MENNONITE

LIFESEPTEMBER 1986 In this Issue

While the migration of the Mennonites to the Ukraine (following the late eighteenth century invitation of Catherine the Great to German colonists) has received considerable attention from historians, the demise of the Molotschna Colony during World War II is seldom discussed. The episode had many unpleasant aspects, not least of which was the Mennonite associa­ tion with the Nazi occupation forces. Horst Gerlach, Mennonite scholar from Weierhof, West Germany, provides new insights into this association through the reminiscences of Hermann Rossner, administrator of the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle [VoMi] in Halbstadt. The VoMi bureau of the SS was charged with resettling, protecting, and administering the German colonies in the Russian Ukraine. John D. Thiesen translated and edited the interesting account for Mennonite Life. Robert S. Kreider, the previous editor of Mennonite Life and former direc­ tor of the Mennonite Library and Archives, conducted numerous interviews with Alvin J. Beachy in late 1984 and has edited excerpts for Mennonite Life. Beachy, a scholar, pastor, and teacher in the General Conference Mennonite Church, described his background as an Old Order Amish youth growing up in western Pennsylvania. Beachy died in Newton, Kansas, on May 27, 1986. After over a half century of providing organized support for church mis­ sions, the Women in Mission (Women’s Missionary Association) presented their first report at a business session of the General Conference Mennonite Church a few weeks ago. The story of expanding women’s roles in the church begins much earlier. James C. Juhnke, Professor of History at Bethel Col­ lege, examines the changing roles of Mennonite women during the first quarter of the twentieth century, when Mennonite women received their first and radically new, but strictly limited, opportunities for church leadership. We welcome another contribution of poetry from Elmer Suderman, recent­ ly retired Professor of English at Gustavus Adolphus College. One of the congregations pastored by Alvin Beachy was the First Men­ nonite Church, Normal, Illinois. Rachel Waltner Goossen, Mennonite writer/historian from Goessel, Kansas, has recently completed a history of this congregation, which is celebrating its seventy-fifth anniversary, and her article is adapted from the first two chapters. The book will be available in January 1987, and may be obtained from the Anniversary Committee, The Mennonite Church of Normal, 805 S. Cottage, Normal, IL, 61761. The book includes the history of the Bloomington Mennonite Church as well. This MC group merged with the GC church in 1976 to form the Men­ nonite Church of Normal. Calvin Redekop’s discussion of the architecture of Mennonites focuses on the issue of building and beauty. Redekop spent three years with MCC in Europe and has numerous slides of church architecture in Europe. He has never taken a course in architecture but shares his “ convictions, in­ sights, and/or biases. The Alexanderwohl Mennonite Church building pro­ cess, discussed in the March issue of Mennonite Life, illustrates the dynamics of the individualizing versus communal aspects of design, as well as other ideas in this article.” Redekop is Professor of Sociology, Conrad Grebel College.

Indexed with abstracts in Religion Index One: Periodicals, American Theological Library Associa­ tion, Chicago, available online through BRS (Bibliographic Retrieval Services), Latham, New York and DIALOG, Palo Alto, California. MENNONITE

September 1986 Vol. 41 No. 3 LIFE

E d ito r Mennonites, the Molotschna, and the David A. Haury Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle in the Book Review Editor Second World War 4 John D. Thiesen Dr. Horst Gerlach Translated by John D. Thiesen Editorial Assistants Stephanie Hieben Barbara Thiesen Memories of an Amish Childhood

Circulation Manager —Interviews with Alvin J. Beachy 10 Stephanie Hiebert Robert S. Kreider

Front Cover Alvin Beachy The Role of Women in the Mennonite

B ack C over Transition from Traditionalism to Heinrich Himmler in Halbstadt, Molotschna, dur­ Denominationalism 17 ing World War II. Jam es C. Juhnke Photo Credits Mennonite Library and Archives, front cover; Bundesarchiv: SS Photographer Alber, pp. 5, 7, Poems 20 and back cover; Robert Kreider, pp. 11, 12, 13, and 14; First Mennonite Church of Normal, p. Elmer Sudennan 23; and Mabel Bertram, bottom of p. 23 and p. 25. An Urban Mennonite Church— The First Two Decades 22

MENNONITE LIFE is an illustrated quarterly Rachel Waltner Goossen magazine published in March, June, Septem­ ber, and December by Bethel College, North Newton, Kansas. Second Class postage paid at Newton, Kansas 67114. Mennonites, Aesthetics and Buildings 27

SUBSCRIPTION RATES: U.S. - One year, Calvin Redekop $10.00; two years, $18.00. Foreign — One year, $11.00; two years, $20.00 (U.S. Funds).

ISSN 0025-9365 Book Reviews 30 Mennonites, the Molotschna, and the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle in the Second World War by Dr. Horst Gerlach Translated by John D. Thiesen

Before me lies the too-little-known from Berlin and, after an apprenticeship from the Soviet Union in 1930. book by Jacob A. Neufeld, Tiefenwege: in his uncle’s wholesale curtain During the period of the treaty be­ Erfahrungen und Erlebnisse von business, attended evening courses in tween Hitler and Stalin, Hoffmeyer was Russland-Mennoniten in zwei Jahrzehn­ Berlin at the Hochschule filr Politik sent to the Soviets with a rapidly ex­ ten bis 1949 [Deep Ways: Experiences, [Academy of Politics]. There he studied panded staff to arrange with them and Adventures of the Russian Men­ Ukrainian history and learned of the methods for the resettlement of ethnic nonites through Two Decades to Black Sea Germans living there. Germans from the Soviet-annexed areas 1949]. I read it a second time during In 1939 he joined the VoMi, which and to lead the resettlement. Among the a recent vacation. One is shocked again had been headed since 1937 by SS groups resettled, only in the group from and again by the events that occurred Obergruppenführer [SS General] Galicia is there likely to have been a in these decades before, during, and Werner Lorenz, an estate owner from significant number of Mennonites. Pro­ after the Second World War in the area Danzig and the father-in-law of the Ger­ fessor Oberländer, today of Bonn, was of the Molotschna colony, on the trek man publisher Axel Springer.3 Within involved in the Galician resettlement. to Poland, and in the flight to the West. the VoMi there was the Russland- The area around Lemberg [today Lvov, At the same time, every informed Kommando [Russia Detachment], head­ USSR] was occupied by Soviet troops historian is impressed by the attractive ed by Oberführer [SS brigadier] Horst in 1939, and the ethnic Germans would objectivity of the author, who portrays Hoffmeyer. Hoffmeyer ended up in a have been threatened in the course of great world events from the viewpoint Romanian prison in 1944. As extradi­ time with expropriation, or partial or of the common man. tion to the Soviets threatened, he com­ complete deportation. The Galician Writings on this theme have appeared mitted suicide together with Obersturm­ Mennonites, who immigrated in from other Mennonite pens, such as that führer [SS lieutenant] Müller of Varel 1784-1785 under Emperor Joseph II of Frank H. Epp in Mennonite Exodus' in Oldenburg. He left behind his wife and numbered 550 in 1939, were con­ and the very critical comments on his and a son, who today works for ZDF centrated at Kiemica-Lemberg and work by G. and M. Cornies in Der [German television] in Mainz. resettled in the Warthegau [a region of Bote,1 and a number of other publica­ Hoffmeyer was bom in 1903 in Posen Poland along the Warta river conquered tions. It was certainly too early at that [today Poznan, Poland] and beginning by Germany in 1939], unfortunately time, for a number of reasons, to see 1 October 1935 was business manager scattered in many places.4 these affairs from a different viewpoint, of the Bund deutscher Osten [League of In connection with this resettlement specifically the viewpoint of those who the German East] and the Volksbundßr activity, Hoffmeyer was in Moscow. took up the administration of this area das Deutschtum im Ausland [VDA, The Russians wanted to have Ukrai­ with the occupation troops in the course League for Germandom Abroad] in nians and White Russians from Poland of the conquest and liberation of the Königsberg, East Prussia [today Kalin­ in exchange for the emigrated Volhy- ethnic German colonies by the German ingrad, USSR]. The leader of the two nian and Galician Germans. But, ob­ army. associations was the later minister for viously, hardly anyone applied for this. For this reason, I recently conversed refugees Prof. Dr. Theodor Oberländer, Documents and invitations preserved with Hermann Rossner of Düsseldorf, who from 1920-1930 was employed by from that time show very close coopera­ an eager reader of Der Bote and friend the Soviet authorities as an agricultural tion between the German and Soviet of the Mennonites of Russian German seedling specialist [Saatzuchtspezialist} authorities. At the border, Soviet com­ background. Rossner came to Halbstadt in southern Russia and took this oppor­ missars gave speeches to the ethnic Ger­ [today Molochansk, USSR] during the tunity to become acquainted with the man transports about friendship be­ war in the service of the Volksdeutsche problem of ethnic minorities in the tween peoples. Mittelstelle [VoMi, Ethnic German Soviet Union. Already at that time At that time, however, statements Liason Office, a bureau of the SS]. Oberländer came to the conclusion that were made by leading Soviet func­ Many of these people have and always the Soviet Union could not feed itself tionaries at a drinking party in the did have a certain weakness for these without private enterprise. He also presence of their German guests that German minorities living outside of visited the Volga Germans at the time those resettled populations would one Germany. Rossner comes originally and on account of this was deported day be recovered. They expected that

4 MENNONITE LIFE Himmler reviews youth group o f ethnic Germans in Halbstadt, 31 Oct. 1942. In front o f Himmler, General Wolff, Himmler s chief o f staff (died 1985).

Hitler would land in England in 1940, group, field and local commandant’s of­ several teachers from Germany were and then Europe could be rolled up fices, and temporarily for a few months drafted. They often performed the func­ from the East. According to this thesis, under the civil administration. He was tion of school superintendent [Schulrat]. discussed in a book by Erich Helm- given the title “ regional official” He remembered, for example, a teacher dach,5 Hitler launched a preventive war [Gebietshauptmann], not “com­ named Hildebrandt. In Prischib, west on 22 July 1941 because Stalin, after the missar,” in order to avoid the bad Rus­ of Molotschna, the VoMi set up a weakening of the eastern front, would sian experiences with persons carrying teacher training institute, headed by the have invaded about two months later. the title “ commissar.” Under the task Swabian national poet and Stuttgart However that may be, after the oc­ force in Halbstadt were the ad­ town councilor [Ratsherr] Karl Gotz. cupation of the Ukraine, the general ministrative detachments [Betreuungs­ Rossner thought—memory is clouded staff of the VoMi came to Landau- kommandos]| of Melitopol, Prischib, after so many years and, above all, by Odessa. At Christmas 1941 a detach­ Halbstadt, Waldheim, Gnadenfeld, Soviet imprisonment—that there were ment of about 20 men was sent oüt by Rostov (temporarily), and Grunau (tem­ about 50 Protestant [evangelische], private car. Subordinated to the main porarily). The Halbstadt (Molotschna) Catholic, and Mennonite students there. staff of the VoMi headed by Hoffmeyer area included about 60 villages with a The hospitals in Halbstadt and Orloff were three task forces [Einsatzgruppen, predominantly German population. also had to be made usable again. not to be confused with the Einsatzgrup­ Rossner recalls that he was trained Eighty-four German Red Cross nurses pen trained for the persecution of the for the administrative work essentially came from Germany and dealt with the Jews]. First there was the Transnistrian orally. He remembers further that the nutritional as well as medical care of the [“trans Dniepr”] task force which armed forces, in this case the First ethnic Germans. Rossner wondered managed an autonomous government of Mountain Rifle Division and the Roma­ why these “ girls” (who in the mean­ the ethnic Germans in the area of nians, penetrated the villages as the time have become older women) are not Romanian sovereignty. The staff of this Soviets were attempting to evacuate the invited to the reunions of former Ger­ group employed a prominent Men- population. The towns were complete­ man residents in Russia [Treffen der nonite, Johannes Harder, as an editor. ly or partially emptied. Almost all men Landsmannschaft] and of Mennonite The second task force was in Niko­ were gone. OnljHn Heidelberg, where Umsiedler [resettlers from Russia to pol, under the authority of the civil ad­ the Russians had assembled many men Germany since World War II]. ministration and the senior SS and to dig entrenchments, were there almost In Halbstadt a pharmacy was set up, police commander [höhere SS- und all men. In other places women and and the German hospital acquired Polizeiführer]. Rossner headed the children were evacuated. operating room equipment from Ger­ VoMi task force in Halbstadt, which Questioned about the duties of the many. Neufeld notes, in addition to this, was in the military-administered area of VoMi, Rossner recalled the following the establishment of a hospital in Army Group South, then under the areas. First of all, the schools had to be Waldheim.6 In Halbstadt Dr. Johann commanding officer of the rear army brought into operation again. For this, Klassen practiced as leader with the

SEPTEMBER, 1986 5 trusty old Dr. Kotat. In Waldheim were allowed the cavalry squadron to be To my question of what Himmler said, a German doctor and the daughter of the taken over by the SS after his visit to Rossner answered, “ Himmler prom­ tried and tested surgeon Dr. Tivonius. Halbstadt on 31 October and 1 ised extra help in the form of clothing Under pressure from the military, a November 1942. It became part of the and food.” Soon after the visit, material self-defense force [Selbstschutz] was SS division “ Florian Geyer.” and clothing arrived from the supplies created, analagous to the development About his visit to Himmler, Rossner of the combat SS [Waffen SS\. This was at the end of the German occupation in wrote to a friend in Canada on 8 March distributed to the population by the the First World War. In addition, there 1972, VoMi detachments. was a mounted unit with barracks, the Prof. Unruh and I agreed perfectly in our Himmler said further in his speech: cavalry squadron made up of 4 pla­ direction of march. In question was the “ I am happy that I can give attention toons. It was based in Waldheim. Ac­ Mennonite oath for the squadron, the to this positive duty, in addition to many cording to Rossner, there were hardly continuation of stationing in the local col­ other duties in the middle of a terrible ony area, and the avoidance of a com­ any partisans in the Halbstadt area. Epp bat assignment for the squadron. All was war.” Now, one knows about Himmler gives the strength of the squadron as promised according to the wishes of Ben­ that he is one of those who ordered the 500 men.7 In the Cornies letter to Der jamin Unruh by the Reichsführer [Himm­ worst crimes in the history of humani­ Bote,9 it was emphasized that it was not ler]. Later or earlier, and at least once, ty, the persecution of the Jews. On the only a question of Mennonites, but that I was with him in Karlsruhe and once in Berlin at the house of [Dr. Horst] Quir- other hand, it is also known that in his the members of the squadron included ing. I knew already at that time who Ben­ youth, he was considered an “ ardent Protestant [Evangelische] as well as jamin Unruh was and sought his advice. Catholic,” for whom Sunday mass was Catholics and Mennonites. Rossner I stood up for him as much as I could, “no outer ritual but an inner neces­ recalls that there were great difficulties and did my part as well as I could.9 sity.’ ’11 The ray of hope in this general in equipping the squadron with all levels The ethnic Germans naturally also picture is surely that, though he later of officers. According to his recollec­ had their religious needs. After the left the Church, his conscience may tion it had three drafted pastors as pla­ flight of the Russians, they cleaned out well have remained and possibly toon leaders. their churches, and church services and motivated this statement. One of the members of the squadron baptisms were held. Among the VoMi In any case, Himmler’s impression of had also told him of a poisoning attempt staff were a few religious men who also the colony was positive, and he wanted on one unit of the squadron. There the attended the church services. The to establish a center for German col­ coffee was brewed with rain water col­ church in Waldheim had been used for onization efforts in Halbstadt. Himmler lected from the roof. Someone (par­ another purpose by the Soviets. A local also agreed that the cavalry squadron tisans?) had scattered poison on the roof VoMi detachment leader wanted to should stay in the Molotschna area and of the barracks. In Halbstadt there was establish a Hitler Youth clubhouse not be sent to the front. He was also a similar incident in which eight or there. Some Mennonites carried this af­ against the idea that the women capable more men, among them Rossner him­ front to Rossner, and he decided in favor of doing translation should be sent to self, became ill. Dr. Johann Klassen of of the reestablishment of a church. The other areas. the Halbstadt hospital at first diagnosed real preachers, though, were largely As a further assignment of the VoMi, the illness as lead poisoning. Rossner deported [by the Soviets], according to Rossner named the establishment of so- ended up in a military hospital in Berlin. his recollection. called “ German shops,” whereby the From the point of view of the VoMi, The Molotschna at that time received most basic things, such as sewing there were many grounds for the prominent visits from Germany, which needles, etc., had to be “ organized” establishment of the cavalry squadron: Neufeld describes.10 Among them were from Germany in slow and wearisome 1) In 1941 the area was almost emptied the Baltic German Reich Minister for shipments. The VoMi was supposed to of men by the retreating Soviets. By the Occupied Eastern Territories, provide shoes and clothing. Everything drafting the young men into the cavalry, Alfred Rosenberg, and the Regional was lacking. It moves Rossner even to­ a few men remained in the local ter­ Party Chief [Gauleiter] of East Prussia day that there were no shoes in the ritory and could no longer be sent off and Reich Commissioner for the winter of 1942. “ We wanted to at least to all points of the compass by the Ger­ Ukraine, Erich Koch. Rosenberg was make wooden shoes. No wood to be man military, the intelligence service put to death in Nuremberg on 16 Oc­ had. Our German Red Cross nurses [Abwehr, for civil administration], or tober 1946, and Koch was sentenced to then wove some shoes out of corn as translators. With Prof. Benjamin death by Poland. However, Koch wrote straw.” 12 Unruh it was agreed that if possible, the his memoirs while in the prison [.Pro­ “ Another argument with all possible squadron should not go into combat. In minentengefängnis]| at Wartenberg in German authorities overshadowed this other respects, the squadron was put southeast Prussia [today Barczewo, whole situation. To many German under the authority of the individual Poland]. The Himmler visit on 31 Oc­ citizens [Reichsdeutschen] it had first to VoMi detachment leaders. (In general, tober 1942 is documented by the ac­ be made clear that it was Germans for a VoMi man and his driver made up a companying photos. He reviewed the whom we were working, what fate lay detachment.) Rossner attended to the cavalry squadron and the teacher train­ behind them and what fate they still en­ clothing, arming, and feeding of the ing institute in Prischib. After a parade, dured, what had to be done for them squadron by the army, mostly through he spoke before the ethnic Germans in and why they had to be preserved and Taganrog. Rossner accompanied Unruh Halbstadt in his office of Reich Com­ protected.13 on a visit to Reich Chief of the SS Him­ missioner for the Consolidation of Ger­ Now, some who know this material mler in Litzmannstadt [today Lodz, man Nationhood [Reichkommissar für will object, certainly with justice, that Poland] in 1943 or 1944. Himmler die Festigung des deutschen Volkstums]. the German administration set different

6 MENNONITE LIFE Top. Participants in parade, 31 Oct. 1942, Halbstadt, Molotschna. In center cavalry band, Himmler with retinue. Center. Cavalry composed o f ethnic Germans in Halbstadt, 31 Oct. 1942. In front o f them, civilians o f surrounding German villages. After the Himmler visit, the cavalry troop was incorporated into the 8th SS Cavalry Division. When the Molotschna was evacuated in 1943/44, they protected the trek and helped refugees repair broken-down wagons, etc. Bottom. SS Major /Sturmbannführer/ Rossner greets Himmler in Halbstadt, 31 Oct. 1942. From left: VoMi-Berlin Chief of Staff Behrens, ?, ?, Himmler, General Wolff. Behind Wolff in camp is Dnepropetrovsk Senior SS and Police Chief Harm.

