Shoofly pie: My Dad—Jake's Granddad; Transcript of Tape 2

I had to change tapes so, we’ll start in again now there...Silvis, Illinois¹...Bill Anderson got on the train. I started to get on and the police caught me. And they held a gun on me till the caboose came along. And then they swung on the caboose and left me standing there. Here it was night-time, alone and Bill had all our money. I didn’t know what to do. Didn’t know whether to go home, or go on out to Illinois,² or go out to Kansas.

But I finally went to Kansas. And made out all right. I didn’t miss any meals, but I postponed a couple. So as we got to...I got out there, I went to work for Freddy Fry.³ And we worked together—he had a half a section of wheat. Now one whole section is a mile square: six hundred and forty acres. But he only had three hundred and twenty [acres]. But I helped him harvest. We got that done, and then he was out...he didn’t have any more work for me, so I went to the neighbor and he was plowing for wheat. They plow the stubbles down just about as soon as they can after...to let it get settled and, if it happened to rain, that the wheat standing in the field would be rotted a little bit. I've seen it already when it was so dry out there that you plowed up last year's stubbles and they didn't...hadn't rotted any. They were still bright and shiny.⁴

But I was out there in the field–three hundred and seventy⁵ acre field, and one little tractor and a two-bottom plow. And I was alone out there and I had to go back and forth and back and forth. And it took days before you could see any sign of getting the field any smaller. But I got that finished and we came home then and Ammon, my brother, he had a job in the restaurant. And he found out there was an opening there for me.

Back in Indiana

So I got a job—now this was all in 1936—and I worked nights and days there at the restaurant.⁶ Most of the time I spent...time was spent in washing dishes and pots and pans. And I stood already for sixteen hours and that’s all I did was help the cook and wash dishes. And...I got ten cents an hour for all of this, and all I could eat.

So later on there was a job opened up across the street in another restaurant. And there I would have been...was a waiter in that. I didn’t have to wash dishes. Then I worked twelve hours a...night–I worked nights–but I had one day off. So I still had a great [unintelligible]...then I remember that...that...the night that President Roosevelt was elected...again. This was the second time he was elected. And the next day, I think it was, they instituted Social Security. And here I was getting ten dollars a week for a twelve hour night, for a seventy-two hours a week, and I...they took Social Security off of my wages. So I got $9.90 a week. They took ten cents a week away.⁷

On to Pennsylvania

That was many, many years ago. I worked there then...and...come...I worked there from 1936, 1937...I think most of the year. And then I went out, back out to Illinois and worked out there. Ervin Blucker⁸ and I—his was in 1938 then—we planned to go to Pennsylvania. Now I only knew a couple of people in Pennsylvania, but that didn’t matter to us. We’d learn to know somebody.⁹

So I went there, and I landed at Dan Fisher’s. He had an old, water-powered feed mill.¹⁰ Well, he didn’t have regular work for me, but I stayed there and I worked for nothing for quite a while—got my board out of it, and things like that. Run around. And their boy, Sylvester, was married to a...a young lady, Anna Hertzler, she was. Of course, Sylvester and I spent a lot of time together. And later on, then, the man quit that worked there and I went with Sylvester on the hammermill.¹¹ And I had a job. I got money for it. And that felt pretty good. I didn’t...you don’t find out much about a lot of things...but when you do without money for so long a time, you really don’t miss it as much as you think you do...would.

But I hammermilled there and...awhile, and later in the fall–it wasn’t steady work, you know, it was just part-time—it got later in the fall and then Sylvester’s brother-in-law—they had married sisters¹²—he wanted somebody to cut corn. Well, cutting corn was a job I despised. I wasn’t good at it and I despised the job. I guess that’s why I wasn’t...couldn’t make any time. But we went over and worked anyway.

The Fateful Meeting

And one day we were at the pump getting a drink of water and there was a young girl walking past. I thought “My!”...I looked at her and looked her over and thought “She’s all right!” But I didn’t even talk to her. She didn’t even look at us. We were getting a drink at the pump and she had to walk past us to get to the house. I found out later that it was Elmer’s wife’s sister, a sister to Sylvester’s wife.¹³

Well, as it went on, I wasn’t a Christian, and I used to run around with Allen.¹⁴ We did everything that you could think of that would pertain to being a non-Christian. But the people I stayed with there, Dan Fisher’s, they always treated me well, and they were concerned about me.

So coming in the wintertime, they had what they call Winter Bible School¹⁵ at Maple Grove.¹⁶ And I had never attended anything like that. I used to think spiritual things are for the old people, the lame, the halt, and the blind, and old maids. Then I voiced the desire: I said “I’d like to go to that school.” And then Sally, that’s Dan Fisher’s wife, she moved heaven and earth to get me to Bible School. And here was this same girl, she was going to Bible School.

