Christmas letters summarizing year.
1963 Paula Tom and Kristin in car seat given to Tom by Willa noted in letter in Aug 1961 while on the train from Fargo to Willa. Family photo taken at Malalo
1963 December 9
Letter written by Al Erickson from the Malalo Mission Gertude and Laurence Rasmussen 608 Sunrise, Park Ridge, Stevens Point, Wisconsin, USA
A very merry Christmas to you, Aeacma apuctongwaga (our Strengtheners):
If a New Guinean man is about to be appointed for an important position, such as a village elder, one of the foremost questions is, does he belong to a client capable of giving him food and supplies so that he can carry out his very important work? The answer to this question may weld me in the difference in whether or not he is selected.
In many and varied ways, we have felt the sense of such New Guinea and practices. To live in New Guinea is to recognize one’s great dependence on other people. Here, one seldom hears a speech or a solo or one or two people making a decision. Aggressive individuality, fits like a square into a round hole. or to make the picture more three dimensional, a New Guinean might think it’s like trying to put a block into the completed sphere of life here. Which makes it very difficult for us missionaries, who, as a group claim more than our share of independent causes. More than one missionary has been lost at sea or lost in the jungle because he failed to follow the local advice – advice out of centuries of experience.
Put it simply New Guinea has much to teach the newcomer, especially about his own ignorance and shallowness, and dealing with the basic problems of living here. But more than that it seeks to install in its new inhabitants the important role being played by those who undergird our work. For this reason we address you using a New Guinea language. You are those who make a strong. From an American point of view, you might look upon yourselves as important for our support. From our newly attained New Guinea point of view, you are much more than that. You are essential to us. Without your prayers and goodwill, without the inspiration of many of our homeland Christians, we would simply be loaners – weak and ineffective. For your support, we are indebted and deeply grateful, because of your faithful support we can, indeed, proclaim the gospel, not only this Christmas season, but throughout the entire year.
The airstrip, which we spoke about sometime ago, has been completed and dedicated. Our mountain people in this area are able to ship their coffee beans out now, and can get supplies before unattainable except by carrying them on their backs. We can help them start building some permanent school buildings. They can get stock for trade stores also. It certainly will be a boost to their morale as they had been working on a road for 16 years trying to chop it out with pick an ax. Many of their people lost their lives in landslides and from falling rock. They have completed a trail which makes walking considerably easier. Our whole family and short term teacher took a trip in there in May. We stayed two weeks, and it took 20 of the confirmation cost to carry all of our things in for us, but only 7 miles are wide enough for a vehicle. And then only if you are a brave driver. The airstrip should be a big boost in trying to help these people develop.
Our church, which has been five years in the building, and the dedication of it has been postponed three times, is now close enough to completion, so we are setting a final date for it, December 29, 1963 – we think.
Our dispensary is finally nearing completion also. We keep falling through the floor in the bush building, so it is not with little joy that we move into the new one. Perhaps we can dedicate it at the time we dedicate the church. We aren’t allowed to use it until it has been dedicated.
Presently Al is spending some time at the congregational sawmill. The European man and his wife that have been there for the last five years are going back to Australia and won’t be returning. He will have to figure out how to run it until we can find someone to replace them. The aim of the sawmill, since it is owned by the congregation, is to train New Guineans to run it, but none have been adequately, interested or educated enough to take it over yet. Really they have done pretty well. They bought a boat for pulling logs and have a large debt. They incurred and setting it up nearly all paid off. Cutting the logs and pulling them to the beach is a big job as they don’t have any modern means of assistance, just sheer manpower.
Beck, Peter, Evelyn and Carol and Rhonda. Operated the Sawet Sawmill for 5 years and returned to Australia in Dec 1963. Paula and Tom. Old Sawmill.
Ina is quite well taken up with the arrival of Kristen Judith in August to soon join in the mischievous antics of Paula and Tommy. She looks much like Tommy did except she has blue eyes and did have brown curly hair, but now she has many bald spots. She had such a warm reception, Paula and Tommy can hardly stand to have her sleep. Tommy enjoys sharing his bubblegum, cookies and toys with her much too mothers disapproval, and Paula enjoys holding her, and upon one occasion, tried caring her, with no mishap thank God. One day, Kristi was gagging and gagging, mother ran quickly to the rescue and found Tommy call me putting his finger down her throat so you see her life isn’t dull.