SEPTEMBER, 1986 7 levels of rations for the individual ethnic sation on 3 September 1943 in the dishonesty. But who could do right by groups. Rossner knew of this grievance, Führer’s headquarters at Rastenburg, Himmler and Heaven [Himmler und East Prussia [today Ketrzyn, Poland]. and in the latter part of his time there Hitler resisted this request and only ac­ den Himmel] at the same time? (while he was “ regional official” ceded to withdrawal of the front behind Rossner further recalls that in 1943, [Gebietshauptmann]), he gave the the Desna and Kalmius rivers. On the no one in the Molotschna was required Ukrainians higher rations, approximate­ other hand he ordered—much too late— to leave. Those who wanted to stay ly what the Germans got. To his the evacuation of the Kuban bridgehead could stay. He believed that Dr. Klassen by the 17th Army (Colonel General knowledge there were hardly any Jews [Generaloberst] Jänicke). of Halbstadt had stayed, but he did not in the area. They had, almost without know for certain anymore. In all cases It is naturally possible that the exception, cleared out before the arrival the VoMi prepared railroad trains for knowledge of the existing ethnic Ger­ of the Germans, an opinion that concurs the town dwellers who had no vehicles. man settlements on the Molotschna and with that of many others. The route of the trek was also deter­ To destroy ethnic German people- by Chortitza had something to do with mined. Each group was accompanied Hitler’s hesitation. Hitler himself had hood, a new redistricting plan had been by VoMi troops, as one can see in obtained a very favorable picture of the undertaken in the Soviet period that photographs published in Mennonite Mennonites in a conversation with the divided the relatively closed Mennonite Life in 1947.19 The nurses accompanied Mennonite district magistrate [Landrat] settlement into many different districts. the trek to provide medical and nutri­ Walter Neufeld on 19 September 1939 In the midst of them Soviet settlement tional service, and the cavalry squadron in Danzig concerning the cultural strategists placed Ukrainian villages. In was to protect the wagon trains from achievements of the Mennonites in the the last three to four months of the partisans. Proskorovo, west ofViniza, Vistula delta and in the Ukraine.15 Fur­ Soviet period, the Molotschna was was planned as a large rest camp. ther, in a report by the head of the under the office of the Dniepropetrovsk Rossner remained in the Prischib area teacher training institute in Prischib and General Commissioner. At the begin­ until combat began there, and only later later of Luthbrandau/Warthegau, Karl ning of the German occupation, it was joined the trek in Nikopol. From under the Armored Group [Panzer­ Götz, the following is expressed: Nikopol he had to travel with the train gruppe] Kleist and then became a rear The Reich Chief of the SS [Heinrich to Jägerndorf, Sudetenland [today area. In the Prischib area (just west of Himmler], on 31 December 1942 in the Krnov, Czechoslovakia] and received presence of SS General Lorenz and SS Molotschna) the kolkhozy [collective Brigadier Hoffmeyer, the head of the the assignment, after his appointment to farms] were dissolved. But the kol­ Russian Detachment of the Ethnic Ger­ Posen [today Poznan, Poland], to ad­ khozy, as far as agriculture was con­ man Liason Office, had a thorough vise the authorities in the evacuation of cerned, were under special agricultural discussion at the Führer ’s headquarters the ethnic Germans out of the Ukraine. chiefs [Landwirtschaftsfilhrem, Sonder- with Prof. Lie. Unruh, in which the Reich Chief of the SS approved of the The Black Sea Germans were settled on fuhrem], Rossner said he got along behavior and attitude of the Mennonites.16 a confessional [religious] basis at the in­ relatively well with the Russian Ortho­ itiative of Prof. Unruh. In the reports One might expect that this information dox Poles. In this his education in Berlin of Karl Götz it is stated: was to his advantage. —although only orally reported— influenced the decisions, although it is On 16 March 1944 a discussion took known of Hitler that he gave orders to place between regional party chief n. The End of the Molotschna [Gauleiter] Arthur Greiser [Gauleiter of retreat only very reluctantly. In the second half of 1943 the news the Wartheland] and Prof. Unruh, in However that may be, the end of the which freedom of religious practice was from the front was increasingly threat­ Molotschna came on 12 September assured, within the scope of fundamen­ ening. The VoMi was in continuing 1943, when the Soviet advance could tal laws, for the Russian Mennonites now coming into the Warthegau.20 contact with the Army Group Don, later no longer be stopped, even by the best South. And what was the situation at military commanders such as Manstein. Many things, though, did not go so that time? According to a report by the smoothly. Rossner, with his secretary, well-known military specialist Werner Many of us may well have had an un­ familiar feeling in this great change in found himself ‘ ‘alone against the entire Haupt,14 brought to my attention by our life and history as we took our places German bureaucracy” and attempted Rossner, things were thus: on our horse-drawn wagons on 12 again to be the mediator and spokesman The crucial point of the powerful Soviet September and turned our backs forever for the people. His assignment came to summer offensive, which had been on our home along the Molotschna. It was a solemn and eventful moment.17 an end in July 1944 when regional par­ underway for weeks between Vitebsk ty chief [Gauleiter] Greiser gave him and the Black Sea, directed itself more The entire flight was organized by SS a “region reprimand” [Gauverweis]. and more against the German Army Brigadier Horst Hoffmeyer. Himmler Group South. The Soviet armies on the Within 24 hours he had to leave the south and southwest fronts compressed is supposed to have observed the flight Warthegau. In a report to the Reich the positions of the First Armor Army of the ethnic Germans by plane, as a Chief of the SS Himmler he wrote, [/. Panzerarmee] and the Sixth Army woman from Canada who participated among other things, that the responsi­ between Isjum and the Sez of Azov from in the flight reported to me at a reunion 16 August. . . . The situation, stretched ble German offices and the district farm to the breaking point—reserves were as in 1978 in Espelkamp. If only he had leaders [Kreisbauemfuhrem] would good as gone—demanded an energetic concerned himself with it! But SS have refused the Russian Germans per­ intervention by the highest German General Lorenz, the head of the entire mission to farm on account of this leadership. The army group com­ VoMi, was also charged at the Nurem­ because, of the twelve district farm manders, Field Marshals von Kluge berg trials, and Prof. Unruh, according (Center) and von Manstein (South), peti­ leaders in the Warthegau, eleven had tioned Hitler to give the order for a to his daughter, exonerated him.18 The been placed in charge of huge estates retreat behind the Dniepr, at a conver­ Mennonites of Holland took this as and certainly must have been more in- 8 MENNONITE LIFE terested in willing and cheap farm the lines in Romanian uniforms to Ger­ remembers. He feels still today (1986) workers than in independent farmers man positions. A Romanian general very connected to his Mennonite friends and agriculturalists. There is something was to be bribed. The VoMi men came and reads every issue of Der Bote. I to this view. On the other hand, one to a large prisoner-of-war camp. The have supplemented the interview with would have to write one’s own book on Red Guards had already previously well-known and little-known books, the resettlement activity of the VoMi come through the area. As surrender to sources, and parts of interviews. To during the war.21 There are plenty of the Soviets threatened, Hoffmeyer and some readers much here may appear documents on this in the Federal Ar­ SS Lieutenant [Obersturmführer] new. But history, and also the history chives in Koblenz. The problem was the Muller committed suicide with their of a small group, is not as it is supposed following: in order to settle a Black Sea service pistols. Muller at one time had to have been, but as it actually ran its German, one first had to expel a Polish headed the main detachment [Haupt- course with all the good and bad im­ family from a plot of land and transport kommando] at Nikopol. At the time of pulses of the human heart. it either to central Poland [Innerpolen] the suicide, Hoffmeyer and Muller were or to Germany for forced labor [Arbeits­ together in one room. Rossner ended up ENDNOTES einsatz]. These expulsions by another in a Soviet prison. The Soviets showed 'Frank H. Epp, Mennonite Exodus: The SS organization, the Transferee Central themselves to be not at all enchanted by Rescue and Resettlement of the Russian Men­ Office [UWZ, Umwanderer Zen­ the work of the VoMi, which they nonites since the Communist Revolution (Altona, Manitoba: Canadian Mennonite Relief and Im­ tralstelle], had led to a great disturbance themselves had strongly supported un­ migration Council, 1962). of the Polish population in the newly an­ til 1941. Before being handed over to 2Der Bote, 1963, nos. 13-25. nexed provinces and in the Warthegau an official prison camp, the VoMi men 3Heinz Höhne, Der Orden unter dem Totenkopf [The Order of the Death's Head] (München: C. and in western West Prussia, and to par­ were dragged along with the Soviet Bertelsmann, 1966?), p. 255f. This book is tisan activity and bombing attacks, so troops and decimated by shootings. On­ available in English as The Order o f the Death 's ly after the transfer to the prison camps Head (New York: Coward—McCann, 1970). that the leadership shrank back from too *Christlicher Gemeindekalender 1939, p. 152. harsh oppression.22 did the shootings, but not the deaths, 5Erich Helmdach, Überfall [Surprise Attack] Hoffmeyer in the meantime (1944) stop. Of the twenty VoMi men who (Neckargemünd: Vowinkel-Verlag, 1975); book review, “ War es ein Überfall?” [Was it a sur­ had been able to visit the teacher train­ came to Romania in 1944, most of prise attack?]. Die Zeit, 7 November 1975, p. 43. ing institute, which had been put back whom previously took care of the Black ‘Neufeld, p. 95. into operation in Luthbrandau, Warthe­ Sea Germans in Russia, only four sur­ 7Epp, p. 395. sDer Bote, 21 May 1963. gau. Then he received a new assign­ vived the Russian prisoner-of-war ’Rossner to “a Canadian friend,” 8 March ment: The British Royal Air Force was camp, among them Ritter (since then 1972, p. 5. flying large bombing raids on the deceased) and Dr. Otto Franke (Trans- 1 “Neufeld, p. 95. "Höhne, p. 38. Romanian oil refinery at Ploesti, north nistria Main Staff [Hauptstab]).23 "Rossner to “a Canadian friend,” 8 March of Bucharest. The raiders sustained There remains no doubt that the 1972, p. 5. "Rossner to "a Canadian friend,” 8 March great casualties but made some lucky VoMi work was done under the sym­ 1972, p. 5. hits. Hoffmeyer, in the meantime pro­ bols established in 1933 in Germany, '*DNZ (Munich) 46, 15 November 1963. moted from SS Brigadier [Oberführer] but also with a great portion of feeling "Diether Götz Lichdi, Mennoniten im Dritten Reich: Dokumentation und Deutung (Weierhof: to SS Major General [Brigadeführer] for their ethnic German fellow men. But Mennonitischer Geschichtsverein, 1977), p. 60. and Major General of Police [General­ because these symbols of 1933 became •‘Karl Gb’tz, Die Mennoniten, 1944, Bundesar­ associated with many unfortunate chiv Koblenz [Federal Archives in Koblenz], R. major der Polizei] on account of his ser­ 69/215, p. 11. vices in resettling 340,000 Germans out things, few found words of thanks to "Neufeld, p. 192. of Russia (among them about 35,000 give after the war, where one could also "Translator’s note: A transcript of Unruh’s testimony at the Nuremberg trials was deposited Mennonites), was supposed to put the thank someone who is not part of one’s in English translation in the National Archives in refinery back in operation. Thus he was own church and confession. Among Washington, DC. Thanks to Allan Teichroew of transferred in July 1944 to Ploesti with these few, however, was the unforget­ the Manuscript Division of the Library of Con­ gress, a photocopy of this transcript is available about 20 VoMi men. He was also for table Canadian elder J. J. Thiessen, in the Mennonite Library and Archives, Bethel a short time Senior SS and Police Com­ who had a warm heart for his Russian College, North Newton, Kansas. brethren in need. In a letter of 19 "Gerhard Fast, “Mennonites of the Ukraine mander [höhere SS- und Polizeifilhrer], under Stalin and Hitler,” Mennonite Life 2 (April but could no longer accomplish much September 1957 he wrote to Hermann 1947): 20. because of the threatening Soviet ad­ Rossner: 20Gotz, Die Mennoniten. "Translator's note: A detailed and thorough vance and the defection of Romania She [a Canadian Mennonite who knew discussion of this resettlement activity in English from the Axis Powers (22 August Rossner in Russia] honors you and with is Robert L. Koehl, RKFDV: German Resettle­ 1944). The VoMi became entangled in her hundreds of our people thank you for ment and Population Policy 1939-1945: A History o f the Reich Commission fo r the Strengthening of struggles with the Romanians. The ar­ your generous help during the departure of the colonists, who had to leave home Germandom (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univer­ my dropped two platoons of para­ sity Press, 1957). and farm in order to not fall into the "Such as the Warsaw Uprising, 1 August 1944 troopers, but the Russians cut off the hands of the Communists. I had firmly to 2 October 1944. See Hanns von Krannhals, Der retreat to the north by quick advances. intended to visit you and warmly clasp Warschauer Aufstand [The Warsaw Uprising] So the VoMi men next fell into Roma­ your hand for what you lovingly did for (Frankfurt/M: Gröfe-Verlag, 1962). suffering humanity. It was not possible "D r. Otto Franke was responsible for building nian internment. They were held in the and so I do it in writing. May God richly hospitals (Landau, Odessa, Hoffnungsthal) and engineer’s barracks in Craiova about repay you for your rescue work and the operated several times with the Mennonite doc­ two to three weeks. Hoffmeyer, who aid that came to the colonists through tor Klassen in Halbstadt. He is now blind and lives you.24 near Freiburg i. Br. knew the Romanians from his resettle­ 24J. J. Thiessen to Hermann Rossner, 19 ment work, negotiated with the Roma­ Please note, I have endeavored to September 1957 (on Canadian Mennonite Board nian front commanders to pass through write down what Hermann Rossner still of Colonization letterhead). SEPTEMBER, 1986 9 Memories of an Amish Childhood —Interviews with Alvin J. Beachy by Robert S. Kreider

