Apologies to Will Carleton

14 A. ROBERTS Boys flying planes retrieve their white-winged birds; you can't do that way when you're flying words.—Apologies to Will Carleton. LE:F9S TALIE E T CV III-11 IFQ IT was in the latter part of Ben- for the. funerals of William McKin- loyal service—death calls—a nation jamin Harrison's Administration ley and Warren G. Harding. mourns ! What a record ! And still —May 6, 1891, to be exact—that it holds nothing spectacular. He sim- there came to the White House in ply went his quiet, unassuming way Washington a young electrician just 911 HERE has been scarcely a dis- doing the next thing that came to his twenty years of age. He was sent by tinguished visitor at the White hand so efficiently that more and the Edison Company of New Jersey House for the past forty-two years more responsibilities were laid upon to install those then "newfangled" who has not taken away with him his shoulders. And, lo, one day he electric lights in the Executive Man- grateful memories of the dignified was indispensable to those he served ! sion. It took him about six months and gracious head usher who wel- Does the task you are doing today to wire the huge mansion properly comed them, made them feel at ease seem unimportant and humdrum ? and arrange things in working order. as guests, and then sped them on their Remember, as you follow the team, Then he returned to his employer. way with best wishes. or drive the tractor, or paint the But the next day an urgent message With his intimate knowledge of house, or fit the pipes in this plumbing recalled him to the White House. men and affairs, he might easily have job, or pound the nails in shingles or Electric devices were not then per- sold his memoirs for a huge sum, but siding, or make a dress, or cook a fected to the point we have them now, to quote his own words, he "valued meal, or clean a room, or run a lino- and the push buttons were out of friendships more than money." Never type, or a printing press, or a truck, order. This happened so frequently has he written a "behind the scene" or punch a typewriter, or mow a that finally President Harrison ar- tale or told an "inside story," even lawn, or sing a song, or write a story, ranged for the young electrician to though the chief actors in the drama or dig a ditch—yes, remember that become a regular employee at the were dead. He felt that it would not this humble task may be the very key White House as usher and operator be in keeping with his high office nor which will open the door to greater of the electric lights. true to the confidence that had been things, if you only fit it carefully in reposed in him. the lock and then turn it with a ready HIS was the beginning. In 1895, When news of Mr. Hoover's death hand and a smile ! Tfour years later, he was appointed came to the White House, President' For don't imagine for a minute head usher and steward. He held this Roosevelt telegraphed the sad word that President Harrison would ever important and highly diplomatic posi- to the Herbert Hoovers in California, have called back a young electrician tion until his recent and sudden death. to Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt, widow who had grouched around the White From the first he was an almost in- of the former President; to Mrs. House for six months, dawdled at his dispensable member of the First Fam- Thomas J. Preston, formerly Mrs. job, and tried to do just as little work ily, and his service under ten Presi- Grover Cleveland; to Mrs. Woodrow as possible each day. No, indeed! dents covered forty-two years. Wilson, Mrs. William Howard Taft, Irwin Hoover didn't do things that Administrations came and went— Mrs. Calvin Coolidge, and Mrs. Ben- way. Republican and Democratic alike— jamin Harrison, all of whom have but "Ike" Hoover stayed on at the lived at the Executive Mansion dur- White House. He was a model, not ing the major-domo's reign. IT will be worth more than a mil- only of style and courtesy, but of Former President Hoover pays him l- liondollars to you if you can get discretion. No man was more fa- this tribute: "Irwin (`Ike') Hoover the right, the wholesome, satisfying miliar with White House etiquette or served as the real steward of the viewpoint of the job you have right social demands. As chief usher it White House for nearly forty years now—today. The art of making lit- was part of his duties to attend all with a faithfulness to each succeed- tle things big, of making unimportant the functions at the Executive Man- ing Administration that won him a things important—that is what spelled sion, to supervise the machinery of unique devotion of every President. O-P-P-O-R-T-U-N-I-T-Y for a young entertainment down to the last de- His sincerity and loyalty has never electrician forty and more years ago, tails, and to arrange for all formal been exceeded by any government and kept right on spelling it in large state conferences. official." and larger letters to the end of his He made all the arrangements for Mrs. Roosevelt came speeding life. President Wilson's marriage to Mrs. home from a camping trip in the To you may not come the call to Edith Bolling Galt, and when Presi- Adirondack Mountains, and son stand before Presidents and kings dent Wilson went to Paris, Mr. James flew down from Boston, to join and ambassadors and the great of Hoover accompanied him. He knew the Chief Executive at the funeral earth ; but whoever you are and what- foreign diplomats and foreign ways service of this faithful, trusted, well- ever your task, yours is the high priv- in matters of etiquette and precedent beloved servant, while all official ilege of looking forward to the day so perfectly that he never made or Washington and statesmen and dip- when you will stand before the King permitted his superior's to make a lomats in many lands afar are sad- of the universe and hear Him speak false move. Also it was Mr. Hoover dened by the passing of this genial, these gracious words just to you: who made the arrangements for the gracious friend familiarly and affec- "Well done, thou good and faithful White House weddings of Alice tionately known in the circles of the servant: thou hast been faithful over Roosevelt to Nicholas Longworth, great as "Ike" Hoover. a few things, I will make thee ruler Eleanor Wilson to William Gibbs over many things: enter thou into the McAdoo, and Jessie Wilson to Fran- joy of thy Lord." cis Sayre. Two Presidents under N obscure, unknown boy—a whom he served died in office, and A workaday task efficiently and his was the sad duty of arranging faithfully done—forty-two years of VOL. 81, NO. 41 THE YOUTH'S INSTRUCTOR, OCTOBER 10, 1933 ONE YEAR, $1.75 Published by the Seventh-day Adventists. Printed every Tuesday by the Review and Herald Publishing Assn., at Takoma Park, Washington, D. C.. U. S. A. Entered as second-class matter, August 14, 1903, at the post office at Washington, D. C., under the Act of Congress of March 3, 1879. The Guiding Hand \ NCHURIA received its first How God Gave missions, the committee began to lay 11 visit by a Seventh-day Advent- plans for the work in Manchuria, and ist missionary when the writer Us a Hospital at last, after several years of wait- entered this great agricultural coun- ing, listed a call for a physician. Dr. try soon after the conclusion of the in Manchuria Martin Vinkel, and his wife, who is a Russo-Japanese War. It was in May, graduate nurse, responded to the call. 19o7, riding in a box car, using my He had served a year at the Portland luggage as a seat, that I went from (Oregon) Sanitarium. They devoted Tientsin to a town called Hsinmin, By their first year to language study, and twenty miles west of Mukden. Here, in the meantime the church in Man- after stopping overnight in a Chinese H. W. MILLER, M. D. churia went out Ingathering to get inn, I boarded the Japanese train for funds with which to begin a medical Mukden. The railway was an im- unit. These were supplemented by provised one, narrow gauge, and the some Sabbath school overflow funds. cars were the kind formerly drawn (formerly Changchun). Several What a blessing these overflow funds by mules in the States. The ceiling years later our first mission family have been! They have encouraged was so low that we had to sit cramped was sent there—Mr. and Mrs. Bern- many a needy enterprise in the mis- over. hard Petersen, who have labored sion field. From Mukden we rode a day and faithfully for nineteen consecutive With part of these funds, Dr. and a night to get to Changchun, the end years. Mrs. Vinkel, after settling at Chang- of the Japanese line, and transferred There are many interesting experi- chun, which then seemed the logical to a droshky, a Russian horse cart, ences that we might relate of the center for our hospital work in Man- in which we rode five miles to the progress and growth of our work in churia, fitted up a small dispensary.

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