A Moment In Time The Life of Ray Alf Outline for a Biography John Fraim & Don Lofgren John Fraim GreatHouse Stories 189 Keswick Drive New Albany, OH 43054 760-844-2595
[email protected] www.greathousestories.com © - 2014 By John Fraim “What will you do with your moment in time?” Raymond M. Alf 2 Chronological Outline 1870 William Robert “Sawney” Webb founds the Webb School in Bell Buckle Tennessee. 1887 Thompson Webb is born, the youngest of eight children. 1905 Raymond Alf is born in Canton, China on December 10th to missionary parents from Iowa. He would later provide his usual dramatic flourish to his birth date observing, “It happened just below the Tropic of Cancer, on the south bank of the Chiu Kiang ninety miles from the blending of its muddy contents with the clear blue waters of the South Pacific. There floated on the Chu Kiang, or Pearl River, countless house boats, sampans, junks, and many other kinds of boats in which lived a large part of the population of the metropolis of Canton, China.” It was the final years of the Qing Dynasty which had ruled China for 250 years and it was traditional to clear evil spirits away for the entrance of a new person into the world. As Ray recalls, “There were demons in the river, and to cope with the dangers posed by them, a dragon boat came to the rescue. It was manned by some thirty men with paddles. The long sleek canoe-like vessel, on the bow of which was carved a dragon’s head, shot through the water with incredible speed.