In the wooded mountains of western sylvania. On September 4, 1942, he was to be faithful and not to be suc­ Pennsylvania along the Pennsylvania- married Vera Clouse at Nappanee, In­ cessful. The Amish approached their Maryland border lies a fertile farming diana. Beachy’s widely-commended faith from a New Testament perspec­ valley where Amish families first settled theological treatise is The Concept of tive, the whole Bible interpreted in the in the decade before the American Grace in the Radical Reformation. context of Christ, God’s supreme reve­ Revolution. This is the valley of the On seven occasions during November lation. I had no feeling of shame in be­ Casselman River, which flows westward and December of 1984, I interviewed ing Amish. into the Monangahela. Here the Amish Alvin Beachy about his memories of Mother ancestors of Alvin J. Beachy lived for growing up in an Amish home. After My mother Lucy was the youngest generations. Alvin was born on July 9, each interview, a transcript was typed daughter of Samuel J. and Magdalena 1913, the eleventh child in the Old and given to him for correction. From Swartzentruber Miller. Grandfather, Order Amish home of Moses and Lucy twenty-one pages of single-spaced who had been a schoolteacher, taught Miller Beachy, who would end up hav­ transcriptions, a copy deposited with the his daughter at home. “Posy Sam,” ing five daughters and nine sons Mennonite Library and Archives, ex­ they called him, because he had so altogether. Alvin J. Beachy retired from cerpts have been selected which would many flowers. Grandfather Samuel the Bethel College faculty in 1978 and give insight into the life of an Old Miller was a nature lover. He planted died in Newton, Kansas, on May 27, Order-Beachy Amish home in the ear­ apple trees along the roads. His 1986, at the age of seventy-two. ly years of this century. spacious lawn with evergreens was a Moses Beachy was bishop of the con­ Meetinghouse shelter for birds, squirrels, swans, gregation which experienced the pain­ peacocks, and deer. He was fond of We worshipped in two meeting­ ful division in 1927 which led to the for­ horses, particularly his brown mare, houses, one at Flag Run and the other mation of the Beachy Amish Church, Daisy. He was gifted in penmanship at Summit Mills, ten miles apart. These a group which today numbers one hun­ and drew pictures of birds in flight in probably dated back to the 1880’s. For dred congregations and 6,500 baptized colored ink. Grandmother Miller’s peo­ the Old Order Amish to have meeting­ members. This 1927 division, centered ple came from the Conservative Amish- houses is unusual, unique to Somerset on the issue of the ban, was similar to Mennonite side of the 1895 split. Father County. Men entered by one door, a controversy in the same community thought a lot of those Conservative women by another. Women sat on the in 1895 out of which emerged the Con­ Amish. left, men on the right. In the center was servative Mennonite Church. Grandfather Miller’s sons inherited a coal stove. In the front was the Alvin J. Beachy lived in the Amish his love for nature. Uncle Jake planted preachers’ table and behind it the community until 1934, when at the age and grafted apple trees along roads. Un­ preachers’ bench. The front bench was of twenty-one he left to find work in cle Elias raised vegetables in his reserved for the Vorsänger (song Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. He greenhouse. Uncle Simon, who made leaders). It was interesting when we resumed his schooling at the age of money on his royalties from the mines, worked on the architectural plans for twenty-four. Study followed at Messiah had time for hunting, which he loved. the Souderton church how much came College, Bluffton College (A.B.), and He had a rare gift for taking care of the from the concept of an Amish meeting­ Hartford Theological Seminary (B.D. ill. He might have been a medical doc­ house. Twice a year members came and and S.T.M.), culminating in 1960 in a tor had he not been Amish. scrubbed the meetinghouse, took the doctorate at Harvard University Divini­ I remember Mother’s kindnesses. She benches outside, and washed them, and ty School. He taught Bible and religion lanced my boils. I ran a rusty nail sanded the floor. After the division in at Bluffton College, Eastern Mennonite through my hand. She tied a rind of 1927, the two groups continued to use College, and from 1969 to 1978 at bacon over the wound to draw out the the two meetinghouses on alternate Sun­ Bethel College. His Mennonite pastor­ poison. She gave me an English- days until the Mountainview congrega­ ates included: First Mennonite Church, German testament. Mother was tall. tion built their present church in 1953. Normal, Illinois; First Mennonite Mary Elizabeth’s description of Mother Church, Bluffton, Ohio; and Zion Men-, Being Amish was correct: “ kind, loving, gentle, nonite Church, Souderton, Penn­ The overriding mission of the church sympathetic and very patient.” Father

10 MENNONITE LIFE used to say that she never became angry when things didn’t go right. She only m -FEukSYkitowtA AEYFRSPALE" cried. Undoubtedly she did much to help him control his quicker temper Summit Mgertr; £ * - when his patience ran thin. Mother HOUSE-jtrv' taught us to pray and to memorize Bi­ ble verses. I especially remember the coffee cake she made with yeast dough. I never remember being spanked by Mother. She did put me in the Brum- schtall, a broom closet by the chimney, to be isolated and to think things over when I had been unruly. The place was dark, hot and smelly. . . . Dr. Lichty, who lived in Salisbury, delivered most of Mother’s babies: nine boys and five girls. He always came by horse and buggy. Mother was selective about the world. A door-to-door salesman came with a “talking machine,” but Mother told him, “We can’t have that.” He responded, “ I know, I’ll just leave it with you for a month.” With the record player were a number of records and one which Mother liked very much and played often: “ Abide With M e.” A preacher came to the community who would not preach in the meetinghouse, so they had preaching services in our home. Mother put the talking machine in a guest room and closed the door before the service. When the wife of the retired bishop came, she poked into closets and found the talking machine. She commented, “ Something like that I wouldn’t want to have in my house. ’ ’ Mother was fearful that this would become something for church discipline, but nothing further was heard about it. The story was told by our family with amusement and anxiety. I don’t remember Mother singing, but she was pleased to hear me singing German hymns on returning from Ger­ man school. When mother was ill she wanted a lit­ tle income of her own. She got some Leghorns and paid Milton and me one dollar a week to tend them. In explain­ ing her offer to pay us she said, “ Now you must do it cheerfully.” When brother Jonas died. Mother used his savings to buy religious books for each of the children. This included the series, “First Steps for Little Feet.” Mother and I once were going to visit Uncle Alvin Beachy’s wife. On the road we met two ministers coming to see Father. They said, “We just want to have a nice cool talk.” Mother com­ mented to them: “ I don’t think there is Map of valley of Casselman River by Gail Lutsch and Moses Beachy farmstead any use. I think his mind is made up.” in about 1914. SEPTEMBER, 1986 11 Alvin at his school desk, ca. 1926. You’re as welcome as the flowers of May” . . . . Father was easily hurt when people wronged him. Father said his grandmother Elizabeth Beachy tried tyr’s Mirror which Father read by the to help him overcome his “ Beachy hour. He used illustrations from it in his temper.” Yes, there is such a thing; sermons. In one of his sermons he told Father had a violent temper if some­ of a young girl who was asked by a thing was broken .... stranger for a drink. She gave him two I never heard Father preach sermons glasses of milk. Later she became ill on the Great Commission. The mission and needed surgery. The family was concern came with Sunday school when poor and could not afford surgery. A they began reading the whole New doctor, who had been the befriended Testament. stranger, came forward and said, “ Here I remember our first car: a 1924 is $200 for two glasses of milk.” He Dodge sedan, four-door, black, twelve- was illustrating how one might find volt battery. The second “ machine,” oneself entertaining angels unawares. as we called it, was a 1928 Chrysler. Father attended the same school I did, Father said he would never own a car. Crossroads, but probably never had They were always registered in his more than six grades of schooling. He wife’s name. I remember him learning chewed tobacco before his marriage, to drive, once trying to shift into second but Mother’s influence led him to stop but putting it instead into reverse. I also it. Uncle Alvin came back from Oregon remember Father trying to drive our chewing Mail Pouch. Under the Mother was of the same mind as Father Huber tractor. He couldn’t find a way preachers’ table was a box of sawdust of stopping it. He yelled “ Whoa” and on church issues. for the preachers who chewed tobacco. Mother died in 1927 on Thanksgiv­ ran through a fence. We enjoyed re­ Two of Father’s brothers were also counting this story. ing Day of Bright’s Disease (malfunc­ ministers. tioning of the kidney). I remember my Two of Father’s sisters, Phoebe and Father did not tell stories of his grow­ sister coming to my bed and asking, Mary, died in childbirth as young ing up years, but he did tell of his “Are you asleep? Momma died.” I women. Father’s brother Ruftis, a physical strength as a youth: lifting a didn’t view Mother in the casket. I was veterinarian and a tailor, had two of­ barrel of apples alone or with one hand told that her features were so bloated fices. He had an office at our place, and and arm heaving a one hundred pound that she was not very recognizable. This in Meyersdale, where he lived, he had bag of feed over his shoulder . . . I was a month before the split. We sat up a barn for sick animals. Uncle Lewis, remember attending a political meeting front for the funeral service and so I a bishop—widely known and respected in Salisbury with Father which focused didn’t see whether both sides in the con­ —lived in Oakland, Maryland, and re­ on the issue of school consolidation, troversy were present. mained Old Order Amish. Uncle Alvin, which the Amish opposed. Father did who had moved back and forth between Father not vote, as far as I remember. In the Oregon and Indiana, was an effective Father was five feet seven inches tall, 1928 Hoover-Smith election Uncle preacher with a strong voice. When Un­ heavy, three hundred pounds, down to Alvin preached that we shouldn’t go to cle Alvin was in Oregon, he wrote that two hundred and fifty at his death. At the polls, but we should pray . . . he was in dire straits. Father sent him haymaking time he went up into the Father would sit in a rocking chair by $500 to move back to Pennsylvania, haymow and trampled the hay down. I the register by the hour singing hymns where they lived in the tenant house on don’t remember that Father helped with in German. One of his favorites was the second farm. Uncle Alvin stood the farm work after I was fifteen. That “ Make room for the little child, make with Father in the split of 1927, but later was handled by the nine brothers and room for the little child . . . for I am moved to Indiana and back into the Old five sisters. coming soon” . . . . Father liked to Order Amish. I remember Father going into his tease. He was a great match-maker. He Father made trips to Indiana, On­ study (the carpeted Stupp or parlor and loved hearing people laugh .... The tario, and eastern Pennsylvania before only used for special occasions), where children knew that Father meant what the split. At one time Father wanted to he would close the door, and read aloud he said. When he said, “ Now iss es move to Indiana, to sell out, pay off his in German passages from the Bible. His zeit,” (Now it’s time) we knew it was debts, and get a fresh start, but the fami­ sermons were a retelling of Biblical time for us to heed, or punishment ly opposed it, and we stayed. We were material. He was free to use illustrations would follow .... Father was widely saved from being sold at sheriff’s sale in English in his German sermons. No known. If someone addressed him as by Ernest, who ran the farm from 1927 one used notes in the pulpit. Father “ Mr. Beachy,” his answer was, “ Mr. on. He gave up everything to save the memorized almost word-for-word the Beachy is not here, but Moses is.” He farm. Father made a mistake in buying scriptures used at communion. He prac­ did not care for titles .... Father the second farm in 1919 at inflated war­ ticed preaching by reciting to the blue never had any difficulty getting ac­ time prices. walls in the living room the scriptures quainted with people and making them Father was a firm believer in prayer. he had memorized. He read the ser­ feel at home. One of his favorite One of Ezra Yoder’s twins was ill. mons of D. L. Moody. We had a Mar- greetings was, “ Come in, come in. Father conceived that he should go.

12 MENNONITE LIFE They lived over by Grantsville, and I took him in my Chevy. He came out of the house and reported that the child was much better. One sensed that prayer was important .... Father had a booming bass voice. My sister said, “ One could hear him a half mile away when he sat on the porch and sang. My sister says his favorite at family sing­ ings was “ Break Thou the Bread of Life.” I remember Mother’s favorite was “ Shall We Gather at the River?” .... He was a good preacher. I would hear him say, “ Put the food low enough for the lambs.” He meant to preach so that children could understand .... I remember Mother admonishing Father not to get into a sing-song style of preaching, which was fairly universal among Amish preachers. Father remarried in 1928—Mary E. Hershberger who was single, about Mother’s age, and resembled Mother. They were married in the Big Valley. It was the bishop’s job to announce forthcoming weddings. Saturday night Father disappeared and sent a note to Noah to have the wedding announced. The Farm On the home farm, we had eighty acres of tillable land and eighty acres of untillable land, much of it marred with soft coal talings, sunken pit heads and cave-ins. There was a big limestone quarry on our farm, the Keystone Lime and Coal Co., which has since been covered up .... On the new place we had a sugar camp—collected the sap in buckets in the early spring .... We had a Frick thresher. Father did thresh­ ing for others and ended up doing ours last, even with the new thresher. We also had a Papec ensilage cutter, one of the best, eighteen or twenty-four inch cut. We tried to throw in enough to choke it but you couldn’t choke a Papec .... In threshing we used trac­ tor power, except when I was very Top. Eight of Moses Beachy chil­ young we used a steam engine. If Father dren in 1930, left to right: had any job, it was keeping the machine Ernest, Ruth, Milton, Alvin, well oiled. He shone in riding the Mary Elizabeth, Irvin, Lewis, and Annie. binder. He knew all the parts and how Center. Moses Beachy house with the to repair and adjust. He knew how to 1926 addition and to the left dump the bundles in nice regular rows the veterinary office o f Uncle so that shocking was easier .... Rufus Beachy. Father always wanted us when going in­ Left. Alvin in his late teens with a to a new field with a binder to open up favorite horse. the field by cutting the grain with a cradle. It saved trampling down and los­ ing the grain in the comer and along the four sides .... We raised a half dozen hogs for our

SEPTEMBER, 1986 13 Limestone quarry shortly before it was torn down, ca. 1965. Formerly on the Moses Beachy farm.

Father agreed and said, “We won’t forget how faithfully you worked to get Milton out of there.” The Mines There were mines all over the area. In the mines there was always the prob­ lem of poison fumes. “ Black damp,” they called it. Some of the mines smoldered for miles underground. Like the Divine Comedy. I remember smell­ ing the escaping sulphur fumes, seeing the smoke rising from the ground. There were sink holes where the ground collapsed over mine shafts. Father was own needs. Milton Hershberger and approached Uncle Simon to ask whether a partner in the Niverton coal business, Simon Miller came with their families I could buy one of his pony mares. He which had a mine on our farm. I and helped with the butchering. By explained that if he let me do that, “ We remember people referring to the noon all the hogs were killed. The rest would have war in our family.” If I Italians who had worked in the mines of the day was spent cutting and stuff­ couldn’t buy, I asked whether I could as “bohunks.” One stable in our barn ing sausage. Ham and shoulders were borrow one of his mares for the feed. was called the “mining stable” for the smoked in the smokehouse. Tenderloin He let me take Winnie. I fed her oats. miners. Our horse, Old Tom, pulled was cooked and canned for quick She had a way of finding her way back coal cars from the mines to the tipple. meals. Lard was rendered in a big iron to our place because she knew that at Sometimes we went back into the mines kettle. We made liverwurst (puddings) our place was oats. to watch. The shafts went back thirty .... Father was a great horse trader. to fifty feet. There were three veins of He would raise them until about the The Bull coal in our area: a four-foot vein, good; time they were to be broken and would I was working at Noah’s place. below that a five-foot vein, not so good; then sell them. We had four horses, Milton came over just before dinner below that an eight-foot vein, best of sometimes six. We kept one for the with a roadster made into a truck: all, almost like hard coal. I don’t know buggy. We never used mules. They “ Come help Duke back into the bam.” if any Amish worked as miners. One were forbidden to Somerset County Duke (full name: “ La Prime’s War Old Mennonite who worked in the Amish .... For a while we had twen­ Duke” ) was a Jersey bull. We drove mines was called “ Coalie.” Our house ty or more cows and a de Laval milk­ with the Ford into the field to get him. had to be moved earlier because of an ing machine operated with a gasoline He put his head down and charged the underground coalmine fire. The farm engine .... We had a flock of two Ford and would have gored the engine below, Christian Zook’s place, had the hundred sheep after we gave up cows if Milt had not eluded him. We cut one same problem. Christian called his .... We had a lot of rail fences .... cow out of the herd and put her in the place the “ burning hill farm” .... We had lots of stones in the fields, bam. She began to bawl. Duke came Father was a shareholder in the which we hauled out to the roads, where to investigate. We tried to entice him Keystone Lime and Coal Co. Father roadmen broke them up with their to come close so that we could slip a and my older brother Noah worked in sledgehammers to fill in low spots .... wooden bar with a hook in the ring in the quarry. We had an old orchard and a young or­ his nose. He was too foxy. He wouldn’t chard: apples—Baldwin and Smoke­ come close enough. We tried to throw Family Life house; no peaches; cherries along the a horseblanket over his head to blind Christmas was not lavish, but it was fences. We had a strawberry patch and him. He threw off the blanket as we meaningful. On Christmas morning pie a grape arbor. were trying to hook the ring. He pitched pans were set out for each child with I wanted a pony. However, the at Milton. He was thrown ten to fifteen the person’s name on it. We would find Discipline of 1837 didn’t approve of feet backwards, struck his head and was on our plates peanuts, hard candy, pop­ mules and ponies. Father gave me an out cold. I jumped down and dragged corn balls. One year I received a wind­ old mare, Nettie, as my own. I led her Milton to safety, while Irwin threw a up train which could run on tracks. up to the pasture with the cows. She fell stable broom at Duke and diverted his Milton and I once received an Erector one night into a mining hole and kicked attention .... Later when I asked set. It had been hidden in a closet. We herself to death. I conducted a funeral Father if I could make a trip with six were not supposed to see it beforehand. and placed a cross at the hole .... I young people to Lancaster County, We found it. As punishment for peek-

