The Story of Lillian Trasher

THE STORY OF LILLIAN TRASHER By Lucinda Yang “After I had been in Egypt a little over three months I thousands more would find themselves in the arms of was asked to visit a dying woman. She had a tiny babe “Mamma Lillian.” about three months old, and it was being fed from a tin bottle. The milk had become caked and green and Lillian Hunt Trasher was born in 1887 and grew up in stringy, yet the baby was trying to drink it. Soon the North Carolina and Georgia. Trasher was originally mother died and the baby was given to me. I took it raised Catholic but came to the Holiness-Pentecostal home. The child had never had a bath, and its clothes faith through the mentorship of Bible school and were sewed on its little body. You cannot imagine the orphanage founder Miss Mattie Perry. Miss Perry, a odors that came from it. The little thing would cry and vibrant independent Holiness evangelist and activist, cry, making it hard for the missionaries to rest at night. operated the Elhanan Orphanage in the mountains of They begged me to take her back, but I could not do Marion, North Carolina (Nancy Hardesty, “Mattie that. So I went out and rented a house for twelve dollars Elmina Perry,” South Carolina Encyclopedia). During her and a half per month, then spent my little all for a bit early adulthood Lillian served Miss Perry in the North of furniture; and thus February 10, 1911, marked the Carolina orphanage and learned skills of caretaking, opening of the Assiout Orphanage” (Lillian Trasher, compassion, administration, and budgeting. Soon, the The Pentecostal Evangel). beautiful, young Lillian Trasher was engaged to be married to a handsome and well-respected preacher, Tom Jordan. This great action of compassion and boldness belonged to missionary Lillian Trasher. She was often regarded as the Assemblies of God’s most esteemed missionary for her That starving and sickly baby, lifelong service to the children of Egypt by founding the whom the twenty-three-year-old Assiout Orphanage. She possessed an uncanny ability Lillian Trasher had taken from the to trust in God’s faithfulness and provision. Near the end of her adventurous life, at age seventy-four, Lillian hands of a dying mother, became Trasher founded and operated the largest orphanage in the first orphan under her care. Egypt of the twentieth century. That starving and sickly For the next fifty years, thousands baby, whom the twenty-three-year-old Lillian Trasher had taken from the hands of a dying mother, became more would find themselves in the the first orphan under her care. For the next fifty years, arms of “Mamma Lillian.” 8 MUTUALITY | Spring 2020 WEBSITE: cbeinternational.org However, though she loved Tom, Trasher painstakingly the orphanage operated on a threadbare budget making broke off the engagement because she had discerned a call the contributions of its members all the more critical. from God to become a foreign missionary. Though Lillian In the early days, the household tasks involved cooking, felt crushed to lay down one dream, the joy of obedience cleaning, mending, and building small pieces of furniture. to God gave her vision to complete a divine assignment unique to her own calling. Lillian Trasher operated by faith, praying each hour to God to meet the needs of God’s children. Many times After discerning the call to evangelize in Africa at the age she was desperate for support, and she often went door- of twenty-three, Trasher left for Alexandria, Egypt, on to-door on her donkey soliciting for donations of food or October 8, 1910, aboard the SS Berlin set to sail from New money from wealthy Egyptian locals. By asking boldly, York. Trasher stayed with a missionary couple, George both to God and to others, Trasher was able to uphold her and Lydia Brelsford of the Apostolic Faith Mission in two requirements: first, the orphanage should never go Assiout (also spelled Asyut), Egypt. Within months of her into debt; and second, no orphan should be turned away. arrival in Assiout, Lillian went to pray for the dying young mother, took in her first orphan, and the rest was history. Trasher was not without troubles. In 1933 an anti-foreigner By Lucinda Yang Later that year, Trasher adopted four more children from and anti-missionary campaign arose from Egyptian destitute situations. Each year after that, her orphanage nationalist groups which sought to break imperialist grew exponentially as locals heard of her compassion. control of Arabs. Lillian Trasher resolutely remained in Egypt despite the flight patterns of other American Lillian Trasher aimed to serve “the least of these” (Matt. missionaries who were in Assiout, Cairo, and Alexandria. 