Making A Choice

Well, I knew then later on that this Christian life, there’s more to it than I realized. Christian life was good for older people, young people and everybody else. And I found out it was good for me too. And I knew that I couldn’t go out with this girl if I wouldn’t be a professing Christian.¹⁷ So I went to Bible School that winter and still didn’t make up my mind about being a Christian. Still I stayed there at Fisher’s...kept on working there, and then later on, the next summer I think it was, I gave my heart to the Lord.

But it didn’t mean so much to me. I just guess I didn’t do it right, or just partially...I was started...I got a date with this girl and we started going together.

Tying the Knot

Then I worked there at Fisher’s for quite a while. And this girl finally consented to be my wife.¹⁸ And so we rented a house there at Menno Eby’s. It was a big stone building where they had the double house to it.¹⁹ We took the one end and we paid I think 7 dollars a month rent...it wasn’t much...wages, I think I was getting 18 dollars a week wages for two of us. But Esther worked at New Holland Garment Factory,²⁰ so that helped out. We bought furniture. We started housekeeping with less furniture than some people had before they started housekeeping. But we made out.

A New Job

Later on, Dan Fisher was getting old, and he thought he would sell the mill, and he advised me to get another job. And Clair Umble came into the picture there. He came one day and sat down on the steps with me, and I...we talked about jobs. Well, he said he would give me a job as...in the electrical business if I wanted it. Well, I had been with Dan Fisher nine years, making flour and feed and stuff like that and...so I took Clair up on it. I got sixty cents an hour to start.

We...I learned a lot. Of course at first, Clair didn’t have a truck, so we would put...we’d go look over the job, and then go back to the shop and get the materials and then go again...We had a lot of loose connections and waste motion like that. We finally...he finally got a job.²¹

A Deeper Commitment

But one day, I was working at Chappy King’s,²² and I was there in the house, and Chappy’s wife got to talking to me. She was assuming that I...she...I knew what she was talking about, but really I didn't know at all...didn’t understand it all. But she mentioned something about a personal Saviour. And you know, that went through me just like a hot iron. So I decided then and there I wanted to have Jesus Christ as my personal Saviour. That was the first that I ever got conscious of the fact that this was for me, not as a blanket invitation, but it was a personal invitation from a personal Saviour.²³

Of course, this fired me up, and made my determination greater to live as a Christian. We went...then about that time, there was a church split. Maple Grove and Millwood. And it got so...they got so mad at each other that I just about gave up.²⁴ This is the sad part about things like that because of the fact that there might be some young Christians who watch these older Christians, and see what they do, and see what they have, and see that they aren’t any better off than the world. So I hung on. I suppose I went to Maple Grove Church then because Dan Fisher went there. He did a lot for me; his life meant a lot to me. Then, living at Menno Eby’s: Menno was always a happy Christian. I inherited a Bible School...I mean a Sunday School class, and I don't know how many years I had that class at Maple Grove. Big class, just small boys—first and second graders.

Missions Work

But I was appointed to the Missions Committee ²⁵ ...within the church...to hunt out new places, to look for new things—a number of things like that, and...So this Missions Committee had a chairman that was...well, he was a peculiar sort of person. He was very interested in missions, and he wanted to go here and wanted to go there, but he wanted to go free. He didn’t...he wanted...so out of this then, a lot of things happened.²⁶ We started a work down at...close to Oxford, Pa. They called it Media Chapel.²⁷ Then there was a work started over at Sandy Hill,²⁸ north of Sadsburyville, and...down at Media then, they had one man that was a convert. He said, “Why don’t you people go down to North Carolina...”—this is where he was from—“...and have a church? They don't have anything like this down there.” Well, this started off, so one day, two carloads of us decided to go down there. And then we had another convert along; he was from southern Virginia. And these two places weren’t too far apart. But they were oh, 25...30...40 miles apart, something like that...and this was just too far for these people. They didn’t know each other. They walked when they wanted to go someplace.

A group of us went down, to look the land over and “spy it out.”²⁹ Two of us, or three of us, there was three of us stayed in North Carolina and had church services there. The others...the rest of them went down into Grayson County, North Carolina.³⁰ And they...we didn’t seem to make much headways in our group. They had more churches than these people knew, and they didn’t quite accept us, and a lot of things like that. So we went down to North Carolina. We decided then that we would concentrate our efforts at North Carolina. So, we would go down once a month and have services. There was an old schoolhouse there, and the schoolhouse was used for a church. The Methodist people had it...owned it, but they weren’t using it. So we asked if we could use it, and they said “Yes.” I’ve seen that place packed to the gills already.

So we started a church there, and chose two brethren to go down, their families. It wasn’t long till we had to build. The Methodists couldn’t stand it. They wanted the building back, so we built a church and called it Big Laurel Mennonite Church. Aquila Stoltzfus and Wilbur Smoker were the two workers that went into this area to start.