14 MENNONITE LIFE ing, it was put away and could not be No one in our family had the gift of ber my father saying, “ Now you need played with until New Year’s Day . . . . powwowing. None followed the signs to get down to brass tacks and start At home we all had nicknames: Lewis in planting garden and the like. We growing hair on your chest and start do­ —Grumpy, Milton—Grit, Ruth— were hucksters of eggs, butter, and at ing the work of a man on the farm.” “Povey Lovey” , Ernest—Kämest, times, fresh pork in Cumberland. We The next fall instead of school I was out Alvin—Fish (toy from weekly bath) or drove a Chevy coupe made into a track. in the field with a three-horse sulky and Rooster (which went back to a story Noah, Ernest and I went from door to plow. I weighed all of eighty-five about a broken glass pane attributed to door. When I first went out I was drilled pounds. Later, when the new barn was a rooster) .... Noah tells of receiving on how to make change. built, we separated the two farms. a severe whipping from Father for go­ We subscribed to two weeklies, the Either Milton or I was to go to Noah’s. ing fishing on Sunday. Later the rales Meyersdale Republican and the Penn­ Milton was the better mechanic so he were relaxed. I don’t remember any sylvania Stockman, which had con­ stayed on the home place. I could have Sunday prohibitions.... I remember tinued stories by Lewis B. Miller about walked back and forth because Noah’s cousin Alvin J. Miller coming to our Indians in the West. We boys made a place was only a quarter of a mile away. home and telling fascinating stories of dive for it to see who could read the I chose to stay at Noah’s. That was the his relief work in Russia under MCC.... stories first. We had Herold der first breaking of the ties. I was sixteen. I don’t remember Thanksgiving in our Wahrheit. A favorite author of mine Leaving Home home, but I remember that the Hersh­ was Horatio Alger. bergers had a turkey at Thanksgiving. We had Sears Roebuck and Mont­ When I went to work for my older At Easter we colored eggs. We also gomery Ward catalogs and a third one, brother Noah as a hired man, I received made spruce beer .... When we had but we never ordered clothing from a no wages, only my keep. Once I made guests Mother said, in Pennsylvania mail order house. We looked through a trip to Lancaster County. My clothing German, "Reach and help yourself’ them and saw what we would like to was nondescript. Noah offered to let me and “ Make yourself at home.” We had have. We had a copy of Robert Louis wear his wedding suit for the trip. After silent prayer at the beginning and at the Stevenson’s Treasure Island and books joining the church at seventeen, I received a new suit made by Uncle end of the meal, the first a blessing and of Louisa May Alcott. A well-beaten Rufus. I also received a Mützer, a long the second thanksgiving. For devotions path led across the fields to the Milton black coat down to the knees with a split we knelt with elbows on the chair and Hershbergers, where we. borrowed faced the back of the chair .... We copies of C. A. Stevens’ novels about tail. When you wore that, you knew you were baptized .... The land on had tramps occasionally. Once a big a family growing up on a farm in Maine Noah’s place was in Maryland and the black man came. We gave him a wash after the Civil War. farmstead in Pennsylvania. I loaded tub and water for a bath by one of the Neighbors outbuildings. He slept in the barn .... manure in Pennsylvania and unloaded I remember a bam raising at Noah’s. Charles Deist lived in the quarry it in Maryland. The first summer I was Two builders were in charge. They put house. His son Albert had polio and was the hired man and there was a hired all the trasses together on the ground handicapped in walking. When going to girl, two years younger. My parents ap­ for this hip-roof bam and then thirty to school together, we adjusted our pace proved of her, but she broke off the forty people helped raise it. There was to Albert’s speed. Charles brought in friendship. I was devastated. I went to a good meal served by women from the a steam shovel in the last years of opera­ see my father who was in the chicken house and told him and said I wanted church in Springs .... Until 1927 the tion. The steam shovel led to strip min­ to go off to Norfolk, Virginia. He asked quarry had the only phone in the ing . . . . One of our neighbors had a me whether she cried when she told me. neighborhood .... Every other Sun­ large family of boys. They often tapped I answered, “ Yes.” He said, “ Good, day when we did not have church ser­ maple trees on our side of the line. They tears are salve for the soul.” Later vices, we went visiting or had guests.... put skunks in our sap buckets. They when I worked in Lancaster County I We made dandelion wine for medicinal fussed so much about the line that was engaged to be married. I had an at­ use. For communion we used grape Father got a surveyor. I think Father juice. At Weaverland in Lancaster paid for him .... Farther down the tack of appendicitus and was taken to the hospital. My fiancee came to visit County they used real wine in the com­ hill was the Livengood family; Elijah, mon cup. the patriarch, lived to ninety-five .... me and was so possessive. I thought I Two of my brothers, Allen and John, We cut ice at the Lewis Yoder place on couldn’t live with that for the rest of my died in infancy. I assume the cause was Flag Run Creek and put it in the ice life, so I broke off the engagement. I dysentery. My parents called in an house at Noah’s. was still Amish and dressed Amish, hooks and eyes and all. In Lancaster Amish woman to powwow. She would School County I worked for a man who had a take a hard boiled egg and rub it over We had a mile and a half to school tobacco field. My job was to pick off the body of the baby, then wrap the egg and a mile and a half back. After they the big green worms from the tobacco in twine and put it in the grate of the stopped working the mines, the cars and leaves. I called this a “ field of corrup­ oven and as the hot ashes fell the string track remained. We used to push one tion.” This man I worked for had left burned off and with that the disease of the cars up the hill on the tracks on would leave the body of the infant. This the Old Order Amish, for which he was our way to school and on our way home supposed to be shunned by his brothers benign kind of witchcraft was called would ride the car down again. Once “brauchen.” Sometimes they called the and sisters. They, however, helped him it jumped the track when we forgot to when he moved to a new farm he one who powwows the “hexer.” How­ brake it. I took the eighth grade exam bought on the other side of the hill. But ever, the Amish never used hex signs. when I was twelve years old. I remem­ when they sat down to a meal, there SEPTEMBER, 1986 15 were two sets of serving dishes—for the day school. I came to one man in his ton. The Beachy Amish group re­ shunned on one side of the table and for carpentry shop, where he was filing a mained .... There was a fuss in the the Old Order Amish on the other side. saw. He responded to my announce­ church about three-pointed and four- I went to Lancaster County when I was ment: “ You can just have your Sunday pointed shawls. I remember women twenty-one and could keep my earn­ school. We won’t come.” demonstrating to Father in our home ings. Singings were held on the Sunday how one way was much warmer .... In October 1936, Amos Geigley, a evenings of church services. They were At Father’s funeral they followed his Mennonite minister at Fairfield, Penn­ moved from home to home. Singings desire to have all those present whom sylvania, married to my older sister Ef- were never announced from the pulpit. he had ordained. Many of the twenty- fie, invited me to help him operate his Information got out among the young three were there. All spoke, some brief­ fruit farm so that he would have more people by word of mouth. We used the ly, some more extended. time for his ministry. Effie was Liedersammlungen, not the Ausbund, Leaving the Amish Geigley’s second wife. Amos is the one for the German singing and the Men­ who encouraged me to go on to high nonite hymnal with shaped notes for the I broke the ties in stages. First, go­ school at the age of twenty-four. I English singing. ing to Noah’s to work as a hired hand, turned toward the ministry under For weddings we had a full length then in 1934 moving to Lancaster Amos’ preaching and influence. In his church service and then went to the County, and then going to Fairfield in extensive library I read Robert Russel home of the bride for a full dinner. Each 1936 where there were no Amish. A Wicks, Kirby Page, and Georgia Hark- bridal couple had two attending cou­ final break was to join the Mennonite ness. ples, Neva bucks, who were side sitters. Church at Fairfield, then an indepen­ dent congregation. In 1937 I wrote for Amish Church Life After dinner the couple would go up­ stairs to receive guests. In the evening my church letter. I received a number I remember listening in on the they would come down for another of letters from members of our Beachy brethren discussing church problems. I meal and after supper everyone would Amish congregation protesting my wish remember a meeting when a group disperse. We had no folk games at wed­ for transfer. Brother Noah was came to discuss a church crisis with dings in the Springs area, but up in the especially concerned: “ Our children Father. My brother and I went upstairs Big Valley I remember a wedding grew up with you. You can’t leave and crawled under a bed and watched where the young people went to the them.” Ernest wrote that I had a gift and listened to the proceedings through bam to "Spiel ” for taking care of animals and that “ the the stovepipe hole in the floor .... Our Sunday school teacher was Eli dream of college will be a disappoint­ My brother Lewis joined the Mennonite Tice. I was present the day he was or­ ment.” Despite this barrage of letters, Church in Springs, and my father ex­ dained. It was a warm day. The win­ I received a letter of good standing plained: “ We didn’t have progress for dows were open. A swallow flew in. without limitations. so long on church problems so Lewis People saw that as the symbol of the The first time I came home after the went over to the Mennonites.” My presence of the Holy Spirit .... transfer, I came back wearing a double- father on one occasion reminded the Father had a great belief in fasting. breasted blue pin stripe Sears Roebuck congregation that once there had been We ate no breakfast on the day of com­ suit with tie. I had discarded my Amish disputes about manure spreaders, cream munion. At communion the bread was clothing. separators and hay loaders and how cut in the presence of the congregation. After my years of study at Messiah they had fussed about these issues and They always served the men first. I and Bluffton and before going to my eventually allowed them to be used. He thought it would have been more first pastorate at Normal, Illinois, I met didn’t see any reason for not trying to courteous to serve women first. Com­ Father. He pressed my hand and said, make adjustments to maintain die fel­ munion was a serious day. I remember “ Be a man for Christ.” I felt his en­ lowship .... There were many com­ the wooden buckets with water for the couragement. I wrote regularly to him ings and goings of Amish ministers in footwashing. The men gave each other from Normal. Father gave me his twen­ my childhood. We picked up many Old the holy kiss after they had hung up ty volume collection of Spurgeon’s ser­ Order Amish visitors at the B & O sta­ their hats and before the singing mons. Later Vera and I came home for tion in Meyersdale and brought them started .... I remember quite well a visit. We attended a service at Flag home in a three-seater springwagon joining church: going to the Kammer Run meetinghouse where Noah Yoder with top .... I remember one year (council room), where the ministers was leading the service. As we were when instruction for membership, talked to us and asked questions. seated, he leaned over to Father and which usually extended from early Father’s term for his ministry was said something. My father nodded. spring to early fall, was postponed, “ keeping house” (.Haushalten) .... After the sermon when the ministers since the church was not sufficiently When Father’s son-in-law Eli Yoder were called on for testimonies, I heard harmonious for it appropriately to take was ordained to the ministry in the Old a voice: “ Alvin Beachy you are in the in members .... I remember the first Order Amish congregation at Norfolk, same calling. You may take your op­ indication of a split when we heard the Virginia, Father spoke to Eli about his portunity to respond as you see fit.” I announcement: “ Next Sunday there duties and encouraged him in the work. spoke in Pennsylvania German, which will be a meeting at the Flag Run Eli appreciated the way Father en­ was rusty. Afterward my father said, Meetinghouse to organize a Sunday couraged my sister Amelia to stand by “ You should have spoken in English; school.” We didn’t have a telephone, her husband Eli, Old Order Amish, everyone could have understood so I was sent from house to house in the when there was a division in the church English” . . . . The hardest part of leav­ community to alert people to the fact at Norfolk. Eli and Amelia remained ing the Amish was hurting Father. that next Sunday there would be Sun- Old Order Amish and moved to Stan­ 16 MENNONITE LIFE The Role of Women in the Mennonite Transition from Traditionalism to Denoininati onal i sm

by Jim Juhnke

In the late nineteenth and early twen­ tions and oversaw relations with the called upon “ missions heroes” to win tieth centuries, organized Mennonite outside world. Mennonites read male “ missions battles.” 5 Women shared the bodies in North America established priority in the Old Testament story of same rhetoric. In 1894 Barbara Sherk new denominational institutions which creation and in New Testament injunc­ of Ontario called for “soldiers of offered new roles of leadership and tions for women to be subordinate and Christ” who would be just as eager as public activity for women. Women in silent in the church. On the other hand, volunteers for a “ dangerous military earlier decades had to be silent in the Mennonites were a nonresistant com­ expedition.” 6 To Mennonite tradition­ church. Now they could serve as Sun­ munity in which men as well as women alists, such rhetoric and spirit could be day school teachers, missionaries, col­ were taught to be humble, submissive doubly threatening. It placed women in lege teachers, deaconesses, writers for and obedient. There were traditional, new roles, and it expressed an aggres­ religious periodicals, and activists in informal sanctions against evidences of sive style that was new to Mennonites— women’s missionary societies. These pride, exercise of power or open pur­ men and women. roles were carefully limited and cir­ suit of high position. It cannot be known Perhaps the most aggressive and cumscribed, however. Women could for certain whether this ethos of humili­ talented of Mennonite women before not become major denominational ty, which was most pronounced in the the war was Ann Jemima Allebach. leaders. In the 1920s the pace of change Swiss-American groups, produced ex­ Originally from the Eden (GC) con­ slowed in the opening of women’s op­ ceptional gentleness in male-female gregation at Schwenksville, Penn­ portunities. In some cases men took family relationships. Male power and sylvania, she went to New York and control of church-related activities away priority surely had its dark side. In 1917 became a scholar, schoolteacher, and from women leaders. one young Kansas Mennonite charged church worker. In 1911 Allebach re­ It became clear that denominational that “ too often marriage is regarded as quested ordination as a minister at the institutions and attitudes could be used a license for sexual liberty, and the First Mennonite Church of Philadel­ not only to expand women’s roles, but woman the slave of the man’s de­ phia. The church said yes. Her home also to redefine and limit them. The sires.”2 Yet Mennonite males, social­ pastor, John Wenger Schantz, preach­ mosaic of Mennonite groups produced ized to nonaggressive behavior and ing the ordination sermon, explained no clear, single pattern for changing denied the catharsis of military service, that social customs of Bible times women’s roles. Those groups which ac­ grew up in a subculture which moder­ should not be used to confine women tively developed denominational institu­ ated the “ machismo” influences of in the twentieth century.7 The 1911 tions (especially “ old” Mennonites, American male violence and militar­ triennial General Conference meeting in Amish Mennonites, General Confer­ ism.3 Bluffton took up the question of ence Mennonites, and Mennonite For both men and women, the women’s ordination, a matter “ that Brethren) showed a general threefold rhetoric and style of progressive mis­ seems to be approaching our people.” development in the late nineteenth and sionary and educational work was more J. W. Kliewer, newly appointed presi­ early twentieth centuries: traditional or less at tension with the traditional dent of Bethel College, summarized the patriarchy first gave way to limited pro­ Mennonite values of humility and sub­ Biblical arguments both for and against gressive challenges and changes mission. Those once labeled the “ Quiet women’s ordination to the ministry. He and then to a conservative counter­ in the Land” now found a louder voice noted Old Testament judges and proph­ development, holding back on the pace and became more aggressive. As they etesses (Deborah, Huldah, Miriam), as of change. In these processes, Men­ did, they shifted the meaning of obe­ well as the role of women in the nonites reflected broader currents in dience to Christ from a living of ministry of Jesus and in the early American society.1 ordered relationships in community to church. The conference should not Traditional rural Mennonite and a working of a heroic cause.4 “ Every judge severely against women ministers Amish society was built on a unique normally endowed person has “ in churches where the membership is blend of both “masculine” and something of heroic valor in his being,” largely composed of women and the “ feminine” characteristics. On one wrote progressive John W. Kliewer in work largely done by them,” he hand, Mennonites constituted a patriar­ a missions article of 1901. “ He wants argued. But Kliewer was also convinced chy in which men held all public posi­ to be able to fight to win.” Kliewer that the Bible, in both the Old and the

SEPTEMBER, 1986 17 New Testaments, did not allow woman 1899, “ and minds are not to be Christian Association, or the Evangeli­ “ a position of commanding over man” ; crushed, but trained and educated.” But cal alliance, and mingled it with favorite so he concluded that women’s ordina­ in the same book Steiner also wrote: Mennonite scripture quotations and the tion was ‘‘not Biblical.” 8 There were “ America needs better homes and more Mennonite preoccupation with regu­ no further ordinations, and Allebach of them, and any trade, or position, or lated dress. became pastor of a Mennonite con­ calling that disqualifies a woman for In 1906, also in a book of moral ad­ gregation, although her occasional ser­ domestic happiness and usefulness is a vice to Mennonite young people, Cor­ mons were well attended. The First curse to the woman that enters it.” 13 nelius H. Wedel of Bethel College Mennonite Church of Philadelphia con­ Single women who exercised genuine developed a similarly idealized image tinued its openness to women’s leader­ institutional initiative, such as Alma of woman.18 Women can benefit from ship. In 1929-30 Mary E. Bakewell Doering of the Congo Inland Mission education not only to become the ob­ served the congregation for half a year or Katherina Schellenberg of the Men­ ject of the noblest interests of a man, in pastoral ministry.9 But for Mennonite nonite Brethren Mission in India, had but also to develop an elevated con­ congregations in the country and small to be seen either as potential mothers sciousness of their own worth.19 Like towns, the “approaching” matter or as exceptions to the ideal. Only in Steiner, Wedel bemoaned modern ten­ would have to wait at least three the deaconess movement was there a dencies for women to go into occupa­ generations. religiously approved role for single tions inappropriate to their nature.20 But For what, then, did women prepare women. It was not solely traditional Wedel’s point of reference was German when they flocked to Mennonite col­ Mennonites who put restrictions on culture and literature rather than the leges? The numbers of them in college women. Progressives did also, as they American home or womanhood. In a were impressive. In typical years at tried to adapt Mennonite principles to list of good sources of information Elkhart Institute and Goshen College the modern world.14 In the process they about marriage, he cited eight German from 1893 to 1930, women were forty projected a new enthusiasm for a writers, including two literary works by to fifty percent of the student body.10 reformed America or improved world. Goethe.21 He praised the depth of feel­ Progressive Mennonites tended to bor­ Lewis J. Heatwole, the Virginia Con­ ing of “ our German people” in terms row images and language from Ameri­ ference bishop and one of the founders that reflected romantic German na­ can liberalism to project their vision for of Eastern Mennonite School, referred tionalism as surely as Steiner and Hartz­ such women’s lives. This vision was not to his wife, Mary A. Coffman Heatwole ler reflected American liberal democra­ rooted in traditional understandings of (sister of evangelist John S. Coffman), cy. The purity of German family life, community, nor did it give primary as “ the queen of my home on earth.” Wedel said, contributed much to the place to women’s careers as teachers, In an essay written about 1908, Heat­ honorable achievement of “ our peo­ nurses or missionaries. The central con­ wole pictured “ woman” as an idealized ple” (“ unserm Volk” ) in history. Some cepts were rather “ motherhood” and “connecting link between men and critics complained that he slighted the “ home,” values surely implicit in tradi­ angels.” Her role was to ennoble men. Bible and quoted too much from poetry tional Mennonite culture but now ex­ “ With her garments in white and her and novels. To them Wedel responded pressed differently. Women needed character unsullied, she stands as the that his audience was already familiar education, the young progressives said, balance in power that turns the very with Biblical foundations but needed to provide high quality nurture for the wellspring of a man’s life into all ways excellent Christian literature for growth young children (boys) who would one of the true, the good, and beautifiil and development.22 Whether they day be responsible to build a better na­ things of this world.” 15 Such idealized turned to American democracy or Ger­ tion and world. In 1901 Olivia W. Good images of women’s purity, piety and man nationalism for extra-Biblical in­ of Elkhart Institute made a fervent ap­ nobility, stood over against alternative spiration, progressive Mennonite peal for meeting the hitherto crushed images of women as fallen and cor­ leaders thus found warrant for “ natural and rightful longings” of rupted victims of “ lustful villains” in educating women while limiting their women for education. As she did, she the cities. M. S. Steiner, acquainted legitimate role to a newly idealized said that woman’s “ highest duty and with the city as founder of “ old” Men­ home or family. her holiest position is in her home, nonite missions in Chicago and in Can­ Mennonite women provided a good through which she is really the ruler of ton, Ohio, provided lurid descriptions share of the material which appeared in the world.” 11 J. E. Hartzler agreed. of the fate of young girls who lost their Mennonite newspapers and religious Casting an old adage into expansive purity and virtue.16 J. E. Hartzler, ac­ periodicals in the form of unsigned rhetoric, he said that “ The power that quainted with New York City through community and church reports. This moves the world is not in standing ar­ his year at Union Theological Semi­ was true of articles selected from other mies and navies; not in political bosses; nary, graphically showed in his 1910 sources, as well as signed articles. And not in millionaires but in the maternal Paths to Perdition how unscrupulous rather often they were able to publish hand that rocks the cradle at mid­ men led and “ spoiled” helpless women over their own names. In October of night.” 12 to slide from dance to drink to adultery. 1892 editor John F. Funk published a This image of an educated mother­ In a section on the “ White Slave Traf­ Herald o f Truth issue full of articles by hood ruling the world not only justified fic,” Hartzler wrote that there are women and reproached the men for women’s attendance at college, it also “ four times as many immoral men as allowing the women to appear “ more reasserted that women’s place was in there are women.” 17 Steiner’s and earnest in the good work” and “ more the home, subordinate to men. “ She has Hartzler’s books of modern moral ex­ spiritually minded.” He hoped for more a mind of her own, as well as man,” hortation borrowed the language of the from the men, “ now that seeding time wrote progressive Menno S. Steiner in Christian Endeavor, the Young Men’s is over.” 23 The number of contributions