The church work seems to be at a standstill, and even at times seems to be going backwards. But in the beginning, New Guinea was evangelized village by village, because people didn’t think as individuals, but as villages, so they were baptized by village by village, and now the village spirit is breaking down, but strong individuals with personal responsibilities are yet to emerge. We must begin again with an individual, by individual, so we can have strong leaders to take over the New Guinea church. We certainly can see God‘s hand moving in New Guinea.
We certainly rejoice as we celebrate, Christ birth, and as we think of you all.
Thanking God for your faithfulness.
Gratefully, yours, Al, Ina, Paula, Tommy and Kristi Erickson
Footnote:
1 The airstrip was built at Wagau south of Lae and near the Buang area. Airstrip in Wagau according Al’s recollection was the only place in the whole Malalo circuit with a flat enough ground space. People had to carry dirt in and level the ground off. They used gunny sacks tied to two sticks. It was a lot of work clearing that airstrip space by hand. There was no road into Wagua. They had a small tractor there with one saw to cut up the lumber. Alvin Erickson recalls a time when he took an airplane and landed at the Wagua airstrip, and before he could get his suitcase off the airplane took off with his suitcase. This airstrip was no more than 8 to 10 miles from the ocean. The water from here flowed inland into the Snake river, and then inland more to the Markham river to the north. Water from the airstrip traveled 120 miles before reaching the ocean.
1963 December 25. ( 2 letters below)
Letter written by Ina Erickson from the Malalo Mission station to Durward and Estelle Titus Box 224 Route1, Carlos MN USA
To the Titus and Tonns
Dear folks,
While here it is the calm before the storm last night we had our Christmas Eve program almost. Four friends from Bula came over and we had two short-term teachers from the Highlands with us. They brought some candles to put on our Christmas tree. We all had supper, and then took our chairs out to the front lawn where everything was arranged for the Christmas pageant. The Busameng’s, which is the village that Al had been having trouble with had been assigned to build the pulpit for the Christmas program. They refuse, saying that it was too much work for them, so the pastor told them well and good, but they had to appoint the village that would build for them. Yesterday they showed up and built a nice pulpit and two booth like shacks for the manger scene and for Harrods Court out of bamboo and coconut fronds. They had arranged everything with coconut palms lined up for seating and rows on the ground. There were lanterns at various intervals, since we still didn’t have lights as the generator that Tommy ‘fixed’1, so well hadn’t come back. We had the opening prayer, and the shepherds, Wisemen, and Mary and Joseph took their places as we sang the opening him. We had just finished when the downpour descended. Hundreds of New Guinean’s for the nearest shelter, and we went for the house. There were people under our house under the workshop, and under the school. The school and dispensary were full and all the houses on the station were full.
The Bula people had been planning to walk back to Bula after the service about 10 PM. I really had thought they would wind up staying all night so I had made beds for everyone. So we passed out pajamas and toothbrushes and everyone spent the night. The rain didn’t stop until almost dawn. Metagemeng brought some compound boys back from Lae so brought us some mail which really was a treat. Two boys carried our generator up in the pouring rain so Christmas night we had lights. I’m so glad we have them for all the preparations for the church dedication.
Friday: (Christmas was on Wednesday in 1963)
I got a note in the mail, saying that the district health officer hadn’t approved my getting more anti-snake venom. I had three ampules of old stuff on hand, but nothing that I felt safe in using. We had just had two bites that would have been fatal. If we had to them send them all the way to Lae before they got the venom. The reasoning behind the refusal was that it was too dangerous to give. Well, it would be more dangerous not to give it. Much to my surprise here came the anti-venom Christmas morning so we did have a lovely Christmas present.
I was busy trying to get early breakfast ready, as some of the Bula people wanted to get back to Bula to have Sunday school for all the little children in that area. But someone came and told me one of the station ladies was in labor. I had wanted her to go to Lae because her hemoglobin was so low and with her last baby, she had bled a lot. (This was her eighth pregnancy). I thought it would be safe to let her wait until all the holiday activities were finished as she wasn’t due until the last of January. We took her down to the dispensary and she was the first one to deliver there. The wife of the carpenter that had built the church and supervised the dispensary. Everything went normal, and she bled some but not enough to endanger her so, we were very pleased. Also, they had a boy after five girls.
Christmas evening when we had all of our station people in for a little tea cookies and lemonade. We gave them some colors and coloring books for their kids and a tin of peaches for each family. We can’t give very much because we would have to start giving to all the teachers, pastors and evangelist above what they get from Commissary. There was only about 14 people that we invited.