From North Carolina to Northern Pennsylvania

And I was still on the Mission Committee, and then in the meantime, one of the deer hunters that hunted in the northern part of Pennsylvania came back and said we ought to start up there at McKean County.³¹ Start a church up there, because there’s lots of kids around—understatement of the year. So a group of us came up. It was Amos Mast, and Calvin Kennel—he had been one of the group to go to North Carolina first—and I, and “Hans” Smoker,³² and I forget whether Dave Mast went along or not. I don't remember anymore who the fifth man was...Yohn Jo...Jonathan Lantz.

So we came up and we looked out. This was in 1931, I think it was. And then in 1932, no, it couldn’t have been nineteen...had to be...well, we just had our twentieth year, and this is ‘76...last year ‘75...twenty off of 75 would be...fif...well, it wouldn’t be fifty years...Well, anyway. 1952, I think it was.³³ We came up and we had a summer Bible School, and I was the superintendent, and we asked the people if we could have Bible School there in that church.³⁴ And they said yes. Then we got the consent of the Methodist church; they said yes. One lady said “Sure you can have it. But where are you going to get the kids?”

Bible School in Northern PA

Well, we had over a hundred come to Bible School, the first Bible School we ever held there. And for quite a number of years, we would come up here ³⁵ and have a summer Bible School. And it was always Esther and I that had to go. But...we didn’t have to go: we wanted to go.

And later on, Calvin Kennel, he wasn’t satisfied. They got to looking around for an empty church building to start a regular witness here. And they came up the Two Mile,³⁶ and here was a little old church that was about falling down.³⁷ They looked into it, and yes, they could have it. So this fired him up, and he went home, and he sold out, bought a farm up here, where we’re living now, and started a church...a witness. There was quite a few of them moved up: Isaac Lapps’,³⁸ Paul Smuckers’,³⁹ and then Calvin⁴⁰ had a big family...they had...used to have as high as 26 home-grown Mennonites in this on Sunday morning. And it was a little dingy old church. They put a new roof in it, and a new ceiling. But, nevertheless, they seemed to enjoy themselves. And he was that way...they went that way until about...oh, May, four years later. Nineteen fifty...oh I don't know just exactly...’56 or something like that. But anyway, Paul Smuckers’ had an unfortunate experience that Paul’s brother got sick and died in just a few days. Then Paul needed to be at home to be with his mother—she had two farms, and she couldn’t handle this by herself—so Paul left. And then Ike Lapps’ left. So this left Calvin and...his daughter got married, and there was just a few of them left to run the church.

Troubles in Northern PA

So in May of 1959, he came down to Maple Grove. I remember the day clearly. He woke up more people that Sunday than...and it did more for Birch Grove than at anytime in his life. He said as of now, the work’s closing up there. And this even woke up some of the people that were sleeping. So the church got their heads together, and come to the Missions Committee. “Will you look into it?” “Surely we will.”

So we used to...somebody used to come up every Sunday.⁴¹ Either the Maple Grove side or the Conestoga side, and...Now John Lapps’ lived here. They stayed. They were the only ones that stayed.

So...[unintelligible] find out all kind of things...they used to be...asked John Lapps’ what they needed. They said they needed two cars every Sunday to haul in children. Well, there was one couple one time came up...with their car and they stood there at the church. Floy⁴² come in with a carload of children and went out and got another one. They didn’t even offer their car. Then they come home and said “You don’t need two cars every Sunday.” That kind of...worked on me. I thought, “Yes, they do. If John and Floy say ‘two cars,’ they're living on the field: they ought to know what it is.”

The Call to Port Allegany

So this was in May when Calvin resigned. And later on that summer, in July or August, they came to our place⁴³ and as a church...some of the ministers and said “Would you be willing to move up to McKean County and help John Lapps’?” I said “Yes,” because I knew God was calling me up there and...I would have been more surprised if they hadn’t asked me than I was when they come...I wasn’t surprised. I knew. I knew what they wanted when they came.

And then it was about three days later, they came again. They said “Will you be the minister for that?”⁴⁴ So I said I didn’t want to run ahead of John Lapp, and they...they assured me that John Lapp didn’t want to be pastor. So I said all right.

Hard choices

Now this was hard for Esther. And because she had all her sisters and her mother and her father and they lived down there⁴⁵ and friends and everything...to move into country...didn’t know anybody, hardly...and a lot of things like that. But nevertheless, she gave her consent, she’s willing to go. But this was just about the beginning of school term, because I said I didn't want to take the boys out of school...and we’d move in between the semester periods. So they said “That's all right.”