18 MENNONITE LIFE per year from women to Herald of ference was an outspoken opponent of Kansas, endorsed female suffrage when Truth and Gospel Herald grew tobacco and alcohol. Offended that her the issue came to a vote in that state.34 dramatically from 42 in 1884, to 173 bishop, Jonas Mininger, smoked cigars. Der Herold correspondents wrote on in 1904, to 360 in 1910. Around the Freed informed him that she would not both sides of the issue.35 Krehbiel drew turn of the century these articles mixed take communion from his hand until he attention to the achievements of women both the traditional view of women’s gave up his filthy habit. Mininger gave such as Marie Curie, Florence Nightin­ quiet virtue in church and family and it up.27 In some cases women bent or gale, and Anna Howard Shaw.36 the newer idealized view of true bypassed church rules restricting their A few Mennonite women who in­ womanhood and its wider civilizing in­ behavior. Some Mennonite women in herited or accumulated property and fluence. But there was no deviation Lancaster County in the 1920s, for ex­ money made significant individual from the theme of women’s submission ample, ignored conference rulings and financial contributions to the church and to men—-or from the importance of the took part in meetings of the “ Society to developing church institutions. In prayer covering as symbol of submis­ Farm Women.” In 1926 one Lancaster 1907 the Bluffton (Ohio) News reported sion.24 man, not quite sure whether to be that the late Louisa Kunkleman Wohl- Clara Brubaker, schoolteacher and alarmed, sent to Jacob C. Clemens, an ford Suavely had contributed more than rural missionary in Missouri, was the influential Franconia Conference $50,000 to die church.37 Mary J. Regier most prolific of “old” Mennonite leader, a newspaper clipping with the in Hillsboro contributed her savings of women writers. Between 1886 and names marked of fifteen Mennonite $20,000 to build a dormitory for 1927 she wrote some seventy-eight ar­ women who had attended a December women at Tabor College, where she ticles. Brubaker was a disciple and cor­ Society Farm Women meeting in Para­ became the first matron in 1920.38 respondent of evangelist John S. Coff­ dise.28 Conservatives held that both Wilhelmina Eisenmayer Warkentin, man until he died in 1899. After attend­ men and women should avoid the un­ widow of the wealthy Mennonite- ing Elkhart Institute in 1895-96, she equal yoke and stay away from farm tumed-Presbyterian entrepreneur Bern- boldly (but also asking pardon if she organizations, labor unions, and other hard Warkentin, gave more money than was wrong) suggested that more be worldly associations. There also were did anyone else to the Bethel Deaconess done to keep the Institute Literary families in which the wife had a Society in Newton, Kansas. In 1910 she Society within the bounds of gospel stronger personality than the husband. funded the building of a new home for simplicity. In her writings she was In 1919 Noah Byers of Bluffton visited the deaconesses; in 1916 she paid to closer to the Mennonite mainstream a family in behalf of a proposed Union have it enlarged.39 than was an aggressive pusher such as Mennonite Seminary. Reflecting on the In the postwar years, the “old” Annie Allebach. In 1893 she was one visit, he observed that even though the Mennonites’ board of missions and of five women speakers at the first husband would not commit himself to charities moved to establish organiza­ “ old” and Amish Mennonite Sunday attend an upcoming meeting, his wife tional control over the “ Mennonite school conference held in the Missouri- was obviously interested and would see Woman’s Missionary Society.” The Iowa district. She supported the that her husband attended.29 MWMS had been founded by Clara evangelical plan of salvation, but also As for women’s suffrage, Menno- Eby Steiner in 1911-12 as an indepen­ emphasized simplicity, service, and nites had double reason for not support­ dent women’s organization for financial nonresistance. She wanted both men ing it: their religious views of women’s and material support of missions and and women to abide by high and subordination and their traditional women’s education of women.40 At first uniform standards of Mennonite non­ noninvolvement in politics. In 1917 two the women, distressed by the mission conformity to the world. As the oldest “ old” Mennonite conferences— board’s threat to their agency, managed daughter in her family, she accepted an Alberta-Saskatchewan and Missouri- to stall a proposed new constitution. obligation to care for her aging parents Iowa—adopted resolutions against That was in 1920. But by 1926 they ac­ and did not marry until this task was women voting.30 In the Gospel Herald, quiesced in the Board’s takeover of the completed. In 1925 at age 55 she mar­ Daniel Kauffman agreed.31 The Chris­ Sewing Societies which were the local ried John Shank, seven years her junior. tian Exponent at its outset in 1924 listed groups of the MWMS organization. The two carried on outstanding rural four women on an editorial staff of six­ Finally in 1929 the Board created a missionary work in the Ozarks.25 After teen, a female contingent unprecedented separate committee under its own marriage, however, her visible role, at for Mennonite periodicals. Yet despite jurisdiction. With that, the independent least as a writer, declined, while her its liberal or insurgent flavor, the Ex­ MWMS went out of existence. A husband increased his writing and his ponent had surprisingly few articles on separate organization in which women public church leadership. Clara women’s rights. 32 In the more liberal exercised executive authority and Brubaker stands for the legion of Men­ General Conference, women’s suffrage handled large amounts of funds did not nonite women who willingly accepted got more attention. In 1911, Clara Rupp fit in a church group ideologically com­ subordination, yet found ways to put Welty, former piano and organ teacher mitted to women’s subordination. How­ their talents to use in family, church, at Bethel College, argued that women ever, the mission board took action and community.26 voters could help protect family life and more for organizational than for anti­ Although women did not hold church the home. In any case, she wrote, “ A feminist reasons. The men who engi­ positions over men, they could use woman’s place is at the side of a man, neered the takeover, particularly San­ moral power to challenge the bishops not beneath him.” 33 In 1912, a time ford C. Yoder, executive secretary of on specific issues. Barbara Freed of the when female suffrage was coming up the mission board, intended to cen­ Line Lexington congregation in the for vote in Kansas, Christian E. tralize their organization and make it Franconia “old” Mennonite Con­ Krehbiel, editor of Der Herold in more efficient. There were bureaucratic

SEPTEMBER, 1986 19 munities of the General Conference of Mcnnonitcs of "W edel, Briefliche Blaetter, 21. reasons for change (much like a case in North America,” (M.A. thesis, Bluffton College and ’“Wedel, Briefliche Blaetler, 102. the Presbyterian Church in 1922, in Mennonite Seminnry, 1917), p. 99. "W edel, Briefliche Blae tier, 25. ’The impact o f the Mennonite nonresistant ethos upon "W edel, Briefliche Blaetter, 103-4. which in the course of restructuring its male-female roles has not been systematically studied. "John F. Funk, Herald o f Truth, 29 (October 15, boards and agencies the church ab­ Gayle Gerber Koontz alluded to the issue in her 1985 1892), 312. Bethel College Bible Lectures, "Two Bodies, One Bi­ "Klingelsmith, “ Women,” 176-77. sorbed an independent Woman’s Board ble: Women, Men, and the Word of God,” Schowalter "Theron Schlabach, Gospel Versus Gospel (Scottdale: Oral History Collection, MLA. David Augsburger's Herald Press, 1980), 159. , of Home Missions).41 Ph.D. dissertation produced evidence against the notion "Priscilla Stuckey Kauffman, “ Clara (Brubaker) Clara Eby Steiner and her friends that the repressed anger of the pacifist results in dysfunc­ Shank 1869-1958, Daughter of the Quickening; Rural tional or aggressive behavior of other kinds, and for the Missionary in Missouri,” Research paper at Associated were victims of “old” Mennonite notion that "cognitive redefinition” of enemies as poten­ Mennonite Biblical Seminaries, 1981. reorganization in the 1920s. Carried out tial friends itself drains anger and allows for productive "R uth, Maintaining the Right Fellowship, 435. and gentle responses. ’■"Women of Farm Hold Meeting,” unidentified by the Daniel Kauffman generation, the ‘Thcron Schlabach, "The Humble Become ‘Ag­ newspaper clipping (dated December 15,1926) attached reorganization not only co-opted the in­ gressive Workers': Mcnnonitcs Organize for Mission, to letter from John B. Scnger to J. C. Clemens, 1880-1910,” MQR, 52 (April 1978), 113-26. December 20, 1926, Clemens Collection, Franconia dependent women’s organization, but ’Klicwcr, "Rucckblick ueber die Missionsthaetigkeit Conference Archives. des letzten Jahrhunderts und Ausblick in das 20. ’’Letter from Noah E. Byers to J. E. Hartzler, also reconstructed Goshen College, Jahrhundert,” Christlicher Bundesbote, 20 (July 18, November 24, 1919, Hartzler Collection, Box 4, folder, phased out the relief commission, 1901), 1. The article was continued in the July 25 and AMC. August issues. The quotations are taken from the August ’“Klingclsmith, “ Women in the Mennonite Church,” disciplined and excluded change- 1 issue, p. 1. 175. minded congregations, and successful­ ‘Sherk, “ If God is for Us, Who Can Be Against Us,” "Klingclsmith, 180. Herald o f Truth, 31 (April 1, 1894), 98. Quoted by "Based upon a topical index of Christian Exponent ly opposed the Youth Conference and Theron Schlabach in “The Humble Become ‘Aggressive articles prepared for the Mennonite Experience in the Christian Exponent. In other Men­ Workers,’ ” p. 114. America project, in possession of the author. ’Ruth, Maintaining the Right Fellowship, 411-13,445. "Clara Rupp Wclty, “ Frauenstimmrecht,” Der nonite branches as well, the 1920s were ■J. W. Kliewer, “ Is the Ordination of Women to the Herold, 25 (March 2, 1911), 3. a time of conservative consolidation Gospel Ministry Biblical.” (sic) Paper read to the 19th "Krehbicl editorial, Der Herold, 26 (October 24, Session of the General Conference, Bluffton, Ohio, 1912), 4. rather than of progressive change. A August 31-September 6, 1911. Printed in the Supple­ "J. E. Wiebe, “ Das Stimmrecht fucr Frauen,” Der side effect was that the times were not ment to The Mennonite, 27 (April 11, 1912), 41-51. Herold, 26 (October 31, 1912); A woman correspon­ ’Christine Kaufmann and Priscilla Stuckey Kauffman, dent "Korr,” Der Herold (October 31, 1912). friendly to radical changes in women’s "Mennonite Women's Calendar,” (Notre Dame: ’‘Krehbicl, "Fraucnrccht anerkannt," Der Herold, 25 Womensage, 1983), date April 20. Seventy-fifth Anniver­ (November 9. 1911). 4; Krehbicl, “Florence roles. sary of the First Mennonite Church of Philadelphia Nightingale,” Der Herold, 26 (December 19, 1912), 4; (Philadelphia: First Mennonite Church, 1940). 24. Krehbiel, “ Women Demand Wars Shall End,” Der '“Sharon Klingelsmith, "Women in the Mennonite Herold, 33 (August 28, 1919), 3. Church, 1900-1930.” MQR, 54 (July 1980), 172-73. "Noted in Christine Kaufmann and Priscilla Stuckey Kauffman, "Mennonite Women's Calendar,” date ENDNOTES "Good, “ Girls in Education,” Institute Monthly, 3 (June 15, 1901), 150-51. September 26. ’■Kaufmann and Kauffman, date March 4. 'For general studies of the roles of women in "Hartzler, Paths to Perdition (Scottdale: Mennonite Publishing House, 1910), 199. ’’Katie Funk Wicbc, Our Lamps Were Lit (Newton, American society see Carl N. Dcgler, At Odds. Women KS: Bethel Deaconess Hospital School of Nursing Alum­ and the Family in America from the Revolution to the "Steiner, Pitfalls and Safeguards (Elkhart: Mennonite Publishing Company, 1899), 176-77, 147. nae Association, 1978), 112. Present (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980); ‘“Melvin Gingerich, “ The Mennonite Woman's Mis­ Page Smith, Daughters o f the Promised Land (Boston: "For another statement of these same values by a pro­ gressive Mennonite educator, sec N. E. Byers, "Nor­ sionary Society,” MQR, 37 (April and July, 1963), Little, Brown and Company, 1970); Peter Gabriel 113-125 and 214-233; Klingclsmith, "Women in the Filene, Him/Her/Self: Sex Roles in Modem America mal Life of W oman," GH, 2 (April 4, 1908), 14-15. "Heatwole, “ Why I Wanted My Wife to be My Mennonite Church,” 195-201; Elaine Sommers Rich, (New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1974), For Mennonite Women (Scottdale: Herald Press, 1983), an excellent feminist historical summary and conceptual Wife,” Youth’s Christian Companion, 23 (November 29, 1942), 380-82. 201-06. framework see the essays by Rosemary R. Ructhcr in "Elizabeth Howell Vcrdesi, In But Still Out "Steiner, Pitfalls, 72-73. Ruether and Bianchi, From Machismo to Mutuality: (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1973, 1976). Essays on Sexism and Woman-Man Liberation (New ■’Hartzler, Paths, 191, 235, 246. York: Paulist Press, 1976). "C . H. Wedel, Briefliche Blaetter an einen Lernenden ’Edmund George Kaufman, “ Social Problems and ueber Bildung, Gesellschafts- und Heiratsfragen Opportunities of the Western District Conference Com­ (Newton: Bethel College, 1906).

Poems

by Elmer Suderman

GRANDFATHER’S FOOTSTEPS

Kansas lies flat under Spring moonlight carefully picked in Russia’s Steppes for hours in every green direction. and brought in the old chest I walk on that green across the Atlantic on the Nederland and enter a magic land. and then on the Santa Fe

The young wheat is busy growing to Peabody. I stop deep in a trance it’s been to hear wheat growing. holding every Spring since Grandfather Listen! Grandfather’s footsteps planted his first plump seeds can be heard in the moonlight.

20 MENNONITE LIFE FATHER TALKS TO HIS HORSE CHEROKEE STRIP—SEPTEMBER 16, 1893

You love this land like I do, What heat! don’t you Florie, A hundred in the shade red and stubborn as it is, And no shade! and full of alkali spots The south wind blows where nothing grows, Everlastingly a land full of cockleburs your coat Howling the heat along and my pants legs catch. From Texas, burning every green thing We’ve plowed under it old solitude On its way across the sizzling prairie. many times, you pulling, I guiding the old walking plow, I stand the free-blowing wind Waiting, sluicing sheets of rain on us, Waiting for the crack on clearer days nothing breaking Of the rifle at noon. sun’s light. Waiting to stake my claim We were strangers once, but no more. For land where only a Hostile those first few years, Few years ago Buffalo grazed. the soil is good now, trained to gulp down clouds, sun, rain and snow. I taste the heat I can talk to grass and you. Biting my tongue. Together our sweat I smell the acrid grass. and the weather I see only have given us laughing, dancing Untouched prairie, Red Turkey Wheat rows, No trees, no building, and a place, a place, No trails feeling we own, a home, Their way through miles of grass. a land to be buried in. Nothing but dry grass In a dry September Stretching as far south and east And west as I can see.

