were going, and so on, at our school. What we kids didn't recognize was that this was a case of love, for at the end of that summer he and the new teacher were married! The McLeans were dear friends of our family for many years. A great many years later, when we moved to Spokane, in 1964, I found that Rev. McLean lived in Spokane, and was still active in the Lord's work. He retired soon after that, and lived for years in Couer d'Alene, Idaho. He was a fine man in every way.
I plan to come back to this subject in a later chapter, in stories of my life after we left the homestead. Now, my readers–has this yarn helped you remember something in your early life? Why not add a comment about that? I would really enjoy reading what you write! In a very real sense, bloggers like me live on comments! I’m fairly starved!