When Brother Knorr entered Argentina from the west, Brother Milton Henschel came down from the north, from Paraguay. In Buenos Aires he picked up his travel companion, Brother Hughes, and together they flew the over 1,000 kilometers south to Neuquén, situated below the 38th parallel in the rich, fruit-growing valley of the Río Negro. Here, on the farm of one of the brothers, some 115 of the friends from four congregations in the area had met together. For these semi-isolated brothers this was the greatest event in their history.

Directly east of Neuquén on the Atlantic coast is the city of Bahía Blanca, and the local train stops at every town along the way on its day-long trip. In many of these towns brothers were waiting to greet the travelers. The following morning Brother Henschel addressed two groups in Bahía Blanca. One of the local brothers who owned a car offered his services, and so began a journey by car of 1,245 kilometers. Traveling north along the Atlantic coast, the next stop was the famous seaside resort, Mar del Plata. Due to a late departure from Bahía Blanca, the brothers wondered if the group in Mar del Plata would still be waiting for them. They were, and after 10 p.m. they were rewarded with the long-awaited talk by a special representative of Jehovah’s organization.

At dawn the next day, our brothers visited Balcarce, where twenty-two brothers assembled in a farmhouse close to the city. Next on the route was Tandil, where a small congregation had been formed by a pioneer brother. In a small house on the edge of town, some thirty-three came together for the talk. Late at night the traveling brothers arrived in Buenos Aires.

Congregations around the Federal Capital were next in line for visits: Eva Perón (now La Plata; many cities were renamed during the Perón regime, reassuming the former names after the 1955 revolution), Berisso, Ensenada, and Bernal. On December 25, Brother Knorr and Brother Henschel were in Buenos Aires. No congregational meetings were scheduled for this day, but in the evening all the graduates of Gilead in Buenos Aires met in the missionary home for dinner and a discussion.

Starting the next day, three days were devoted to visiting groups in Buenos Aires. Each group received a full two-hour program: first, Brother Knorr, with his interpreter, spoke for about forty minutes; when he concluded, he introduced Brother Henschel, who read a forty-minute talk in Spanish; then Brother Hughes was presented and he gave a discourse in Spanish on the theocratic organization. A very accurate schedule had been made, and it ran as smoothly as clockwork. When the brothers arrived at an apartment or a little house on the edge of town, or walked into a patio, or kitchen, or living room, everyone was seated, anxiously awaiting them with smiling faces. How they desired to applaud​—but they didn’t dare attract attention to their place of meeting! One day nine such two-hour meetings were held, and the following day, Sunday, eleven groups were visited.

On this visit to Argentina, Brother Knorr addressed a total of 43 groups, with 2,053 in attendance. Brother Henschel had talked to the same groups in Buenos Aires, plus 13 other congregations to the south and west, with an attendance of 452, bringing the grand total up to 2,505 persons for this very different kind of assembly arrangement. Not without reason The Watchtower of May 1, 1954, entitled its account of Brother Knorr’s travels as “Holding a New World Assembly Nationwide in Argentina”!

CIRCUIT SERVANTS CONTRIBUTE TO EXPANSION

Circuit work continued to make a splendid contribution to the increased activity in the congregations and isolated groups. Brother Del Pino vividly describes the obstacles and joys of this service: “Our work with the brothers was not always one of explaining the meaning of some Bible prophecy and its fulfillment, at times it had to do with many aspects of daily living​—putting order into the home life, the children, and a decent ‘outhouse.’ It was a question of organizing the congregation files, explaining their use​—only to return a year or so later to find that nothing had been done. So we would start all over again. The same was true with instructions regarding field service and meetings; the big thing was not to become discouraged, and to use what was available, what was at hand. How much joy we have today when we observe these same brothers occupying servants’ positions and having much responsibility within God’s organization and carrying it out with ability and appreciation!

“When we visited small isolated groups and congregations with few publishers and in places where the work was well known, we made arrangements to visit other nearby settlements. This meant getting up early, sometimes at 3 a.m., in order to wait for a small bus that went by only at this early hour and returned at sundown. During the cold season we would all be shivering. Arriving at our destination around 5 a.m., we would get off the bus before arriving in the town, because the police would check the passengers at the stop and ask questions of those not known in the community. We kept in mind that the work was proscribed. As soon as the roosters would begin to crow and we could see some movement of the people, or the lights going on, we would begin to visit the homes with the good and early news of the Kingdom. We would always work the rural portion till noon, arriving in the center around the police station while they would be eating. We would stop for a while, eat the sandwiches we brought along, and then continue on till the bus came along for the return trip home.

“Circuit activity in Chaco Province will also acquaint you with what our work of making disciples involved. The intense heat, the lack of transportation in those years, the lack of water many times, and the mountains of dust on the roads made the visits hard and fatiguing. Many times we had to use bicycles so as to cover long, tiring distances, and since most of the brothers were younger and more used to riding bicycles it was hard for us to keep up the pace that they set on those tortuous roads and paths. Many times we returned at night through narrow paths grown up with weeds and thorns, and if one got just a little off the narrow road he would end up with torn clothing and bruised skin. Arriving at the house, we would find the scratches on our bodies. Today we remember those days and how Jehovah blessed his zealous servants. Today in Chaco, along those roads and byways, there are groups and congregations that praise Jehovah.