RESERVE MORE EXPRESSIVE THAN WORDS

As silent as the Oklahoma prairies on that first night you spent under that endless sky, you did not search for words to express your inner life, THE SPARROW’S STORY your reserve more expressive than words. Father when you locked At the county fair tractors dressed in John Deere green your arms beyond words and Allis Chalmers orange looking I knew what you meant, like athletes long in training heard what you said. nonchalantly wait their turn in the tractor pulling contest. A sparrow tells me he has just come from the horse heaven where old horses who WORDLESS SECRETS used to be here watch enviously as tractors especially souped-up When father homesteaded a quarter section pull more than horses could. of rabbits, rattlesnakes and windy They complain to each other buffalo grass sweeping buffalo wallows, and to the god of he brought along Low German thoughts. horses that it’s a Words, if he had any, were shame for machines to take swallowed by empty acres, their place. Embarrassed, one old drowned out by wind’s paragraphs, mare, nevertheless, places bets on or turned under broken sod. the Allis Chalmers. She loses, He had wordless secrets, just as she always did or thoughts he did not need when she entered the contests or care to find words for. long long horse years ago.

SEPTEMBER, 1986 21 An Urban Mennonite Church— The First Two Decades by Rachel Waltner Goossen

In 1912, thirty-five persons joined in an upstairs room of Baumgart’s store six hundred was on hand to help together as members of the First Men­ on the northwest corner of Hovey and dedicate the new building. Schantz em­ nonite Church of Normal, Illinois. The Main in Normal. Of the cramped phasized the evangelistic mission of the new town church was the sixth Men­ quarters, one person wrote: “ It has in­ new church. Joseph King, minister at nonite congregation established in deed reminded us of the upper room in Carlock, presided over the special ser­ McLean County.1 It affiliated with the which the disciples gathered.” 4 vices. Guest ministers from the Central Central Illinois Conference of Men- Neighborhood children had attended the Conference preached throughout the nonites and served persons of Amish Sunday school meeting, and during the day, including A. B. Rutt of Chicago Mennonite heritage. Many of these had next few days Schantz and several and Valentine Strubhar of Washington, lived in outlying rural communities and others visited their homes. Attendance Illinois. A reporter for the Bloomington had moved to Normal for retirement. at the next week’s gathering doubled. Pantograph wrote: “ The church is a First Mennonite was a comparatively Schantz built a home on Osage Street very pretty and well built little struc­ late arrival on the Mennonite scene in in Normal and began visiting with local ture. The prospects look towards a large central Illinois. In 1912, Normal and Mennonites about building a church on congregation.” 8 Bloomington were established regional the west side of town. Throughout the building phase and centers for business and industry, The growing Sunday school needed into 1912, Schantz continued to serve education and government. By organiz­ an adequate meeting place. It moved to the church. Since it had never formal­ ing First Mennonite, minister Peter Smith School, located a block south of ized its membership, many in the Con­ Schantz hoped to reach the “ non- Hovey Avenue, where Schantz began ference referred to it as the “ Mennonite churched” of Normal.2 preaching. Within a year, the Normal mission church” and associated it with The Mennonite Church of Normal, as “ mission” decided to build. Schantz the large East White Oak congregation. it is now called, has roots in the historic and two local men, Peter Augspurger The new mission church brought to Nor­ North Danvers Mennonite Church, and Samuel Kaufman, chose two adja­ mal religious speakers of such stature considered the “ mother church” of at cent lots at the corner of University as Dr. Charles A. Blanchard, president least seven congregations, and in the and Plum Streets. The building of a new of Wheaton College in Wheaton, Il­ East White Oak Mennonite Church, church at the site prompted Normal’s linois. Early in 1912, neighborhood organized in 1892 by minister Peter city council to change the name of Plum residents gathered at the church to hear Schantz of the North Danvers commu­ Street to “ Church Street.”5 three presentations by Blanchard on the nity.3 For more than a quarter of a cen­ The cost of the land in the 1911 trans­ controversial issue of lodge member­ tury, Schantz served the large rural East action was seven hundred dollars. The ship. One person who attended the lec­ White Oak congregation. In 1899 a committee hired contractor Charles tures commented: “ His presentation of younger man, Emanuel Troyer, joined Sakemiller to complete the modest substantial and reliable facts convinced him and gradually assumed congrega­ frame building by the summer of 1911. a few of the errors of the lodge. We tional responsibilities. Men of the church helped with con­ trust they may be further led to separa­ In his later years, Schantz led a struction. Farmer Philip Bertram tion of the same.”9 remarkable career in church planting. brought in a team of horses and a By inviting outside speakers, Schantz As a young man, he had assisted Amish scraper to dig the basement.6 The cost hoped to keep alive the mission fervor Mennonite Bishop Joseph Stuckey with of the church, with heat, light, water, which had sparked his vision for a city evangelism and church work in Illinois, and furnishings totaled $3,654.70, a church. Indeed, the church drew in non- Indiana, Nebraska, and elsewhere. sum raised by treasurer Samuel Kauf­ Mennonites as well as Mennonites. One After Schantz helped to establish the man and other solicitors. A. H. Patton, example was George Washington King. Central Illinois Conference of Men- a son-in-law of Schantz, recorded that In his retirement years, this Civil War nonites in 1908, he turned almost ex­ “ many from the other churches of the veteran lived near the church, on clusively to mission work. This led him Conference met with us and showed the Franklin Avenue. Interested in the ac­ to Normal, site of the Conference’s first true Missionary Spirit by their liberali­ tivities of the Mennonite church, King urban congregation. ty and cooperation in helping us to com­ “ was as regular as possible in atten­ On July 24, 1910, Schantz gathered pletely cancel the debt incurred.”7 dance and was much interested in the twenty-five persons for Sunday school On Sunday, July 2, 1911, a crowd of building up of the Kingdom of Christ.” 10

22 MENNONITE LIFE In 1912, Schantz preached his funeral service. In February of 1912, Schantz in­ troduced Mennonite evangelist Lee Lantz of Nampa, Idaho, to the con­ gregation. Lantz led the Normal church in a two-week revival while other town churches hosted their own protracted meetings. Lantz’s evening messages were only part of the Mennonite effort. Pearl Ramseyer and Elsie Nierstheimer played the piano, and John Rosehart of Meadows assisted with his cornet. Elizabeth Streid performed gospel solos and the congregation joined in the “ old time hymns.” The campaign also in­ cluded a “ house to house canvass of the neighborhood.” By the time the revival concluded, ten persons had accepted Christ and others were “ seriously con­ sidering the matter of their souls’ salvation.” 11 On March 27, 1912, thirty-five per­ sons, including six whom Schantz had baptized during revival, joined together as charter members of the First Men­ nonite Church of Normal. Frank Bertram—at present the sole surviving charter member of the congregation- joined the church with his parents and two older sisters.12 The new congrega­ tion elected as its first deacons John Ropp, Albert Nafziger, and Samuel Kaufman and applied for membership in the Central Conference. No longer was the church at Normal a “ Men­ nonite mission.” In May of 1912, Schantz led the con­ gregation’s first Communion service. The event marked the formal end to his leadership at First Mennonite, for he asked the congregation to call Lee Lantz as pastor. As Schantz turned to other agendas of home mission at Chicago, Peoria, and elsewhere, he challenged the new congregation with the words of John 4:35: “ Say not ye, there are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? Behold, I say unto you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, for they are white already to harvest.” 13 By 1913, church attendance rose to one hundred, and organizations within the church—Ladies’ Aid, Junior and Senior Christian Endeavor, and men’s and women’s Bible classes—met regu­ larly. The Sunday school elected of­ ficers. A newly formed choir rehearsed Top left. Peter Shantz. from the songbook Great Revival Top right. William Grubb Hymns.14 Bina Denier, a member of the Center. Sketch o f the original building (1911) o f the First Mennonite Church, newly organized congregation, wrote of corner o f University and Church Streets. development in Normal: Bottom. Young people o f the congregation, ca. 1928.

SEPTEMBER, 1986 23 We are encouraged by having others of leaders of the period, conducted his the congregation during its early years? our people moving here .... Just keep ministry without pay. To support his The Mennonite congregation at Normal a coming. Normal is a very desirable was a more heterogeneous group than place to live with the best educational ad­ family, Lantz did carpentry work, vantages as well as the conveniences of raised corn, and with his sons ran a its sister congregations in the rural com­ two large, modern cities, taxes are not dairy delivery route. Members of the munities. But there existed a core of high and property is comparatively rea­ congregation contributed to the family’s elderly Mennonites, most of whom had sonable in price though it is advancing welfare by helping with some of the moved to Normal for retirement. Many rapidly. If you chance to be in the city of these were farmers. The majority of over Sunday, come and worship with farming responsibilities. During the us.ls early years, financial commitment to workers in the church held semiskilled The church placed high priority on the church was minimal on the part of positions. Some were carpenters and children. Beginning in 1914, the con­ most members, who were assessed a painters; others worked for the railroad gregation observed Children’s Day with “poll tax” of one and a half dollars at companies or at local factories. Among a special service promoting the ac­ the beginning of each year.19 the few businessmen of the congrega­ complishments of Sunday school pupils. Lantz was foremost an evangelist. On tion were several automobile dealers, Related to the Sunday school efforts Sunday mornings, he “ preached till the an inventor, a meat market operator, was Junior Christian Endeavor (C. E.), tears rolled from his eyes.” 20 His and an industrialist who co-owned the a society for children modeled after the strength lay in persuading crowds as he large Meadows Manufacturing Com­ adult Christian Endeavor program. On moved from place to place; he was not, pany in Bloomington, which produced Sunday evenings, children of the ultimately, a “ church builder.” 21 In washing machines and portable eleva­ neighborhood attended missionary and 1912 Lantz invited to the community a tors.23 music programs along with the children popular revivalist, Ira E. Hicks of Other members of the congregation of Mennonite church members.16 Topeka, Kansas, and together the two found ways to support themselves dur­ The Central Conference churches, as men led a five-week evangelistic cam­ ing retirement. Older men engaged in well as those of other denominations, paign in Normal. Afterwards, Lantz part-time work. Couples and widows considered Junior C. E. a major instru­ was absent from his pastorate for ex­ kept rooming houses for university ment for leading young persons to tended periods. During his six years at students. Occasionally students attend­ Christian commitment. Children aged Normal, he traveled to Nebraska, In­ ed church with their Mennonite land­ ten to fourteen were prime candidates diana, and Pennsylvania to lead lords, and a few eventually joined the for baptism. Elsie Stahly, presently a revivals. In 1914, a member of First Mennonite congregation. One widow, member of the Mennonite Church of Mennonite noted: “ As winter comes, Anna (Stalter) Mohr, provided a home Normal, came from a non-Mennonite our pastor is gone a good deal, but if for her grandchildren when they background in McLean County. Her the Lord needs him in other places in reached high school age and kept Il­ childhood experiences with Christian Evangelistic work, we must not com­ linois State Normal University boarders Endeavor demonstrate its appeal to plain but wish him God’s blessing in his as well.26 midwestem Protestants of that era: work.” 22 Not all families were “ ethnic Men­ nonites.” A study of members during When I was fourteen years old, I went In his stead, visiting ministers from forward at an old fashioned revival the Conference filled the pulpit. Prior First Mennonite’s first decade shows meeting. That year the Mennonites had to 1920, the most frequent of these was that just over half of the members who tent meetings and the whole high school Peter Schantz. But other Conference belonged to the congregation prior to went. Rev. Emanuel Troyer [of the East men helped out as well: Emanuel 1920 were fully “ ethnic Mennonite.” 27 White Oak congregation] preached that night. A friend of mine came over to me Troyer, Benjamin Esch, John Kin- Most of these were persons of Amish and asked me if I was ready to go, so singer, A. B. Rutt, Valentine Strubhar, Mennonite heritage whose Alsatian we walked down towards the front and others. Moreover, several Men­ Amish ancestors had immigrated be­ together. That was in the fall of 1914 and nonite ministers moved to Normal and tween 1830 and 1860. A minority in March of 1915 I was baptized in the descended from the Pennsylvania Danvers Presbyterian Church .... I participated in church life. Youthful became active in the Christian Endeavor Julius Oesch, for example, was a man Amish, and some of the "ethnic Men­ of the Presbyterian Church. That was of conviction. In speeches and in nonites” descended from a mixture of where I learned to do public speaking.17 writings, he rallied against the “ modem Alsatians, Pennsylvania Amish, and Baptismal services at First Mennonite religions [of] Christian Science, Hessians. Significantly, nearly a quarter in Normal were held several times a Unitarianism, Russelism, Spiritualism, of the early members had no Mennonite year to bring new converts into the Mohammedanism, etc.” He spoke on family connections. Some had lived in church. Although “ pouring” was the behalf of the temperance movement. the East White Oak neighborhood and traditional method of baptism practiced “ Are you ready to undertake the task?” attended that church before transferring by the East White Oak Mennonites and Oesch asked. “If you are even a to Normal. The majority of the “ non-, other Central Conference congrega­ moderate drinker, ‘Quit sin and serve ethnic Mennonites,” however, lived in tions, Normal pastor Lee Lantz accom­ God,’ become a rescuer for God and the neighborhood of the small frame modated three newcomers to the Nor­ throw your influence against the traf­ church. While some dropped away mal church who requested immersion.18 fic that sends so many to hell.” 23 In within a few years, a considerable Lantz, ordained in 1899, was a native 1914, the First Mennonite Church of number became Mennonite and re­ of Congerville, Illinois. After preaching Normal adopted by unanimous vote a mained Mennonite. Finally, another for several years in Nampa, Idaho, resolution endorsing the movement for fourth of the early members were per­ Lantz moved to Osage Street in Nor­ a national, constitutional Prohibition.24 sons who had some Mennonite and mal. Lantz, like other Mennonite Who were the people who made up some non-Mennonite background. In 24 MENNONITE LIFE many cases, a parent had married out­ the end of the war, personal conflicts General Conference man, William H. side the Mennonite fold.28 developed between pastor Lee Lantz Grubb, and offered him $150 a month, Central Conference Mennonites were and some of his parishioners, and in a salary higher than was customary in progressive in their views towards in­ 1918 he returned to Nampa, Idaho. In Mennonite churches.36 Grubb had been termarriage and other matters of social the aftermath of the controversy, other educated at Temple University and consequence. Stylish dress and the use families also left the church. Lee Hartz- Eastern Pennsylvania Seminary. A of musical instruments never caused ler, a young minister from the Men­ former president of the Eastern District controversy in the Normal congrega­ nonite Gospel Mission in Chicago, was Conference (General Conference), he tion. Walter Ropp, a member at East the next pastor to come to Normal. came from a distinguished Mennonite White Oak who later joined First Men­ Hartzler served only a few months at family. His father, Nathaniel B. Grubb, nonite, teased his fellow churchgoers Normal before poor health forced him had pioneered in city ministry during a about coveting the lifestyle of other Pro­ to resign. career at the First Mennonite Church of testants: “ The plain clothes, caps and In the spring of 1919, a General Con­ Philadelphia. William Grubb’s older aprons . . . are all dead, so if we want ference minister from eastern Penn­ brother, Silas, was a minister and adornments and other doodads we can sylvania, Andrew S. Bechtel, accepted scholar of Mennonite history. have them. . . . We’re just like the a call to Normal. Bechtel emphasized William Grubb himself was an able other folks now and that makes us feel inter-Mennonite cooperation, and he writer and historian. In 1916 he better.” 29 edited the Central Conference’s Chris­ published a history of the Mennonites The Central Conference Mennonites’ tian Evangel from his Bloomington of Butler County, Ohio. While at Nor­ accommodation to American ways car­ home. The first salaried minister of the mal, he continued to pursue his interests ried over to their perspectives on na­ congregation, he received eighty dollars in writing and history. During his first tional and world affairs. In 1914, for a month and lived in a house rented by year there, he founded the yearbook of example, the Christian Endeavor Socie­ the church.34 Bechtel had served First the Central Conferences of Menno­ ty at Normal sponsored a program on Mennonite for just over a year when he nites.37 To local organizations he gavq current events. Several persons of the decided to move his family to Pulaski, presentations such as “ Mennonite Mis­ church delivered speeches on topics Iowa. Before leaving Normal, he ad­ sionary Activities Beginning with the such as “ Some Commendable Charac­ vocated a shift towards full-time, pro­ Mennonites of Holland.” 38 The presi­ teristics of President Wilson.” 30 As the fessional leadership in the Central Con­ dent of Illinois State Normal Universi­ World War became a dominant event, ference churches. Said Bechtel: “ It is ty, an agnostic, learned to know Grubb most Mennonites of the area supported not physically possible for a man to be and invited the Mennonite minister to American involvement. Mennonites, working hard at some occupation most address the full student body with a including those at First Mennonite in of the week and then come into the series of lectures on the history of Normal, purchased liberty bonds. Ap­ pulpit on a Sunday morning. . . . God religion. This Grubb did.39 parently none of the men from the Nor­ has called us to do His work in the During the seven years that the Grubb mal congregation were of draft age dur­ church, there are enough others to do family lived in Normal, the church ac­ ing the war. the farm work.” 35 quired its first parsonage. Jacob Schad, Pro-government sentiment ran strong The congregation at Normal took an elderly deacon and retired farmer of in most Central Conference families. Bechtel’s message to heart. In 1921 the the congregation, built a large brick Many central Illinois Mennonites had church called another easterner and home directly west of the church on close business and personal ties with their non-Mennonite neighbors.31 The war issue was so explosive that Men­ nonite children in Normal avoided disclosing to their schoolmates the fact of their German ancestry.32 Trouble over the war issue was something most families wanted to avoid. The costs of publicly challenging the prevailing view became clear when Emanuel Troyer of East White Oak Mennonite Church “ draped a flag over the pulpit and preached a sermon in which he ex­ plained provisions in the Constitution that provided for conscience.” Troyer believed that conscientious objection was a legitimate part of the spectrum of patriotic behavior. But an indignant group outside the congregation dis­ agreed—and plotted to tar and feather him.33 Meanwhile, at First Mennonite in Normal, the congregation’s focus shifted to problems at home. Towards SEPTEMBER, 1986 •’Frank Bertram interview. University Street. The Grubb family and walked to church each week with ’’Quoted in First Mennonite Church Minute moved in, but the parsonage remained her husband, Andrew. Younger people Book, 1912. in church hands for only a brief time. of the church remember that the Ander­ 14“ Church Correspondence,” Christian Evangel, August 1913, p. 320. In 1922 Schad was killed in an inter- sons had one pair of glasses which they ” Bina Denier, “ Church Correspondence,” urban and automobile collision. After passed between them as they read Christian Evangel, May 1912, p. 232. scripture.45 In addition to serving as 16“ Church Correspondence,” Christian his death, the house on University Evangel, February 1915, p. 72. Street was deeded to several of his deaconesses, women of the congrega­ ’’Evelyn Bertsche, “ Interview with Elsie S.,” eighteen children. In 1924 the tion gave leadership in a variety of transcription of interview with Elsie Stahly, ways. In 1920 Lillie Heck joined four January 19, 1986, p. 25. In Bertsche’s possession. minister’s family moved to Hovey ‘'Information provided by Mabel Bertram, Nor­ Avenue.40 Twenty years would pass men in publishing the Constitution of mal, IL, April 30, 1986. before the church would have another the Sunday school. Others contributed ’’Minutes, Church Board Minute Book, 1913-1920; Mary Sharp letter to the author, Oc­ parsonage. as teachers, as officers of the Christian tober 17, 1985. The church had an entrance stoop on Endeavor Society, and with music. ’’Frank Bertram interview. Mabel Nafziger (Bertram), a musician ’’Interview with R. L. Hartzler, Bloomington, the University Street comer which IL, October 8, 1985. served as a gathering place for educated at Illinois Wesleyan Univer­ ’’“ Church Correspondence,” Christian neighborhood children. Behind the sity, served as pianist.46 Evangel, November 1914, p. 435. A major congregational event during ” “ A Consideration,” Christian Evangel, June church the children played ball during 1912, p. 286. the daytime and “ Blackman” at night. the twenties was the remodeling of the ’••“ Resolution,” Church Board Minute Book, They also played around the hitching church. The small frame building had January 1914. ’’Research by Myma Park provided to the posts located along the east side and become too crowded. After a plan to author, February 18, 1986. northeast corner of the church. One of build at a Bloomington site failed, the ’«Ibid. deacons proposed modest improvements ’’Figures on membership are derived from the Grubbs’ sons, Norman, recalls hav­ Park’s study of the 1985 congregational “ Fami­ ing to mow around those posts “ which on the building at the comer of Church ly History Charts” and her study of church had long since served their useful­ and University. A local construction membership lists from 1912 to 1920. crew removed the outside comer steps ’“Research by Park provided to the author, ness.” 41 February 18 and March 3, 1986. Under William Grubb’s leadership, and added an entrance onto the west ’’Walter Ropp, “ East White Oak History,” c. the church grew rapidly. During his side. Carpenters erected a bell tower 1932, p. 5, hand copied from the original by Elsie and restructured the classrooms, kitch­ Slonekcr, I-B-51, Mennonite Church of Normal first eight months at Normal, twenty Archives. persons joined the congregation.42 en, storage, and fellowship areas.47 ’°“ Church Correspondence,” Christian In the spring of 1928, at the conclu­ Evangel, February 1914, p. 72. Many in the congregation liked to hear ’’Interview with John Miller, Meadows, IL, a good sermon in German, and Grubb sion of the remodeling project, William November 16, 1985; Greg Stucky, “ Interview took such occasions as “Old Folk’s Grubb left for a Congregational parish with Lloyd Ramsey er,” in Voices Against War: in Cobden, Illinois. The next pastor to The Schowalter Oral History Collection on World Day” to preach in German. Yet the War I Conscientious Objection, tape #137, 1970, congregation included neighbors of serve First Mennonite would be Mennonite Library and Archives, North Newton, very different backgrounds. A block Emanuel Troyer, a leader in the Cen­ KS. ’’Information provided by Mabel Bertram, Nor­ south lived an elderly black woman who tral Conference and a promoter of Men­ mal, IL, April 30, 1986. had done field work as a slave girl nonite institutions. ’’Maurice Troyer letter to the author, October 30, 1985. generations earlier. “ Mammie Lee,” as 34Minutes, Church Board Minute Book, 1919. she was called, told the neighborhood ENDNOTES ’’“ Church Correspondence,” Christian children what slavery had been like and Evangel, September 1920, p. 250. ’'Minutes, Church Board Minute Book, March attended Sunday night services. Another 'The other five were the Hessian Meeting/South Danvers Church (1841), Rock Creek 27, 1921; Interview with R. L. Hartzler, Bloom­ black family of the neighborhood, the Meeting/North Danvers Church (1851), Meadows ington, IL, October 7, 1985. Calamees, operated a barbershop and Mennonite Church (1890), East White Oak Men­ ’’William Grubb, History o f the Mennonites nonite Church (1892), and Anchor Mennonite o f Butler County, Ohio (Trenton, OH: The author, came to church occasionally. A white 1916); Year Book of the Central Conference of Church (1894). family of the neighborhood, the Nor- ’“Brief History of the First Mennonite Mennonites (n.p: n.p., 1922). gaards, never attended, but they con­ Church,” Sixtieth Anniversary: First Mennonite ’'“ Church Correspondence,” Christian Church (Normal, IL: Anniversary Committee, Evangel, April 1923, p. 91; “Mennonite tributed regularly. Apparently, their History,” Christian Evangel, June 1921, pp.- 1972), p. 1. view that “ the church helped to keep ’Steven R. Estes, A Goodly Heritage: A History 123-26. ” Transcription of tape by James Grubb, Palm a good neighborhood” was shared by of the North Danvers Mennonite Church (Danvers, IL: North Danvers Mennonite Church, Harbor, FL, November 1985, p. 3. other local families.43 But many 1982), pp. 125-26. 4DFrank Bertram interview. neighbors who participated in church 4‘‘Field Notes," Christian Evangel, October 4INorman.Grubb letter to the author, November 12, 1985; James Grubb transcription, p. 1. life in one way or another never joined. 1910, p. 3. 5Pantograph, 12 August 1911, p. 7. 4’“ Church Observes Anniversary Date,” Pan­ When an outsider asked: “ Why is the interview with Frank Bertram, Normal, IL, tograph, 1922 clipping in Scrapbook I, Mennonite church not its present size?,” Grubb November 21, 1985. Church of Normal Archives. ’First Mennonite Church Minute Book, 1912, 4’Grubb transcription, pp. 3-4. responded, “Mennonite peculiarities.1,44 44Penned notations on “ A Questionnaire,” Mennonite Church of Normal Archives. Throughout the early years, the con­ 1925, in Harry F. Weber Collection, Archives BPantograph, 3 July 1911; p. 9. of the Mennonite Church, Goshen, IN. gregation met on New Year’s Day for ’“ Field Notes,” Christian Evangel, April 1912, 4SInterview with Myma Park, Normal, IL, its annual business session. In 1925 the p. 182. November 16, 1985. congregation voted to allow women to ,0‘‘Obituaries,” Christian Evangel, June 1912, 46Mabcl Bertram, “ Music in First Mennonite p. 281. Church of Normal,” undated, in possession of become deaconesses. The first woman '•‘‘Church Correspondence,” Christian the author. to hold this elected office was Minnie Evangel, March 1912, p. 133; “ Mennonite 47Minutes, Church Board Minute Book, Church Revival,” Pantograph, 12 February 1922-1926. Anderson, an elderly woman of Swed­ 1912; “The Mennonite Revival,” Pantograph, ish descent who taught Sunday school 17 February 1912.

