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Ferris, Norman Asprey (1902–1958) and Rubina May (Chatman) (1899–2003)

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Ferris, Norman Asprey (1902–1958) and Rubina May (Chatman) (1899–2003) Ferris, Norman Asprey (1902–1958) and Rubina May (Chatman) (1899–2003) SHIRLEY TARBURTON Shirley Tarburton, M.Litt. (Distinction) (University of New England, Armidale, New South Wales, Australia) retired in 2008 after 40 years teaching church- school (mainly high school but including eight years at university). An Australian, she has taught in four mission fields, Australia, and New Zealand. She has authored five books and co-authored one on church history, biography and family history, as well as several magazine articles. She is married to Dr. Michael Tarburton with two adult children and four grandchildren. Norman Ferris was a Seventh-day Adventist pastor and missionary who was awarded an M.B.E. (Member of the British Empire) by Queen Elizabeth II for his services to the people of the Solomon Islands and Pitcairn. Early Years Norman Asprey Ferris was born on November 20, 1902, in the small country town of Devenish in Victoria, Australia, to orchardist Arthur Houston Ferris (1869- 1 1961) and his wife, Jessie (nee Dunlop, 1879-1958). Norman and Rubina Ferris Norman was their eldest child, and was later joined by Photo courtesy of Ervin Ferris. two brothers, twins, Walter (1904-1985) and David (1904-1987), and three sisters, Esther (1906-1922), Muriel (Mrs. Peter Ferris, 1918-2006), and Edna (Mrs. Verner Heise, 1922-2006). Education and Marriage When he was nearly two years old, Norman’s parents became Seventh-day Adventists,2 and soon afterwards they left their orchard to become Adventist evangelists.3 After working in many Victorian rural towns, when Norman was eight years old, they went as Adventist missionaries to Norfolk Island, serving there for the next ten years.4 Most of Ferris’s schooling was provided by his parents. Not long after arriving on Norfolk Island, he became fascinated with the local sawmill where the church members were sawing boards from pine trees donated for the building of their new church.5 When he was old enough he was allowed to join his father at the sawpit using the huge crosscut saws to cut the boards.6 He became so skilled at this that he continued sawmilling until he left Norfolk Island in 1918 to work at the Warburton Sanitarium in order to earn money to attend college.7 After working at Warburton for three years, Ferris enrolled in the missionary course at the Australasian Missionary College (now Avondale College) in March 1921. However, in 1922, when he was part-way through his course, it was discontinued and he never completed a program.8 Despite this disappointment, in 1924 he was appointed tent master for an evangelistic series being run at Wagga Wagga, New South Wales (NSW),9 and then for another series at Cootamundra, NSW, run by E. G. Whittaker.10 When that series finished he was appointed to work in Blacktown (a western suburb of Sydney) over the summer months with J. Thompson, studying the Bible with people whose interest had been awakened by the camp meeting held in the area.11 This was followed by a tent evangelistic series that continued into 1925.12 During his college years, Ferris became acquainted with Rubina (Ruby) May Chatman who was also studying at Australasian Missionary College. Chatman graduated from the missionary course in 1921 and from the Business course in 1923. Before she commenced work as a secretary at the Sanitarium Wholesale Office in Sydney, Ferris took her to Lord Howe Island, where his family was now living, to meet his parents.13 All went well, and they were married in the Concord (Sydney) Seventh-day Adventist Church on October 3, 1925.14 Rubina Chatman Known as Ruby, Rubina May Chatman was the second child of Alfred Ernest Chatman (1869-1961) and his wife Catherine Kent (1874-1949), whose father, Thomas Robert Kent, became a Sabbath-keeper in 1895 and a Seventh- day Adventist in 1898.15 Ruby Chatman was born on November 8, 1899, in Eugowra, New South Wales.16 She had an older sister, Mary Ann Julia (Pennington, 1898-1977), and two younger brothers, Alfred Ernest, Jr. (1901-1998), and Leslie Albert (1905-1976). When Ruby Chatman was nearly two years old, her parents also became Seventh-day Adventists.17 The front room of the Chatman home was turned into a schoolroom, but by the time Ruby Chatman commenced her schooling, a schoolhouse had been built on a neighboring farm and she attended church school there.18 When she was eighteen, she was sent to Avondale to attend college and completed her studies four years later.19 Career At the time of his marriage, Ferris was on Pastor E. G. Whittaker’s evangelistic team, which was running a tent evangelistic series in the Sydney suburb of Ryde.20 In January 1926, the tent was