25:40). Her orphanage took in abandoned children with physical disabilities and illnesses as well as vulnerable widows. By doing so, she gained the respect of the local people and word of her openness spread quickly. Many of her orphans were born as illegitimate children in an Arab society, both Coptic and Muslim, that saw family lineage as crucial for future respectability. The American reporter Jerome Beatty interviewed Trasher for The American Magazine and found: Even the governor of Sudan heard of her and sent from far-off Khartoum a young mother and her illegitimate child, to save their lives. Both, as is the general custom, would have been poisoned or their throats cut by religious relatives, their bodies secretly burned, and, bowing to public opinion, the police would have asked no questions. Many such mothers seek haven with Miss Lillian. She has children of lepers, too, taken from their parents before they contract the disease. Lillian quickly made Egypt her home. She was determined to care for her orphans as a biological mother would for their own. The orphanage was staffed solely on a volunteer or freewill system, though children and widows within the grounds were expected to play their part in keeping the affairs and daily workings of the facility in order. As word spread of Trasher’s success, many from America came to volunteer their time and efforts by teaching, serving as chaplains, and filling odd jobs throughout the orphanage. Photos courtesy of Flower Pentecostal Heritage Center Due to the fluctuating and unreliable streams of funding, BOOKSTORE: cbebookstore.org MUTUALITY | ”What Holds Us Together: Hope that Spans Generations” 9 During years of political hardship, Trasher expanded some 1,141 children, though an estimated 6,000 children the capabilities of the orphanage and doubled down on had called it their home (Trasher, Personal Letters, and efforts to create a sustainable community, especially when Statement of Account, FPHC). the local Egyptian community wrestled with violence and instability from nationalist uprisings. While other The Assiout Orphanage was a home for the people of Westerners fled back to America and Europe, Trasher laid Egypt, and Trasher labored tirelessly to make sure that the her stakes in Egypt, and purchased more land adjacent institution was also managed by the people of Egypt. As it to her orphanage. This was a task she had wanted to was her custom, she instilled values and a sense of familial accomplish for years. Trasher had a vision for the new unity within the orphanage, so that her first generation of land. She intended to use the property for agriculture children became caretakers of the next generation. so that orphans would be fed from their own crops. The new addition of land complemented Trasher’s already A true mother and overseer, Trasher worked tirelessly to existing dairy farm and slaughtering pen, which was home provide financial stability, hope for the future, and spiritual to Jersey cattle purchased from the former American care to all in her orphanage. She administered a familial Presbyterian mission. model in day-to-day operations, causing the orphanage to eventually reach a population of a small village. Beginning By the end of World War II in 1945, the Assiout Orphanage her career as a single, simple, servant-hearted Pentecostal began installing running water into the buildings and girl, Trasher eventually gained the colloquial title of the celebrated the completion of a hospital wing, which “Nile Mother,” a name given to her by the thousands of allowed sick children to be housed separately. By the 1950s, orphans she raised in Assiout, Egypt. the “orphanage” expanded to include a total of sixteen buildings on nine acres—complete with dormitories, a hospital wing, a chapel, schools, nurseries, a bakery, Lucinda Yang is a doctoral candidate in Religion gardens, sewing rooms, carpentry workshops, and other at Baylor University. She specializes in religious various facilities to teach orphans trade skills which history, gender, and women’s roles in the church, and her forthcoming dissertation focuses on accompanied their education. The 1957 annual report Pentecostal female missionaries of the twentieth revealed that through the course of forty-six years, the century. Lucinda earned her Master of Divinity from Duke Divinity orphanage had received well over $1.6 million in monetary School, where she served as a worship leader and youth pastor in donations alone. By that year, the orphanage was home to multicultural ministry settings. Can’t get enough Mutuality? Subscribe or renew your print subscription today! cbe.today/subscribe 10 MUTUALITY | Spring 2020 WEBSITE: cbeinternational.org.

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