26 MENNONITE LIFE Mennonites, Aesthetics and Buildings by Calvin Redekop

* Adapted from a paper presented at the Russia by how much frost the barn grew up that way even in the New Sarasota Builders’ Conference, Sara­ would develop on the walls in the cat­ World. sota, Florida, 22-24 January 1986. tle area which was right next to the First of all, then, the Mennonite house. And if it got really cold, they buildings were, in terms of the architec­ For an introduction I will make an ex- would open the doors from the stable tural structure, very Junctional, which egetical application of a wag who said, part of the bam to the house. The smells resulted in very simple and very honest “In Sarasota about 90 percent of the would get rather strong, but the house architecture. There was nothing false or buildings are beautiful. The rest are kept warm. pretentious, i.e., dysfunctional. The built by Mennonites.” I think there is Those of you who have seen an Old homes we visited yesterday were beau­ a very interesting and good reason why Order Mennonite church will recognize tiful, but in one of the houses, a this type of joke comes about: beauty it immediately. I think there is no type cathedral house, the beams were nailed is something very, very problematic of church building that is exactly like on, and I am sure if I had grabbed them and complex. I would like to propose that of the Old Order or the Amish and I could have pulled them down. But that Mennonites have had some special other plain groups of Mennonites. So traditional Mennonite architecture difficulties with beauty, with aesthetics. why were they designed this way? If would never have this kind of structure. I you go inside, you recognize that the A beam would be an authentic beam auditorium always has the chancel or that would hold up the roof. This il­ Mennonites have adapted and the pulpit along the elongated side of the lustrates that wood is for the purpose developed some very important styles building. The builders had a deep func­ of covering or bearing or whatever, not and types of architecture. One needs to tional insight: the preacher or the pulpit for decoration. mention only the Alsatian farms, the bench was close to everybody. They There is thus a way in which the Swiss Mennonite churches—one could probably did not verbalize it in terms designs spoke for the purpose, for the recognize them anywhere. The Dutch of the abstract theory, but functionally practice which then reflected the ideas. Mennonites also developed their own they developed it because they had I think the best illustration is the 'architectural style. It clearly was a many Vorsaenger, that is, the people grossdoddy house. When you first see descendant of the Dutch, but the Men­ who led the singing. There were also these grossdoddy houses they look like nonites took that style and developed the deacons and the preachers. They a hodge-podge kind of building and ar­ some very specific and unique adapta­ needed a long bench, so they put the chitectural design. But there is no at­ tions to it. The Dutch hidden church is two benches along the long side. When tempt here to put on any kind of a unique architectural style; those of you compare this with any other type impression—if you need another two you who have travelled in Holland will of church structure you will recognize rooms, you tack them on. The addition have seen hidden churches and their the difference immediately. Typically may not be the same color, it may not very functional and simple beauty. The the pulpit is standing over against many be the same design, but it comes out of Russian Mennonite house-barns can still rows upon rows of short pews. The last the needs it will serve. So the building be seen in many parts of the world. rows of people could always conve­ begins to reflect what the purposes and Those of you who have travelled to the niently wander in mind or even go to the intentions are, and thus its integrity Chaco will recognize an architectural sleep. emerges. style that has come via Canada, Russia, Another example is the heating oven And so for Mennonites, if it was and West Prussia from Holland. Men­ in Russia. My father said that until he functional, it was plain; it was honest nonites have developed some very left home, he used to sleep on the oven. and had integrity, and hence it was recognizable architectural forms or The winters got awfully cold in Russia, beautiful. That is my definition as well adaptations of some traditional forms so the oven in Mennonite homes was as an art critic’s definition of beauty. which can be recognized at a glance.1 the center of the house. They fed the In our history, beauty was something Through the years Mennonite ar­ straw from one room and baked in that that had quality, i.e., served a purpose. chitecture or the way Mennonites built room, and the oven extended into the It had plainness, simplicity, and mean­ their buildings thus developed from a other room. It was huge, with a big flat ing because of its utility. functional base. Mennonites, as many platform on top where four or five H others of course, built their buildings in children could sleep, and my father said a basically functional or utilitarian there was often some competition for Secondly, I would suggest that func­ form, to serve a specific purpose. What the central places. Imagine the kind of tional architecture normally develops is the reason for putting a house and a togetherness that that kind of situation into a system of symbolic meaning. In bam together under one roof? Basical-, would develop. This was a very func­ our heritage and many others, function ly function, i.e., the hard winter. My tional way of heating, and the Russian came first. Mennonites built an oven to father told me many times—one could oven still has a great amount of heat their houses and cook in winter. immediately tell how cold it was in nostalgia in the memories of people who What happens when a group of people SEPTEMBER, 1986 27 with at least quasi-cultured homogenei­ grossdoddy houses being built today ex­ tegrity, I would suggest that we are ty or similarity develops a pattern of cept in the most conservative Amish copying other people’s architecture. behavior? The functional building, the groups. But I would suggest that among The motivation of other people as they grossdoddy house, develops into a style the rest of us Russian Mennonites, we design their houses, buildings and their because of a traditional practice. are no longer building these ovens to churches has become ours. “ Grandfather built one, we need a new heat our homes. I am laying a heavy load on the ar­ one and so we’re going to build one too. Why have we changed architectural chitectural profession. Let me get very And how do we build it? Just like he forms, the style and the symbolic im­ specific but I hope not judgmental. I did.” That’s how the grossdoddy house age? I would suggest first of all, that the would say church and church institu­ became a tradition among the Amish, old patterns are no longer useful. The tional architecture concerns are in a hot for example. activities housed in our churches and spot. But there is some religious church And if our traditional style is prac­ our homes are no longer the same, and architecture which is very exciting and ticed long enough, it becomes symbolic. since they are no longer the same, the encouraging. I can feel good about the It creates an image and conveys a com­ old forms have no meaning. We ap­ symbolic image that these beautiful plex and very meaningful system of parently have increasingly adopted buildings are projecting. But others are ideas, beliefs, values and feelings. What function and form from the world disasters; in church architecture the does the grossdoddy house say? It says, around us. In other words, our needs pragmatism of most for the least is often for example, that the grossdoddy or the are becoming increasingly like the the motivation. grandparents are influencing the needs of others in religious, social and I would like to read a statement that children and the grandchildren because physical life.3 Marvin Bartel made in a recent Festival the grossdoddy was a continuing We no longer are living in closely Quarterly article from the Summer presence in the family. It says knit Mennonite communities, so our 1985 issue entitled “ Who needs a something as well to those who drive geographic designs and buildings no church architect?” He says, by and see the grossdoddy house. What longer provide for the functions that “ Is it really good stewardship to pay an the superficial appearance gives off is they once did. For example, the local architect money that could otherwise go important, but what it says about what village and especially the church in the into materials? While many smaller churches today bypass the architect in goes on behind the walls of those local community is no longer the center favor of a design-build firm, or a church facades is even more important. A of our activities. We go to the golf builder, I see this as an extremely un­ facade or architectural form reflects the course, we go to the Y, we go to the fortunate trend. essence of what the persons behind it resort for the weekend, or whatever. Good builders are pragmatists. They are trying to do. In Amsterdam along We no longer have the same needs in are skilled at building crafts. They are efficiency experts. They are skilled at the canals one sees fantastic facades. terms of our own houses or the religious managing workers. And they do perform One might think, what superficiality! building either. Our residence, for ex­ important and essential functions for the No, they began functionally but began ample, has become like the residence church building committee. Your build­ to outdo each other in affluence and of almost anybody else. And finally, ing committee may even be fortunate enough to include one or more builders power and so forth. And these various images have changed because they are and their knowledge. styles of facades are projecting the im­ no longer based on earlier functions and Yet if I had to choose between a good age even to us today. The grossdoddy forms. builder and a good architect, I would house immediately projects an image of I would suggest that we are increas­ much rather choose a good architect, many, many things. Mennonites have ingly being dominated and motivated by even if the builders had to be trained. In­ deed, one fair-sized church was recent­ unconsciously depended upon the sym­ the criterion of economy. We, like most ly built by an industrial arts teacher on bolism of their architecture, probably other people, are increasingly beginning leave and a crew of college students on more than any other form, to express to build our styles, not on the basis of their summer vacation. Fortunately, and maintain their belief system. The a traditional function, but on the basis good builders are usually available. The symbolic world of the Mennonites is main concern is customarily to find a of what is most economical. I talked to good architect.” readily observable to outsiders and a group of people recently who were scholars, but few insiders are very very incensed that the church’s building There is a development among Men­ much aware of it, because they are so cost had overrun original estimates by nonite builders that is reflecting fully conditioned by it. The symbols of a high percentage. The major concern something of our heritage by really separation, such as the plain dress, have was financial . . . It doesn’t make much beginning to say something about become fairly self-conscious symbols of difference what we expect from this Christian function and form, and this Mennonite life, but the role of architec­ building, only what the bottom line is. needs to be encouraged. ture as a symbol system of Mennonite We build our homes on the basis of the IV faith has not been seriously studied, nor most house for the money. We have are Mennonites very conscious of its changed our definition of function. Most creative architecture, designing influence.2 What is our lifestyle? How do we live and building is coming from what I call with these buildings? community planning groups. The most m I would suggest that the outcome of creative church buildings that I have What about the contemporary role of having adopted the more or less prevail­ seen are those that are planned by a con­ architecture in Mennonite buildings? ing attitudes, norms and values regard­ gregation or a community. I would sug­ Let me suggest that the traditional ar­ ing building is that we have lost touch gest that the Bloomington, Illinois, chitecture forms that Mennonites have with an intrinsic beauty and are more Mennonite congregation has developed used have slowly been changing and or less copying others. If beauty is a total plan, which includes not only the have in many cases been totally deleted. defined as a combination of function architecture of the building, but the base I doubt if you will see very many resulting in simplicity, honesty, and in­ from which the whole community 28 MENNONITE LIFE comes: What are they going to be do­ architecture, to the urban Mennonites basketball in the old gym at Goshen. ing here? What are the objectives? who are probably the least communal, “ Why don’t they get with it—put aside “From cradle to the grave” is in a sense we still have a communal heritage: all these simple things such as black what the Bloomington congregation was working and thinking together to stockings?” I said to myself. But here concerned about. Similarly, the con­ discuss why we are here—what is our I am in 1986 in conclusion reading to gregation is concerned about providing function and our purpose to be here. We you from Romans, the 12th chapter. “ I tuition support for any child that goes begin to say—“ Let’s do it this way.” beseech you therefore brethren (it to a Mennonite school. That is architec­ I predict that our churches are going to should be sistren as well) by the mer­ ture. That is planning. A General Con­ be increasingly built in a round form of cies of God that you present your bodies ference Mennonite church in Bogota, some kind. But this will happen only if as a living sacrifice, holy, accepted unto designed by a Mennonite architect, is these buildings are planned communally God which is your real service and be one of the most beautiful communities by people in the community, by people not conformed to this world. But be I have seen in many a year. It is a big who know something about their own transformed by the renewing of your round church where the congregation heritage. mind that ye might prove what is that can face each other. They have a boys I would like to suggest that the good and acceptable and perfect will of club, playgrounds and so forth, right in buildings like Bluffton College God.” This passage tells us something the middle of Bogota. There are other Marbeck Center, the Paoli, Indiana, about form and function. It begins with aspects of this community which are Medical Center, and the Bloomington obeying the will of God, and conform­ beautiful; it is the total community. Church are the best evidences I have ing our living sacrifice to that will, What about some other examples? seen of function, integrity, plainness, together as a community of faith, in What about some of our service institu­ and simplicity in architecture. teaching, life and in architecture. tions? The Paoli, Indiana, Medical The final question now—is the col­ Menno’s theological slogan was, Center was designed by a Mennonite lective conscience still among us? Or is “ For other foundation can no man lay group of doctors and others with Men­ each of us as a builder and as an in­ than that which is laid, which is Jesus nonite architectural help. It is a func­ dividual homeowner simply borrowing Christ.” This is an architectural meta­ tional part of the witness and outreach from the world? How can we stimulate phor, and the phrase “Let each man into the larger community. I have talked and encourage this collective con­ take heed how he buildeth thereon” to a few non-Mennonite residents, and science? What are the contemporary gives us something to think about. there is nothing but praise for the enter­ functions and purposes of our Men­ prise. It already is a symbol—the way nonite community and in what way can * The Alexanderwohl Church building the building is designed and the ac­ we develop a style that will express our process, discussed in the March 1986 tivities that take place there are already tradition? Mennonite Life, illustrates the saying a lot of things to many people, Let me ask you quite bluntly: are we dynamics of the individualizing ver­ and I suspect that in years to come the still identified as the communal people? sus communal aspects of design, as medical services building will become There is integrity and beauty in the ar­ well as other ideas in this article. a symbol that will say, “ That is where chitecture of plain people, although Mennonites serve the entire communi­ there may be as much internal strife and ENDNOTES ty on a day-to-day basis, serving peo­ 'Cornelius Krahn maintains that “nowhere, lack of achieving the golden rule as however, has any characteristic or distinctive ar­ ple who cannot pay, giving some among us. A fellow sociologist at the chitectural style developed which was created by medical service free if necessary.” University of Waterloo said to me, Mennonites" (ME, p. 146). This can be debated, depending upon the definition one uses. Krahn What about other institutions? “ You know this competitive, vicious himself rejects his own statement in the same ar­ Among the most impressive institu­ academic life gets to me after a while. ticle. “ But Mennonite meetinghouses in Holland, tional designs that I’ve come across in When it gets so bad I tell my wife, at least until about 1840, are quite different from other Protestant church buildings” (p. 148). I our educational circuit is the Marbeck ‘Let’s get in the car and go to the Old maintain that adapting a particular style of ar­ Center at Bluffton College. And Order country.’ We just drive through chitecture is original to the group. Further, there ironically, or appropriately, the ar­ are numerous examples which can be cited such the area and stop and talk to Old Order as the Alexanderwohl Church, which was dis­ chitectural design at Marbeck Center persons, and we come back refreshed. cussed in Mennonite Life in the March 1986 issue. comes out of function, out of utility: A T here’s something wholesome, Even a “smorgasbord" adaptation is a form of unique architecture. few years before it was built, Bob something with integrity there.” In­ 2There has been little done in the analysis of Kreider, the president, bubbling over tegrity is the issue I think we have to Mennonite symbolism, but what has been done with the kinds of things he wanted to face when we talk about beauty and shows clearly how architecture expresses beliefs. The Hutterite organization of geography, hofs, do there, asked me, “ What do you building. Building and beauty are not tind buildings portrays the symbolism of life very think we ought to think about yet before separate or antagonistic—they are, as a clearly. E. K. Francis, in studying the Russian we build?” It might not hurt for some Mennonites in Manitoba, is probably most con­ matter of fact, brothers. In fact, they are scious of this fact (In search o f Utopia, p. 107ff). of us to visit some of these places just the same. A building has beauty if it has 3The contemporary status of awareness of ar­ to see what they are trying to say and function and simplicity and integrity. chitectural issues among Mennonites appears to do with form, not only for function but be relatively dormant. Mennonite Life, especial­ I came into the Swiss Mennonite or­ ly articles by Cornelius Krahn, has presented the for symbolism. bit from the Russian Mennonite tradi­ most concerted discussion. Krahn’s article in the Our Mennonite enterprise comes tion and now consider myself a pan- Mennonite Encyclopedia includes a bibliography of important articles until 1958. Smucker’s The through the best when we design and Mennonite; I don’t think one conference Sociology of Mennonites, Hutterites and Amish: plan things together.* It is in a com­ has anything over another. But when I A Bibliography with Annotations contains no munal aspect that a real ethos and our references to studies of Mennonite architecture. came to Goshen College in 1946, they The only conference in recent years, according real faith comes out. We are a com­ were pushing nonconformity, which I to my information, was the “ Consultation on munal people. From the Hutterites, who thought was an old-fashioned idea. The Church Building services,” held at Goshen, May are totally communistic in their life and 30-31, 1975. Undoubtedly there is activity, but girls were still wearing culottes to play it is not coordinated or available. SEPTEMBER, 1986 29 Book Reviews