Al has a meeting to try and decide what to do about teachers. Each year someone has reasons they shouldn’t teach in the school that they had taught in the year before and some communities have gripes about their teachers. One of our school teachers got himself into trouble so we will be losing him. He was such a reliable person, we had to depend on him for a lot of things, but now he will have to leave. We don’t have a teacher of his caliber to replace him so we will not be able to take as many students as we thought that we could before. That is the discouraging part of life here, you just can’t count on anyone, but of course, it makes us realize how wonderful it is to have a loving Savior that we can depend upon, and that never lets us down.
We still have no idea how many guests that we may have for the church dedication, but I have plenty of supplies I think on hand, and we are going to butcher a cow and grind everything up. I’m sure no one will starve. I’m hoping to get 20 loaves of bread from Lae, and then we will have barbecued beef, potato salad, corn, and a fruit salad for dessert with cookies. Then a few trimmings. We have no idea if we will have 25, 50, or 100 “European” guests. So with this menu I can stretch it if we have 200 and shrink it if we have 50. I’ll cry if we have less than that. It will be a relief to get it finally out-of-the-way. We have no idea if it will rain or not. There will be hundreds of New Guineans. Nothing is ever definite so we don’t count on being out of the way, until it is actually happened.
Abele who helped on the station and with the cows
One of our visitors will take pictures of it for us. I hope you got all of the slides I sent. Then send them to Al’s mother and instruct her to send them on to Trinity Lutheran Church, Rogers Avenue. Stevens point Wisconsin.
Thank you so much for the money Willa and Martin. Would a camera be personal enough. We really do appreciate your generosity. Everyone has been so good to us since we arrived. It sure hurt to see the picture of all the little Tonns and see that they weren’t so little anymore. Fritz and Jennifer sure are little Tonns. The picture of little Dan was so precious. He sure is a cutie also. Just think only three more Christmases and will see you all.
I’m in a hurry so please excuse all the mistakes.
God‘s blessing Al, Ina and kids.
Footnote:
1 Paula has a memory of Tom putting sawdust in a tray of oil that was on the generator. Could that be what damaged the generator at this time. That would mean a very early memory for Paula at 3 1/2 years old.
1963, December 25,
Letter written by Ina Erickson from the Malalo Mission station Alvin and Louise Erickson, Box 1327, Glendive Montana, USA
Dear mom and dad Erickson,
(Note—-everything is the same as the letter to the Titus’s which I have the same parts in italics —But there are some different details later in the letter to the Erickson’s.):
While here it is the calm before the storm last night we had our Christmas Eve program almost. Four friends from Bula came over and we had two short-term teachers from the Highlands with us. They brought some candles to put on our Christmas tree. We all had supper, and then took our chairs out to the front lawn where everything was arranged for the Christmas pageant. The Busameng’s, which is the village that Al had been having trouble with had been assigned to build the pulpit for the Christmas program. They refuse, saying that it was too much work for them, so the pastor told them well and good, but they had to appoint the village that would build for them. Yesterday they showed up and built a nice pulpit and two booth like shacks for the manger scene and for Harrods Court out of bamboo and coconut fronds. They had arranged everything with coconut palms lined up for seating and rows on the ground. There were lanterns at various intervals, since we still didn’t have lights as the generator that Tommy ‘fixed’1, so well hadn’t come back. We had the opening prayer, and the shepherds, Wisemen, and Mary and Joseph took their places as we sang the opening him. We had just finished when the downpour descended. Hundreds of New Guinean’s for the nearest shelter, and we went for the house. There were people under our house under the workshop, and under the school. The school and dispensary were full and all the houses on the station were full.
The Bula people had been planning to walk back to Bula after the service about 10 PM. I really had thought they would wind up staying all night so I had made beds for everyone. So we passed out pajamas and toothbrushes and everyone spent the night. The rain didn’t stop until almost dawn. Metagemeng brought some compound boys back from Lae so brought us some mail which really was a treat. Two boys carried our generator up in the pouring rain so Christmas night we had lights. I’m so glad we have them for all the preparations for the church dedication.
Friday: ( Christmas was on Wednesday in 1963)
I got a note in the mail, saying that the district health officer hadn’t approved my getting more anti-snake venom. I had three ampules of old stuff on hand, but nothing that I felt safe in using. We had just had two bites that would have been fatal. If we had to them send them all the way to Lae before they got the venom. The reasoning behind the refusal was that it was too dangerous to give. Well, it would be more dangerous not to give it. Much to my surprise here came the anti-venom Christmas morning so we did have a lovely Christmas present.