So this is the way we went the rest of the year then. In the meantime, we had also started a church at Wesley Chapel, which was at Newark, Delaware.⁴⁶ And, I...here I was asked to serve too, and they ordained a preacher and I was in the lot for preacher, and, but the lot fell on Herman,⁴⁷ but I knew God was calling me to preach. It was very real to me. I could...I just knew it was going to be. So, we had spent ten years going to this church down there at Newark, Delaware, and then in 1960, about the 7th of January, we moved.⁴⁸ And of course, to show you how innocent we are, we had no idea how cold it gets and how much snow.⁴⁹ But here again, God was very gracious and good to us, because of the fact that we moved on a day, or in a week that there was no snow. The sun was shining and it was warm enough that the ground thawed a little bit, and we had...come up we had no house to go to so we stored it in a widow woman's barn, our furniture, and we moved in the house and lived out of a suitcase. We kept the house going for her while she went to Florida.⁵⁰

Life in McKean County

We had no idea. We didn’t know a thing about the country or the climate. And we saw...everybody at the time used to hand their wash on the porch and my wife couldn’t figure this out “Why are they hanging it out on the porch? Why are they doing this and that?” But we found out, it wasn’t long at all till it got to snowing and it kept on snowing, and then it kept on snowing, and it kept on getting cold, and you know, in March yet, we had way below zero weather. I mean below.

And...we...found out fast, and quick.⁵¹

First Encounters

But we...oh, incidentally, the first weekend that we moved up here, we lived alone.⁵² It was on a Monday morning and Esther was washing—this lady had a wringer-type washer—and had wash scattered all over the floor. And one of the ministers from town came out and welcomed us to the community and introduced himself and asked us...you know, if we would help in their ministerium, and the following Sunday night, we went to the Week of Prayer services at the Presbyterian Church, and the president of the ministerium came to me “Will you help on Good Friday services?” And I said “Well...yes, I will, but I been wondering what's....been keeping you from asking me this long time? We’ve lived here a whole week already.” But, I shook in my boots because we never bothered much with Good Friday services down in Lancaster area⁵³ ...but we had...I went...got through it, I lived through it, then on Good Friday, and since that time of course, everybody and his dog know us. I don’t...there’s a lot of people come up to me and say “How do you feel? How are you?” and this is home.⁵⁴

Getting Acquainted at Birch Grove

And this is the start of an interesting subject. We had very few people come to church at first...many a time we had 15 or 16. Johns’⁵⁵ had one child I think, and we had three. So there was five of us and three of Johns’: that was eight. Then we'd have 15-16 young people—children rather. And some of those came to church just for the sake of going away, so they could get out of the house. One family, there was eight or nine in the family and they had a two room house. And they came faithful. Fact is, two of them are still here. They’re married and still come to church.⁵⁶

So, it began. And I oftened wondered and was thankful that we didn’t know the end from the beginning. But we kept on; we were just not...we just kept on praying and working and preaching. I would haul children and teach a Sunday School class and do the preaching, and John would haul children and be Sunday School superintendent and teach, and Floy, she had...everything in...we had every...only one room, had no anteroom to hang clothes; had an old space heater–oil burner–to heat it up. It would never get warm in there till after the church service was out and we'd have to turn it out.⁵⁷ So I got wise to this and went down Saturday evening and lit it up. Got the place warmed up a little bit.⁵⁸

But we kept on going...hung on and trusted God, and He really came through. There are many things happened that first year that I can't remember offhand, but I had started keeping a diary from the time we moved up here in 1960. And I'm going to go through that and pick out some of the highlights...out of the diary from 1960 on to this time.

[tape pauses]

Before I go any farther than this, I’d like to go back over some things that happened to us before we went...got ready to move up here, or moved up here. We were always busy. It seemed that I...we helped in Bible Schools all over. At one time, Maple Grove had Bible Schools at Doe Run, at Lewisville, Pennsylvania, and a number of places, and we helped in about all of them.

One year we were in...Newport, Denbigh, Virginia, and we helped down there. The whole family just moved down. We left our garden and everything go. We thought that...well, we would trust the Lord in all things. We...just for instance, we had peas that year, and we figured they would get ready to put up about the time we'd get down there. So—now this is exactly what happened—we were down there in Bible School work and the peas were ready. And [End of Tape 2, side 1. Side 2 begins with some repetition of the end of Side 1] figured they would get ready to put up about the time we’d get down there. So—now this is exactly what happened—we were down there in Bible School work and the peas were ready. But we committed it to God. And didn’t the neighbors go together and picked our peas and froze...blanched them and froze them and put them in our freezer. I...We had more...I often said that we had more peas that way than if we’d have stayed at home because we’d have surely eaten some. Our freezer was quite full of peas when we got home.

And another time, there was a call came to us about going to Minnesota—Strawberry Lake and Cass Lake ⁵⁹ to teach Bible School. Well, it so happened that...well, we said we would, but we didn’t have any money. And it so happened two of the brethren in the church said they’d find...finance our trip. So we were just getting ready to go and had everything planned out, and didn’t Esther get sick, and had to go to the hospital.⁶⁰ Well, we had all arrangements made. We didn't know what to do; I didn’t. And she came home and we prayed about it. Then Barbara Kennel⁶¹ came and stayed with us. She was going to stay with Esther while I was in Minnesota. There were two young girls had also promised to go,⁶² so I took our car—left Esther without a car—and we started for Minnesota.