Raymond F. Wiebe. Hillsboro, Kansas: interpretation of trends, or of how ma­ rather than their objectivity. Their jot­ The City on the Prairie. Hillsboro, jor events, such as the Depression of the tings rarely reflect upon the success of Ks: Hillsboro Centennial Commis­ thirties or the World Wars, affected the vegetable and flower gardens, creative sion, Centennial Publication Commit­ community. If there is a disappoint­ cooking in times of famine, the raising tee, Hillsboro Historical Society, ment, it is that the mass of detail of children, or the trauma of widow­ 1985. Pp. 189. ($26.00 pb). prevents the long look, the nostalgic hood in unsettled times. remembering. Readers will also not Anna Baerg’s diary will help to Hillsboro’s long-awaited centennial find the underside of history—many change that. Young and sensitive, she publication is not a disappointment. stories of the little people and ordinary matures amid the vicissitudes of World Written by Raymond F. Wiebe, a families who never became heads of War I, the Russian revolution of 1917, historical scholar recognized for his businesses and institutions. and the subsequent civil war. When she meticulous research, this volume gives As centennial books are expected to began her diary in 1916 she hoped it the reader an excellent overview of the be, the material presented here is plea­ might be a *‘a tiny mirror . . . reflect­ history of Hillsboro, former hub of sant, with only a sidelong glance at the ing a little of the life that passes by.” much Mennonite activity, and of the difficulties, trials and hard work in It became more than that. Endowed surrounding area from the time when breaking land and building a communi­ with a rich emotional life and a gift for the Quivira/Wichita Indians made their ty. That story still needs to be written. exacting expression, she records the ex­ home there to the present. The book, A nation’s history is about its wars and panding violence associated with the well documented with endnotes, political struggles. A city’s history is Bolshevik Revolution. There is an bibliography, appendices and an index, about its civic, business and economic added dimension: Anna suffers from a is a treasure trove of information. development. That is well presented spinal condition which never allows her The author moves from the city’s here. to fully participate in the life of the com­ early history, when the growing cattle I was dismayed to find only three munity. Again and again she struggles trade began to edge out the Indians, to women indexed—Theresa Kuhn (hand­ with feelings of inadequacy and useless­ the coming of the first Anglo settlers icapped), Esther Ebel (Kansas Mother ness. She finds it difficult to accept the prior to 1874. With the arrival of the of the Year), Margo Schroeder (Miss consequences of her handicap, especial­ ethnic Germans and the Mennonites Kansas)—and little or no mention of the ly when she falls in love with the young from Russia (identified by Wiebe as many women’s organizations, such as teacher, Harder, who is boarding with Dutch-Low Germans even after they ar­ the Mentor Club and women’s church the Baergs. rived in Kansas), the market town took organizations, that played an important Anna’s father was an overseer on the shape as businesses, schools, churches, part in Hillsboro’s development. Others large Mennonite estate Apanlee. They civic government and other institutions will miss the mention of the influence were the servants, Dicks were the were developed. John G. Hill, the of athletics and music on the life and masters—and the relationship was not founder, intended to call the communi­ spirit of the community. Yet despite without its pain and humiliation. Yet ty Hill City, then Hillsdale, but was these omissions, the book is a worthy there was the beauty of the physical edged out of these names by other Kan­ contribution to the historical record of world, and Anna faithfully recorded her sas cities who claimed them first. Hillsboro. perceptions of the changing seasons. At Hillsborough was shortened to the snap­ Katie Funk Wiebe heart she was a poet and even developed pier Hillsboro. In successive chapters Tabor College a local reputation for her verse. Apanlee the reader is introduced to the various Hillsboro, Kansas lingered in her consciousness long after members of the healing arts professions it ceased to exist. In later times of and some of the early cultural activities, dislocation and stress, its tranquility, its such as the Dutch Band, Choral Union, gardens, and the memories of childhood library, Marion County Fair, Adobe Gerald Peters, ed. and trans., Diary o f innocence became a source of solace. House Museum, and the Arts and Anna Baerg, 1916-1924. Winnipeg: Anna’s portrait of the intensifying Crafts Fair. This latter event, more than CMBC Publications, 1985. Pp. 158. Russian holocaust is most impressive. anything else, has placed Hillsboro on In 1916 she could still write: “ Nothing the map of Kansas in recent years. Almost all of the diaries and memoirs much happens here. One day passes like Churches, those that have disap­ published by the Russian Mennonite the next” (November 14, 1916). By peared and those that have made a place emigrants of the 1920s are penned by mid-summer of 1917 she commented: for themselves on the horizon, are men. As such they frequently chroni­ “ Conditions in our Fatherland are dark carefully noted and described. Because cle the macrocosmic happenings related and gloomy” (July 3, 1917). The Hillsboro is the cradle of both the Krim­ to village life, pontificate on politics, or following year is filled with foreboding. mer Mennonite Brethren and Men­ bitterly condemn the violence of a “ Horrible things have taken place in nonite Brethren churches in America, revolution destined to change their lives Halbstadt these last few days. Seven they and their institutions, such as forever. All this does not detract from people have been shot, including our Tabor College and Salem Hospital, are the accuracy or usefulness of such neighbor” (February 6, 1918). “ They featured significantly. material, though we might complain say the anarchists plan to murder Even as the careful attention to that the authors cannot free themselves everyone, burn everything and drag all documentation and detail will delight from their parochial world or realize the women off” (April 27,1918). After the researcher, it may also discourage that they are victims of cataclysmic more than a year of civil unrest in the the casual reader. The reader should not events completely beyond their control. Molotschna settlement, she despairingly expect to find here an examination and Yet the real problem is their maleness. notes: “The whole world appears to 30 MENNONITE LIFE have become one big field hospital” Gerald Friesen, The Canadian Prairies: such a school will recognize the (December 22, 1919). A History. Lincoln, NE: University similarities between our experiences Anna’s reflections on the effect of of Nebraska Press, 1985. Pp. 524. and the Amish school experience. The general violence and the lack of law and ($22.50) Searson and Martin Readers of the Kan­ order are most revealing. Whether beset sas country school of 60 or more years by anger, fear, or a sense of helpless­ Here is a new synthesis of western ago are similar to the readers used in ness, she is always careful to examine Canadian history. Friesen, a professor the Amish schools today in that they not her own priorities. “ Whether or not of history at St. Paul’s College, Univer­ only taught reading as a basic skill but they are as you say ‘stupid Russians’ sity of Manitoba, brings together the they also emphasized values such as Anna Baerg you have no right to hate results of Canadian prairie historio­ loyalty, integrity, responsibility, ap­ them. They are people too and as such graphy in a critical and discriminating preciation of nature, and love of the God has placed them on the same level manner to create a new and authorita­ land. as you” (December 22, 1917). Not long tive interpretation. Friesen’s presenta­ The Amish schools are very suc­ after, she prayed: “ Lord save me from tion is distinctively up-to-date in its con­ cessful in teaching basic skills with this hatred towards the Lenin family. cerns; more pages contain economic, value orientation. Their teachers are not Please help me for your sake not to wish social, and cultural history than political academically trained to meet state stan­ them evil” (February 16, 1918). “ It is events. The native people occupy an ap­ dards, but they are carefully selected, unfortunate but true that we Germans propriately prominent place through the encouraged by parents and fellow have all too frequently treated the Rus­ first third of the book. All the themes teachers, and experience community sian with disregard” (February 23, that make the Canadian prairies unique support that would often be the envy of 1918). Her comments on the com­ are carefully laid out: the for trading other teachers. Teachers meet frequent­ promise of nonresistance through the companies, the metis communities, im­ ly to discuss common concerns; they para-military Selbstschutz are equally migration, western antagonism towards have access to a periodical, The astute. “ All I can say is that often there the rest of Canada, agriculture, natural Blackboard Bulletin, devoted to the im­ is more courage in patience and en­ resources, class structures, the school provement of teaching in Amish durance than in retaliation” (May 20, question, the confusing political party schools, and distractions are held’to a 1918). “ Four Mennonites came by system. To one more familiar with the very minimum. yesterday afternoon, rifles on their American West, the anti-Turnerian The Amish school plays its part in shoulders, grenades in their pockets. features Friesen points out are quite reinforcing the sense of security im­ One would think God could handle the interesting. parted by the Amish home and com­ problem without this little heap of Men­ Friesen has little to say about Men­ munity and in undergirding the work nonites” (December 23, 1918). The nonites directly, but much indirectly. ethic as a basic value. However, let it dislocation of her own family, wide- This is the context which has controlled not be said that Amish children do not spread famine, and the continual seesaw much of Canadian Mennonite history. have fun. They play all the traditional of the civil war front evokes a desperate A completely inadequate index is the games country school children have assertion of faith. “ Doesn’t it say in the work’s only obvious flaw (for example, always played (the authors could have Bible that God will take care of all the no entry for “ Ukrainians,” the prairies’ told us more about games and pranks), widows and orphans?” (July 23, 1919). most important non-English ethnic and children learn that life is essential­ Anna is keenly aware of the cumulative group). ly a happy venture. effect of such circumstances. “ What John F. Schmidt would once have brought tears of com­ North Newton, Kansas passion and pity now elicits little but the Sara E. Kreider and Rachel E. Stahl. show of sympathy” (February 16, The Amish School. Intercourse, PA: 1922). “ Oh there is so much sadness People’s Place Booklets, 1986. Pp. Stephen M. Kohn, Jailed for Peace: in this world. Any word of comfort is 96. ($3.95 paperback) The History of American Draft Law meaningless” (March 18, 1922). Violators, 1658-1985. Greenwood The diary offers a rich mosaic of A former teacher in the Amish Press, 1985. ($29.95) similar images from the pen of a young schools of Lancaster County, Penn­ woman gifted with a reflective mind, sylvania, and a writer have teamed up In a concise 143 pages, Kohn outlines the requisite writing skills, and a com­ to produce an interesting and readable the historic and philosophical develop­ passion for the world which surrounds account of the whys and hows of Amish ment of draft resistance in this country. her. It is one of the most moving and schools. He brings to light both the failures and reflective diaries of this era that I have After World War II, the traditional successes of individuals who have made read and should be required reading for country schools were closed, except for the difficult decision to abide by their all students taking a Mennonite history more or less isolated areas in western beliefs and convictions, and exercised course. states. School attendance ages were also the right to freedom of conscience so raised in many states. These two fac­ valued in this country. Their struggles, tors and a distrust of urban values as as presented by Kohn, have a lot to John B. Toews represented in the new schools played teach us of what real strength and Professor of History, a dominant part in the decision of the courage are all about. University of Calgary Amish to organize and conduct their Mary E. Murphy Calgary, Alberta own schools. Those of us who grew up Fairfield Preparatory School in the country school and/or taught in Bridgeport, Connecticut SEPTEMBER, 1986 31 Hoisting the flag at the edge o f the racetrack, Halbstadt, Molotschna. From left (next to the right flag hoister): SS Lieutenant /Untersturmführer/ Dietrich, ?, ?, Heinrich Himmler, SS General /Obergruppenführer/ Wolff, ?, Hermann Rossner.

Himmler talks to Mennonite surgeon o f the Halbstadt hospital, Dr. Johann Klassen, 10 Oct. 1942. Klassen tells him that partisan fighters tried to kill some cavalry men by putting poison onto the roof of their quarters. At right, General Wolff.