I was busy trying to get early breakfast ready, as some of the Bula people wanted to get back to Bula to have Sunday school for all the little children in that area. But someone came and told me one of the station ladies was in labor. I had wanted her to go to Lae because her hemoglobin was so low and with her last baby, she had bled a lot. (This was her eighth pregnancy). I thought it would be safe to let her wait until all the holiday activities were finished as she wasn’t due until the last of January. We took her down to the dispensary and she was the first one to deliver there. The wife of the carpenter that had built the church and supervised the dispensary. Everything went normal, and she bled some but not enough to endanger her so, we were very pleased. Also, they had a boy after five girls.
Christmas evening when we had all of our station people in for a little tea cookies and lemonade. We gave them some colors and coloring books for their kids and a tin of peaches for each family. We can’t give very much because we would have to start giving to all the teachers, pastors and evangelist above what they get from Commissary. There was only about 14 people that we invited.
Al has a meeting to try and decide what to do about teachers. Each year someone has reasons they shouldn’t teach in the school that they had taught in the year before and some communities have gripes about their teachers. One of our school teachers got himself into trouble so we will be losing him. He was such a reliable person, we had to depend on him for a lot of things, but now he will have to leave. We don’t have a teacher of his caliber to replace him so we will not be able to take as many students as we thought that we could before. That is the discouraging part of life here, you just can’t count on anyone, but of course, it makes us realize how wonderful it is to have a loving Savior that we can depend upon, and that never lets us down.
We still have no idea how many guests that we may have for the church dedication, but I have plenty of supplies I think on hand, and we are going to butcher a cow and grind everything up. I’m sure no one will starve. I’m hoping to get 20 loaves of bread from Lae, and then we will have barbecued beef, potato salad, corn, and a fruit salad for dessert with cookies. Then a few trimmings. We have no idea if we will have 25, 50, or 100 “European” guests. So with this menu I can stretch it if we have 200 and shrink it if we have 50. I’ll cry if we have less than that. It will be a relief to get it finally out-of-the-way. We have no idea if it will rain or not. There will be hundreds of New Guineans. Nothing is ever definite so we don’t count on being out of the way, until it is actually happened.
Christmas morning we gave out the commissary that the women of the church in America had sent out for Christmas cheer. We gave two lap laps to each man, two T-shirts, and two dresses to his wife and several articles of clothing to each of the children of the family. There were about 70 families that received a pack. They really look forward to it. For some of them this is the only clothes they have, as their salaries are too low about $36 a year to be able to purchase more clothing. The government pays them if they are able to pass some of their exams.
Thank you so much for the lovely Christmas box. Thanks so much for the beautiful clothes. Kristi’s sweater set is so lovely. We can put it to good use now when we go to the Highlands, and she can wear her lovely dress and slippers from Helen for the church dedication. Paula loves her skirts and blouses as well. She enjoys her dolly also. Tommy’s clothes fit nicely and he really thought the little tractor was lots of fun. That is the first wind up toy that he’d ever had.
Kristi has been such a good baby in spite of all of the activity. She seldom cries, she eats, and then plays, or sucks her thumb and goes back to sleep again. I surely have been grateful for that.
I surely will be nice to have the church dedication out-of-the-way. Everything is so uncertain that it is hard to plan for it. We only get part of our orders when trying to order food. We have no idea how many might come 25, 50, or 100. We’ll just have to wait and see if it rains or not. There will be many hundreds of Guineans. We’ll butcher a cow on Saturday, and cut up all the meat and grind it as it will be too tough to eat otherwise.
We surely pray for God‘s blessings to and thank you for all your love prayers and gifts.
Love Al, Ina and kids
1963 December
Letter written by Ina Erickson from the Malalo Mission station to Durward and Estelle Titus Box 224 Route1, Carlos MN USA
Dear folks,
A very merry Christmas and a happy new year. It is getting a little more normal to be preparing for Christmas with poinsettia trees, instead of having a little plant and palm, waving in the sun, instead of pine trees, covered with snow and warm weather instead of freezing and rain instead of snow, it is interesting to try and explain snow to Paula and Tommy. They have no concept to connect it with.