We got there all right. We had summer Bible School at Strawberry Lake. We moved up to Cass Lake on Saturday night. And I wasn’t there very long until I got a call. And Willis Umble was at the other end of the call and he asked how things were going, and everything, and he said: “Are you ready for a good bump?” Well, I said: “What is it?” And he said: “Your brother-in-law, George Stoltzfus,⁶³ died.” And...well, I knew I was needed at home then to take care of some of the things around home. I didn’t know what to do. I had promised to help in Bible School. I had my car there, and everything. So I just decided I’m going to fly home and let the girls have the car. Then they could bring it home.

So that’s what I did. I didn’t have the money to go home. I wrote out a check to pay for the transportation. I got on the train and rode to Minneapolis/St. Paul and from there, took the airplane and come home. Got to Philadelphia...and then Sylvester Fisher was there with Gene and Clair, and we went out to our place then...our home. And Esther was still quite weak. She wasn’t getting around too much. So anyway, we went to the funeral...George...and I helped whatever I could. And then came home. She went to bed, Esther did...didn’t[tape pauses]

The next day we went back to the doctor for a checkup and he wouldn’t even let her come home from the hos—she had to go right back to the hospital again. And that was quite a blow to us. It was Clair’s birthday, and we had a birthday party set. So we called her sister Anna, and asked her if she’d take care of this party, which she did. Well, Esther came out of the hospital then and we picked up our lives and tried to go on from there.⁶⁴

And, in the meantime-—I had mentioned Newark, Delaware—we had served...we served there ten years, and it was a good proving ground for us. The church is not operating at the present under the Mennonite Conference. I think there’s an independent group has rented it or bought it—I don't know what happened anyway. But it’s still open as a church.⁶⁵

It was many things like that that happened to us. [tape ends.]⁶⁶

1. Silvis (IL) is a small town in Rock Island County, Illinois that is now part of the greater Quad Cities complex of Davenport and Bettendorf (IA) and Rock Island and Moline (IL), situated on the Mississippi River. ↵

2. There is a bit of confusion here in the narrative, as Dad previously says that the incident in which he and Bill got separated occurred in Silvis (IL), yet here says that he was undecided about going “out to Illinois.” When I see him again, I’ll ask him which he meant. ↵

3. As noted in the annotations to Tape 1, this is the Freddy Fry who is identified in Descendents of Barbara Hochstetler as being an Amish man from Haven (KS). ↵

4. The unrotted wheat stubble suggests that the years of the Dust Bowl were not yet over around Haven. ↵

5. Sections of 640 acres were typically subdivided by halves, so either Dad got the number wrong here or the piece he was plowing wasn’t symmetrical. ↵

6. This is likely to have been the B & B Restaurant in Nappanee. According to a Nappanee writer’s website, the B & B Restaurant opened in 1925 and was famous for its Walleyed-Pike and Oyster Stew. (accessed 20 Nov 14) ↵

7. Employee payroll deductions for old-age insurance (Social Security) began on January 1, 1937, with the tax rate set, as Dad notes, at 1%. ↵

8. The 1920 US Census shows Ervin Blucker, age 3, living at home near Arthur, IL with his parents, Enos and Ida Blucker. ↵

9. In addition to Dad’s generally sociable nature, we should not overlook the fact that the high rates of intermarriage amongst the Amish meant that nearly everyone was related. Since Pennsylvania was where many of the original Amish settlements were, Dad was confident that, sooner or later, he would turn up a cousin or two, or perhaps find someone he had met during his travels and would thus find a place to stay and maybe even a job. And even if he might have come up empty on occasion, hospitality would likely have been extended anyway to him by virtue of his Amish heritage, including—not least—his ability to speak Pennsylvania Dutch. ↵

10. Dan Fisher’s mill was one of several hundred water-powered mills in Lancaster County. Lord’s Water-Powered Grist Mills, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania (1996) cites an 1824 map of Lancaster County showing the exact locations and owners of some 250 such mills. According to Lord, as late as 1996, there were nearly 100 of these mills still standing. Fisher’s mill was more commonly known as the Millwood Mill and may well have been the source of the name of the area called Millwood near Gap, PA. The Millwood School, the Millwood Mennonite Church, and Millwood Cemetery are all still extant. The mill itself, built near the end of the XVIIIth century, was on the Pequea (pronounced “PECK-way”) Creek, which arises in eastern Lancaster County and flows southwest to the Susquehanna. The old mill and the dam that made it possible are gone: only a memory marks the spot.
    
