Pursuing My Purpose in Life
As told by Shirley Hendrickson
A FARMHOUSE of two rooms, near Frederick, Oklahoma, is where it all began for me November 13, 1913. About that event I have, of course, no memory and can mention only what others have told me. Father and mother were not very religious, although mother always was reading the Bible but not understanding it. A neighbor lent her some of Pastor Russell’s books about 1924, after we had been settled for several years on a farm my dad had bought in the panhandle of Texas. The more she read, the more she liked those books; so we learned the truth. About four families of us got together for study. Learning later that we were the “other sheep,” we dedicated ourselves to Jehovah and were baptized.
Even in childhood I liked Bible truth and soon began to work long hours in the service, pursuing my purpose in life. With a friend I went to Big Spring, Texas, to hear some lectures from a sound car. There I became acquainted with the brother and sister who, with their two boys, were taking that car to California. Next December they came back through our town. They took me along to several towns, where we worked the business districts, giving sound-car lectures. My first day out I placed forty booklets. In central Texas the division (then comprising numerous congregations in that area) had arranged to buy a sound car. I had decided to be a pioneer; so they invited me to work with their car group. Early in 1936 we proceeded to Los Angeles to have part in the February convention there. That summer we worked the business districts in several Texas towns, going in the fall to Atlanta, Georgia, then to the assembly at Newark, New Jersey, and back to Atlanta.
Persecution aplenty there was about that time, and I was arrested for the first time for preaching the good news of God’s kingdom in a nearby little town. But pioneering kept getting better all the time, the Atlanta congregation kindly helping us.
Working again as a sound-car group, we spent the summer of 1937 in business sections of Chattanooga, Tennessee; Louisville, Kentucky; and Indianapolis, Indiana; then moving on to the convention at Columbus, Ohio. There I met exactly the kind of partner I needed, Rosa May Dreyer. We have been together ever since.
After working a few months out of a pioneer home at Cincinnati, Ohio, we were assigned as special pioneers to Waterbury, Connecticut. Our first day there was our birthday, both hers and mine. All day it rained, but we worked eight hours. The winter there was snowy and beautiful. There, in time, we began to see coming to the meetings some of those to whom we had witnessed.
Next, Torrington, Connecticut, where in 1938 we shared in the first campaign for Consolation magazine, taking over a hundred subscriptions. One young sister whom we helped get started there in the service later became a pioneer, a Gilead graduate, and now is a missionary in Italy.
After Torrington we went to the Massachusetts cities of Pittsfield, Leominster, Fitchburg, and finally Boston. Here Rosa May was assigned by the Society to teach a Kingdom School for children expelled from the public schools for refusing to salute the flag. So I continued to work with other special pioneers, and later with my two younger brothers in Oregon and Washington. Then, after attending the 1940 Detroit convention in that summer’s intense heat, supplemented by prevailing heat of nationwide persecution, I was sent first to work at San Diego, California, in the business section, and thereafter to San Antonio, Texas, where Rosa May rejoined me.
We attended the 1941 grand assembly at St. Louis, Brother Rutherford’s last, hearing his beautiful talk on “Children of the King.” Soon afterward special pioneer work was reopened, we being assigned to Alice, Texas. We began to find much interest on the Mexican side of town and to learn some Spanish while working there for several months. On the town’s American side superpatriots stirred mobs against us. I was arrested, jailed, released on bond, and then the case was thrown out of court. Again I was arrested while doing street work with magazines, notwithstanding my having been knocked to the street by a renegade lady, under whose assault a big white hat and a pretty white dress of mine were definitely soiled. The local paper gave free movie passes to the lady!
From Alice we went to Aransas Pass, a peaceful little town on the Texas Gulf coast. But much of it soon was blown away by a hurricane. While it was being rebuilt we attended the 1942 assembly at Cleveland, hitchhiking there. There Gilead was announced, and we jokingly said: “We want to go to Mexico and pioneer.”
Having returned to Aransas Pass and finished our work there, we were assigned to Sinton. Here we received our invitations to Gilead, starting north by bus late in January, 1943. It was a hot morning when we left Texas, but before arriving at Gilead we had covered many an icy mile. Our first day at Gilead I vividly remember. Bundled up in our overcoats and galoshes, we were taken around the grounds, seeing the cows, chickens and buildings, Brother Knorr guiding us. What now is the beautiful main entrance was then just a loading platform with a stairway at one end. But how it attracted us! Never in all my life did I do so much studying. There my appreciation of the organization and the immense assignment it has grew, yes, increased a hundredfold. I learned so many things. Everyone was so kind to us there and graduation came all too soon.
Mexico it was for Rosa May and me! But first, with two other graduates, we worked for two years on the Texas-Mexico border while waiting for our visas to enter the country, meanwhile learning more Spanish.
In the spring of 1945 a big convention was held in Mexico City. The brothers in Monterrey were arranging a special train for that event. Round-trip fare, ten dollars! We bought tourist passes and, of course, were on that train. It was a second-class affair, with chairs of wood; but it was full of Jehovah’s witnesses, our brothers. They thought that we gringas would not be able to take it, but before finally arriving at la capitál we were taking hot coffee to some of them. Who should be at the station in Mexico City to meet us but Brother Knorr and Brother Franz!
A most impressive convention it was. We worked in the bookroom and learned how to count Mexican money; we also visited Xochimilco, Mexico’s famous floating gardens. One day Rosa May broke her glasses and we went alone downtown to have them repaired. Spanish everywhere! And while there I momentarily wondered whether I would be able to take it constantly, permanently. But when the convention ended and we had returned to Texas, within two weeks our visas came. On May 21, 1945, at Laredo, we crossed the border with all our belongings. On our arrival at the branch in Mexico City Brother Bourgeois helped us get started in our territory. Shaking, and with my pidgin Spanish, I went into the first apartment house, placed four books and arranged for a study, all in less than an hour! The brothers, enthusiastic, were glad to have us with them; their meetings were so lively. Soon we felt completely at home. Now we have been here twelve years. We have seen the two local congregations grow into thirty-four units. Many with whom we studied, as well as those with whom they later held studies, now are among that number. We have seen brothers who could hardly read and write grow into mature servants, causing us to overflow with joy that we had had a part in it.
Looking back now over more than twenty years of pioneering, truly I can say that I have never had one regret that I said to Jehovah, “Here am I; send me.” The World’s heartaches and headaches we just look at from the sidelines. Of course, I do not mean that there are no “downs” with all the “ups.” The joys of service entirely outweigh all passing moments of difficulty and hardship. Jehovah continually manifests his justice, his kindness. Besides his abundantly providing our daily needs constantly, there have been also the wonderful conventions we seldom miss, pleasant trips home, picnics among ourselves and, as feature events, the encouraging visits of the Society’s president, to which we always look forward. So while pursuing my purpose in life, to Jehovah I pray that I may be able to continue in my assignment with the New World society, to see all his enemies smashed at Armageddon, and then to live endlessly in his new world.
[On Sunday, July 28, 1957, Shirley Hendrickson was interviewed on the work in Mexico for four minutes on the television program presented 11 a.m. to 12 noon at Wrigley Baseball Field during the Los Angeles (California) District Assembly.]