Well, our sawmill friends left today. We had a farewell for them here at Malalo last Sunday. The three people from Bula walked over, the Becks came on Friday, and then us, so we did have a houseful. They really were happy several months ago to think that they were going home after five years. Australia’s terms are five years than a six months furlough. They won’t becoming back. When it really comes right down to leaving, everyone gets a bit apprehensive, as they have changed so much living in the bush for so long, and their relatives have changed with the passing of time, and they don’t have a settled home to go to. Nearly everyone we’ve seen leave the field are that way. It is funny how we get so much more sensitive, much more conscious of what others will think of us and also an inability to talk. We’ve really gotten into a rut and aren’t able to discuss anything but our immediate surroundings. All of this makes going home a bit scary. Those going back to the states appreciate a three week boat trip to get used to living in a civilized world, to relearn the niceties of life, and catch up on the latest styles, and just generally learn what has happened in the world since they’d left.
The Becks had an added concern as they weren’t coming back. Pete hasn’t really been trained in anything, and he seems to be more of a philosopher than laborer so he might have quite a time getting a job. If he had had the education, he surely would do well in elementary education. They have two daughters, age 4, and 2, and they really were advanced. The oldest was saying long sentences at two.
they have really had to struggle. In the first place, he didn’t know anything about sawmilling, but as often happens, they are placed where they are needed, and not necessarily according to their abilities. They were also living in two small houses, one was the kitchen and the other living room and bedroom. They would have to run in the rain just to go from room to room. This is because they eventually , want to turn it over entirely to the new Guinean people and have them living there. A family to each house. Then they were so isolated down there. They did have a boat, but no radio, so if someone was sick, they would have to send a runner to us, and that took eight hours and if our radio worked, we could get some help for them. It was a rarity that someone would visit down there, and Evelyn got so sick when she traveled on the sea, so getting out was as unbearable as being isolated. They were hired by the congregation, and not by the mission, so they had to be paid by the Malalo congregation. Therefore, their salary and fringe benefits were that of the rest of the people. Pete was afraid to leave Evelyn there alone, so didn’t go out to examine the stands of timber. They had people to tell them what they should be bringing in. This made for some hard feelings. He also was running it like a profit, making business, which it was supposed to be, and not like a mission station where everything is free, so he made some enemies with the closer villages. The sawmill bought a boat for building logs, and they had quite an investment in machinery, Though they didn’t have any permanent buildings, just bush buildings. The debt was considerable. The first years he had to do so much experimenting to try and find out how much to sell and buy things for working with New Guineans, keeping books and etc. that they didn’t do very well. He was cut criticized on all sides. Then he decided to just run things his own way, and not listen to anyone else, and he made it pay. He got the sawmill entirely out of debt, but hasn’t reinvest anything into it so the next guy, if there is one, will have to buy new equipment and make it profitable.
There was a group of mountain people that moved down to the sea, and just sat down. Nothing as they say in pigeon, English. They kind of lost their dignity and ambition. Everyone looked down upon them. However, with the sawmill they started selling some of their logs, and making a fair living. All of their young men have come back from the compounds and our staying in their villages. So many villages are stagnant as their young men have gone off to work in the compounds, and there are so many single girls in the villages along with old people. So there are not many good laborers, and also the family is breaking down, as the boys don’t marry. It cost too much to hire married fellows, so they get fired if they get married, and they employer must give enough food for the entire family running up to two and three times the wages of a single man. This village has worked hard to support the sawmill and don’t want to see it fold. They will try and get someone to replace the Becks. I’m not sure if that is possible. It is such a shame to have to fold now when it was finally becoming a paying proposition. They had learned a lot about business, but not enough to take it over.
Al spent the last few days that they were at the sawmill, to try and see how he ran it so that Al can run it until they get a new man. He’ll have to run it by remote control and we will pay the workers here, but they won’t be supervised. That system won’t last long, but it may work for a little while.
When the Becks left, the congregation gave them 100 pounds, about $225. Pete was so touched that he cried. He sent back about 175 of it, but it was the idea of the people. Al had anything to do with it, so I guess after all the abuse that poor Peter got, they did appreciate his efforts.
By having the family live there, the people were able to get mail, medicine, and have a trade store, where they could buy sugar, rice, tobacco, cookies, matches, and the little things of life.
Fred started the sawmill, and surely didn’t like to see it, go under, that is why he didn’t have much good to say about Pete, but given a free reign, Pete did pretty well. I just thought you’d might be interested in the other side of the story.
(Note: This was written on the inside of a Christmas card like paper and not signed after the letter.)