    I remember visiting the mill when I was a very young boy. It was noisy and dusty, with moving pulleys and wide canvas belts that passed through holes in the floors, walls, and ceilings. I remember a large opening near the peak of the roof in the front of the building with a windlass on the roof beam. It was through this high door that grain was lifted up to the top of the mill, whence it was put into hoppers and fed by gravity down into the water-driven millstones to be ground. My Uncle Sylvester, whom Dad refers to above, recalled many nights in which his father, Dan, would go out to the mill, having been awakened by the sound of the millstones grinding against each other, which indicated that the grain was no longer feeding properly between them. If the bare stones were left to grind against each other, they would grind themselves to dust and have to be replaced. Once the grain flow was unstuck, the stones would resume their normal muffled rumble and Dan could go back to bed. ↵

11. A hammermill is a portable, small-engine powered mill for grinding grain which was mounted on the back of a flatbed truck or on a trailer pulled by a truck. A farmer who lived too far from a mill to be able to conveniently transport his grain crop there for grinding would arrange for a “house call” by a hammermill. ↵

12. Uncle Sylvester’s brother-in-law was Elmer B. Stoltzfus, son of Bishop John A. and Annie Stoltzfus. The sisters they had married were two of the eight daughters of Joseph Y. and Lizzie (Warfel) Hertzler of Elverson, PA. As noted, Sylvester had married Anna; Elmer B. had married Rebecca. My mother, Esther, whom we are about to meet, was the youngest of the eight Hertzler sisters. ↵

13. Elmer B.’s farm was near Elverson, PA. Elmer B.’s oldest daughters, Fern (Stoltzfus) Mohler and Betty (Stoltzfus) Stoltzfus remember helping to cook for all the men there working on the harvest, which meant many trips to the water pump outside the house. They also remember a slender young stranger from Indiana who would later become their Uncle Alvin. ↵

14. Uncle Sylvester’s brother. “Running around” was the generic term for the not altogether atypical excesses of youth. ↵

15. According to the Mennonite Encylopedia, Winter Bible Schools became widely popular among the Mennonites during the 1930s. Insofar as Mennonites were still overwhelmingly farmers, wintertime was a time of rest, relatively speaking, so it was possible for them to attend these two-week sessions. Held in churches, these Bible schools attracted teachers and students from a wide area. Dad took me to several sessions before I was even old enough to go to school. See http://www.gameo.org/encyclopedia/contents/winter_bible_schools (accessed 21 Aug 08.) ↵

16. Maple Grove Amish Mennonite Church, (now Maple Grove Mennonite) Atglen, PA. There were three “home” congregations for the Amish Mennonites of eastern PA: Conestoga (Morgantown, PA), Millwood (Gap, PA), and Maple Grove (Atglen, PA). The story of the withdrawal of Millwood from her two sister congregations will be encountered later. Amish Mennonites in eastern PA were “church Amish” who had split from the Old Order (“house”) Amish in the latter XIXth century over such issues as whether to building meetinghouses for services or to continue to meet on a rotating basis in members’ houses. Until 1944, all three churches were loosely affiliated with the Ohio and Eastern Amish Mennonite Conference. ↵

17. Ah, the things we do for love... ↵

18. Alvin Miller and Esther Hertzler were married at Conestoga Amish Mennonite Church, Morgantown, PA, on August 30, 1941. Bishop John Mast officiated. ↵

19. The Menno Eby residence was just across the Pequea Creek from Dan Fisher’s mill, where Dad was working. The double house is a frequent feature of Amish construction in which small and separate living quarters were attached to the main house to provide a home for retired parents or sometimes—as in this instance—for young couples just starting out. ↵

20. New Holland (PA) is the largest of several towns along the Rt. 23 corridor east of Lancaster. This factory seems to have been on the corner of Main Street and Diller Avenue. There were a number of garment (and other) factories along the Rt. 23 corridor, with materials supplied by rail via the New Holland branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad. This branch ran from Lancaster through New Holland, Honey Brook, Glenmoor, rejoining the Pennsy mainline to Philadelphia at Downington. Some of these garment factories were still operating when I was young, and they continued to employ lots of young Mennonite girls. My brother’s dog was hit and killed by a carload of neighborhood Mennonite girls on their way home from work in a garment factory in either New Holland or Blue Ball. ↵

21. Not only did Clair Umble get a job, by the time I was old enough to understand what Dad did for a living, Clair had two trucks, one of which Dad drove. Clair Umble (married to Miriam Kreider) was later ordained as minister for Sandy Hill Mennonite Church. ↵

22. Presumably he was doing electrical work at the King residence for Clair Umble. Chappy’s given name was Elam; his wife was Sara (Mast) King; they lived near Atglen, PA. ↵

23. This is of course the language of revivalism brought to the Mennonites around 1870 largely by John F. Funk, a disciple of evangelist Dwight L. Moody. Revivalism was initially strongly opposed by Mennonites and Amish as an unwanted and even unholy intrusion of worldliness in the form of modernist individualism. Revivalism stresses individualistic salvation as expressed through a personal and emotional religious experience, as over against the discipline of the daily walk of living faith as discerned through the gathered body that is the Church.
    