transferred to Gladesville21 and a church was raised up as a result.22 At the Australasian Union Conference meetings held in September 1926, the Ferrises were asked to work in the Solomon Islands.23 In preparation, they joined six other prospective missionary couples in a series of classes at the Sydney Sanitarium in November, receiving instruction on nursing and tropical diseases.24 Early in 1927, while awaiting medical clearance before embarkation, they attended another series of lectures on tropical medicine at Sydney University, which they found very helpful.25 Ferris was also sent west of the Great Dividing Range to collect for the Appeal for Missions in Orange and Dubbo, New South Wales.26 On March 16, 1927, the Ferrises finally sailed for their new mission and in due course arrived at Batuna in the Marovo Lagoon, Solomon Islands, where the mission headquarters was located. While their house was being built, they shared the home of another missionary family. Their first task was to learn the language and this was facilitated by teaching in the school (through an interpreter) in the mornings, and by Ferris working in the school gardens with the boys in the afternoon.27 Due to the lack of medical facilities in the Solomons, Ruby Ferris returned to Sydney the following year to give birth to their first child. She was weak from malaria, but safely delivered a daughter, Norma Estelle.28 However, the baby developed heart problems. After spending several months in Sydney, Ruby Ferris left Norma with her sister, Mary, who was a nurse,29 and returned to the Solomons alone in October.30 Before the Ferrises could move into their new house at Batuna, they were relocated to Dovele on the island of Vella Lavella where they lived in a leaf house with an iron roof. 31 Ruby Ferris soon became pregnant again and arranged to go to the hospital at the Methodist mission several miles away. Here, Raymond Harrison was born.32 While they were still in the hospital a storm destroyed their house at Dovele. Consequently, they moved back to Batuna.33 As furlough approached in 1930, the mission president suggested that Ruby Ferris, now weak from malaria, take the baby back to Sydney to recover her health and spend some time with Norma. Norman Ferris would join his family a few months later.34 Feeling much better by April, Ruby Ferris and the two children sailed to Lord Howe Island to be reunited with Ferris when he arrived to visit his parents and meet his two-year-old daughter for the first time. The family returned to the Solomons in October 1930, not knowing where they would be located.35 After an eventful trip, during the latter part of which Ruby Ferris and the children were knocked overboard from their small inter-island ship when it struck a rock, the Ferrises finally arrived at Batuna only to learn they were to open a new mission station on Guadalcanal.36 An islander, Jugha, had been working there, but the interest aroused was now too great for him to cope alone.37 Ferris took the mission boat, Melanesia, loaded with some boards and roofing iron with which to construct a two- roomed shelter for them at Wanderer Bay on the south-western coast.38 It was a hostile environment. Mosquitoes were abundant and the villagers, adherents of the Anglican mission, wanted nothing to do with them. However, with kindness and loving medical care, the Ferrises eventually won their way into the people’s hearts. Many calls for medical help came to them and were often followed by a request for a teacher to be placed in the village.39 Although based on Guadalcanal, Norman Ferris travelled widely among the other islands of the group holding meetings, running clinics, planning the erection of new churches, and generally supporting the island missionaries in their work.40 The Ferrises were repeatedly beset by health problems, suffering bouts of malaria and struggling with other assaults on their health. In August 1931, Norman Ferris was struck with a severe case of renal colic.41 He was taken to the doctor at Tulagi who sent him to the Sydney Sanitarium on the steamer, Montoro, which, providentially, was leaving the next day.42 He returned, restored to health, six weeks later, much to the relief of his wife, who had been running the isolated mission station by herself.43 In mid-1932, a better location was found for the Guadalcanal mission, with room to build a school, so the Ferris family moved to Kopiu at the eastern end of the island.44 Here they lived for the next ten years. Their second son, Ervin Alfred, was born at the government hospital on Tulagi Island, the British administrative center for the Solomon Islands. 45 While awaiting this event, Ferris was invited by a chief, Mou, to come and teach his people.46 He sailed across to the Tasamati Coast of Guadalcanal, visible from Tulagi, but unentered by the Adventist mission.
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