    But the revivalism that had been so strongly opposed in 1870 had by 1900 become a core belief and practice amongst most Mennonites. It remains so, and also remains a powerful distinction between them and the Amish, which latter continue largely to resist both the language and practices of revivalism for the aforementioned reasons. Although this experience of salvation was unquestionably formative for Dad, his Amish roots continually reasserted themselves through his continued concern about how his Christian faith was to be lived out, as opposed to merely talked about. ↵

24. The Millwood/Maple Grove schism was finalized in 1944 when Millwood became affiliated with the more conservative Lancaster Mennonite Conference while Maple Grove remained with the more liberal Ohio and Eastern Amish Mennonite Conference. Part of what made this schism so painfully destructive was the fact that Bishop John Kennel, who led the Millwood faction, and Deacon Isaac Kennel, who led the Maple Grove faction, were brothers. According to Nathan Stoltzfus’s assessment in his Amish and Mennonite leadership patterns as illustrated by the Millwood-Maple Grove schism of 1944 (1978; available at the Lancaster Mennonite Historical Association library, Lancaster, PA), it was Bishop John Kennel’s 1942 excommunication of Deacon Isaac Kennel’s son and daughter-in-law that proved to be the act leading to the final break. Stoltzfus doesn’t mention what the infraction was that brought down this severest of ecclesial disciplinary actions.
    
    Although my father and mother were married at Conestoga, which was my mother’s home church, they lived much closer to Maple Grove, so it became their home church. ↵

25. According to the unpublished memoirs of Amos Mast, the Mission Committee Chairman, Dad was appointed to the Missions Committee on February 24, 1948. Memoirs ms. courtesy of Edna Mast and Marilyn Wagler Kennel.  ↵

26. Dad apparently had some serious reservations about how Chairman Mast of the Missions Committee carried out his responsibilities. The depth of Dad’s feeling may be measured by the fact that he doesn’t want to mention the chairman’s name. A subsequent observer and friend of our family has confirmed that Mast was perceived as a little odd, not always in a pleasant way. ↵

27. Media Chapel held its first service on April 27, 1947. ↵

28. The first Sunday School at Sandy Hill was held December 6, 1947. ↵

29. Numbers 13:17 and similar. ↵

30. There are counties named Grayson in Virginia and Kentucky, but none in North Carolina; there is, however, a town named Grayson in Ashe County, North Carolina. I suspect that Dad meant to say that a small group of them stayed in Grayson County in southwestern Virginia, which is indeed not all that far from Grayson, NC. But it was near Grayson, NC, that a Mennonite mission was started in 1951. ↵

31. About 230 miles northwest of Lancaster, PA, McKean County is on the New York/Pennsylvania border, with Potter County to the east and Warren County to the west. The county is largely rural, mountainous, and is sparsely populated. Whitetail deer outnumber people in McKean County by at least 10:1, which is why hunters drove up from the Lancaster area each fall. ↵

32. Abner Smoker, a plumbing contractor from Gap who attended Maple Grove and who had a major stake in the “Buck Run” hunting camp near Port Allegany, Pa. “Buck Run” served as informal McKean County headquarters for hunters during the winter and summer Bible Schoolers during August. ↵

33. Dad correctly noted that there was a problem with his dates. 1952 is most likely the correct date.  ↵

34. This will have been the Wrights Methodist church along PA Rt. 155 at Wrights, PA. It had been vacant for a number of years. ↵

35. Dad was taping at home in the Birch Grove parsonage near Port Allegany, PA, which is not far from Wrights. ↵

36. “Two Mile” is the name for a road and the creek it more or less follows. The creek joins the Allegheny River approximately two miles north of Port Allegany, hence the name. Birch Grove Mennonite Church is three miles up the Two Mile. ↵

37. The church that would become Birch Grove Mennonite was, according to the Maple Grove Mission Committee Chairman’s memoirs, built in 1898 as a Lutheran Mission Church. The date seems correct, but the Swedes in the area around Port Allegany included many members of the Mission Covenant church, so it seems more likely that it was Mission Covenant than Lutheran. Unused and unmaintained for a number of years, the church building and property were loaned to the Maple Grove Mission Board free of charge, provided that the church be kept open and operating as a church. The first Mennonite service at Birch Grove was held September 12, 1954. ↵

38. Isaac and Ruth Lapp and family. ↵

39. Paul and Elma Smucker and family. ↵

40. Calvin and Elsie Kennel and family. Calvin had accepted the position of pastor at Birch Grove. ↵

41. Meaning that someone would drive up to McKean County from either the Maple Grove or Conestoga congregations to provide preaching and any other Sunday morning assistance needed. Considering that it was over 200 miles one way, it was not a satisfactory long-term arrangement. ↵

42. Mrs. John Lapp. ↵

43. They came to our home in Gap, PA. Soon after I was born, Dad and Mom purchased a home about a mile from their “starter” home by the Millwood mill. Their new home was on what is now called Buena Vista Road, just below the Millwood Amish Mennonite Church and cemetery. I vaguely remember these meetings with the church leadership. They were somber events. ↵

44. Meaning of course Birch Grove. ↵

45. Mom’s father, Joseph Y. Hertzler, died in 1949 and was buried near Conestoga Church in Morgantown; Mom’s mother lived close by our house in Millwood with another of Mom’s sisters, Martha. Mom’s six other sisters all lived within twenty or so miles of our house and the families saw each other regularly and frequently. Starting in the mid 1930s, all the sisters and their families would gather together for Thanksgiving dinner; the attendance regularly exceeded 100. These Thanksgiving dinners lasted until the late 1990s. Rebecca, the last surviving sister, passed away in 2000, but the extended families still meet annually, on or around July 4. ↵

46. First services were held at Wesley Mennonite Chapel on December 14, 1950. Notwithstanding the fact that it was nearly 30 miles one way and that driving there each Sunday morning meant passing at least a half-dozen other Mennonite churches, Wesley Chapel was our family’s church until we moved to McKean County. ↵

47. Herman Glick, from Atglen, PA. In the oldest Mennonite traditions, there were no professional pastors; rather, pastors were chosen by lot from among the men of the congregation. A nominating committee would select a small group thought to be reasonable candidates, but the final choice of candidate was made by having each candidate select from a group of hymnals or Bibles, one of which had a slip of paper or small card placed in it. The candidate whose selection contained the slip of paper (or card) became the new pastor. The call to the ministry was the most sacred call in our religious life. Ordination was for life, and was without remuneration, excepting for reimbursement for expenses incurred for church-related travel, e.g., to conference meetings and the like. ↵

48. In preparation for this move to McKean County, Dad was licensed to the ministry at Maple Grove Mennonite Church in December, 1959. Our family sat in the front row for this service. After the licensing ceremony was finished, there were two long lines of people to wish blessings and say farewell as we prepared to move away from the Lancaster area. There was more weeping by adults than I had ever seen before and probably will ever see again. ↵

49. Temperatures in this part of Pennsylvania occasionally dropped below -20 degrees F. Port Allegany is also just close enough to Lake Erie to be affected by “lake-effect” snows; in consequence, average annual snowfall could easily be from 80-110 inches. ↵

50. Mrs. Charlotte Wasmer’s residence near Wrights, PA, not far from the Buck Run hunting camp. ↵

51. Laundry was hung on the porch to dry because the snow was often too deep to get out into the yard. Of course, the intense cold meant that the laundry was frozen stiff when taken in. Dad sometimes described McKean County weather as “nine months of winter and three months of bad sledding....” ↵

52. I have no idea what he meant by this. I’ll ask him when I see him again. ↵

53. Indifference to the liturgical calendar was another Anabaptist/Mennonite hallmark. Aside from celebrating Christmas and Easter (and Ascension Day among the Amish), the rest of the liturgical year celebrations were regarded with suspicion as being a hang-over from the high church excesses that the Anabaptists had separated themselves from. So for Dad to participate in Holy Week services meant another step away from the Anabaptist/Mennonite tradition of self-isolation. ↵

54. Home indeed: the local radio station observed a minute of silence in honor of Dad’s passing. ↵

55. John and Floy Lapp. ↵

56. This will almost certainly be the Galentine family, although the family’s father, Rex, didn’t attend. His wife, Doris, was a war-bride from Northampton, England. ↵

57. “Turn out” means “turn off.” ↵

58. The first major renovation of Birch Grove Mennonite was in 1963. The building was jacked up off the field stone foundation, a basement was dug underneath, running water was brought to the church, and, most importantly, central heating was installed. ↵

59. Strawberry Lake, near Ogema (MN), is on the White Earth Indian Reservation north of Detroit Lakes MN. Cass Lake is about 100 miles northeast of Strawberry Lake. Right after Dad was in Minnesota–although not because of him–the Mennonite church at Strawberry Lake became a center for some Mennonite charismatics, which caused a great deal of controversy across the church. Mennonites, while evangelical, were a sober people who regarded the showy demonstrations of the charismatic movement with considerable suspicion; Dad wasn’t comfortable with the charismatics either. See the on-line Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia entry “Charismatics” at http://www.gameo.org/encyclopedia/contents/C4602ME.html. (Accessed 31 July 2008) ↵

60. This may have been another of Mom’s miscarriages. ↵

61. This appears to have been Barbara E. (Kurtz) Kennel (1883-1976), widow of David Kennel. ↵

62. Since I first annotated this tape, a centennial history of Maple Grove Mennonite Church was published. According to that history (Celebrating 100 Years: Maple Grove Mennonite Church, 1909-2009(2009)), the two young women were Elsie Lantz and Sadie Shirk. ↵

63. George B. Stoltzfus was my Aunt Miriam’s husband. Pastor at Parkesburg Mennonite Church, he passed away suddenly on July 10, 1954. ↵

64. After a number of miscarriages, Mom finally succeeded in carrying my younger—and only—sister, Marianne, to term in 1957, about seven and a half years after I was born. ↵

65. Perhaps the Wesley Chapel building was still being used as a church when he dictated this, but, judging by a slow drive past the premises a few years ago, it doesn’t seem to be any longer. ↵