she became your mother. “Mother!” Yes, Jan. She was arrested four times and I three. We were fined $75 or thirty days in jail. We appealed the case but in the meantime we continued house-to-house work and back-calls. We were arrested once more and locked behind bars again. That time I got dreadfully sick. I had to take three months off to recuperate but I rejoice in my privilege of suffering, for all the court proceedings were well attended and the way was opened for a greater witness.

Our next assignment to Ottawa, Kansas, was also colored with police interference. This time we were better prepared and profited by the mistakes made in the Newton case. Jehovah gave a sweeping victory from start to finish.

From Ottawa I was sent to Grand Island, Nebraska. I had many blessings there but my greatest thrill came one day when I received a long letter from the president’s office. How my heart thumped! Could it be what I so much longed for? Yes, an invitation to Gilead. I made my last visit to Leavenworth federal prison where all three of the boys were serving three- and four-year sentences for their integrity to Jehovah. I wish you could have seen their faces beam with joy as I told them. They were as excited as I was about my going to Gilead and not a thought of no more visits.

“You loved it at Gilead, didn’t you, grandma?”

Yes, Jan, that was one of the happiest experiences of my life, and I do treasure those memories.

But the momentous thrill came when I received my foreign assignment to Puerto Rico. In just three weeks our group was eating our last meal in the United States at Brooklyn Bethel and then we were taken to board ship, the Marine Tiger. Four days later we arrived in Puerto Rico. It was a different world. Their customs, though strange, were very interesting. The beautiful mountains, the flowering trees and shrubs have been our constant delight. We were too busy to be disturbed by the various noises, poverty, etc. We were happy to have a real hope to offer such a friendly people who were so responsive to the Kingdom message. It was our God-given assignment and we loved it.

At nearly every house we were invited inside so we could sit down and be at ease in every way, except that we could not find words to say fully what was in our hearts. The patience and kindness of the people were overwhelming and we were determined to learn the language at any cost. We had lots of fun at that, too. My partner still reminds me of how I said eggs (huevos) for Thursday (jueves) for many a month.

Expectation was high as we advertised our first public meeting and our cup of joy was full as we saw our Kingdom Hall packed out. After six months the Ponce congregation was organized and some of those form a part of the thriving congregation of 123 publishers today.

In May, 1948, my partner Gladys and I were called to replace vacancies in the Santurce home. That month the congregation averaged 43 in attendance at the Watchtower study. In seven years I have seen that congregation grow and divide five times and our Santurce unit last month had an average attendance of 110 at the Watchtower study. As I look back over those years and see that, for five years, from almost every territory assigned to me, some publishers came out, and one a pioneer, I rejoice in the part Jehovah has given me, as he gave the increase.

After spending three and a half years in a foreign assignment it is quite thrilling to take a leave of absence and vacation and recuperate in the United States, but not to remain. Gladys was forced to remain because of illness and I have keenly felt the loss of her congenial, loving companionship these last five years. In a recent letter she said: “Those years in Puerto Rico were the happiest of my life and I’d not trade them for anything in the world. I was never homesick for the U.S.A., but I surely have been for Puerto Rico.” And that is just how I feel about it, too.

“But don’t you get homesick for Uncle Don, Dave and us sometimes, grandma?”

Although your uncles and aunts, Don and Earlene and Dave and Julia, are missionaries in Korea and the Philippines, yet we seem so near, for distance is a small factor when minds and hearts are fixed on Jehovah and his kingdom. It is just as Jesus said, “Everyone that has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands for the sake of my name will receive many times more” in this period of time. (Matt. 19:29, NW) How I wish you could know some of those parents and brothers and children I have in Puerto Rico!

Jan, I hope you never lose your desire to be a pioneer and if Armageddon should be still ten or fifteen years in the future, wouldn’t you like to be a missionary?

“Of course, grandma.”

True, you’ll have many trials and you’ll miss your parents when at times it may seem you have no arm of flesh to lean upon, or you may be misunderstood or deeply hurt, but that is when you’ll draw nearer to Jehovah. You’ll turn to his Word, and as he talks to you and you listen you’ll lose those burdens. My love for you cannot spare you from either the discipline or the joy that comes from learning to pursue a right purpose in life, that most excellent way. Yes, pioneer missionary service affords a most excellent opportunity to learn that most excellent way, the way of love, that leads up, up, yes, all the way up that highway to eternal life in Jehovah’s new world.

But It Is the Truth!

● The schoolteacher of a certain Florida second grade had asked her pupils to write a Christmas story. The children were to ask her about any words they could not spell and she would write them on the blackboard where she had already written such words as “Christmas,” “stocking” and “Jesus.” Eight-year-old Richard asked her how to spell “celebrate” and “birthday.” After young Richard had finished his story the teacher, noting what he had written, exclaimed: “Richard, this is not nice!” What had he written? What he had learned from his mother, who is one of Jehovah’s witnesses: “There is no Santa Claus. Christmas is not Jesus’ birthday. We do not celebrate Christmas.”

‘Christian Africa—Pagan America’

● There used to be a time when Americans viewed virtually all the Africans as pagans. Apparently the time has come for the Africans to view the Americans as pagans. According to preacher Roger Coon, a “Christian Africa” may be sending missionaries soon to convert a “pagan America.” Said preacher Coon as he boarded a steamer in Portland, Maine, to return to Nigeria: “Much of the grotesquely huge jewelry hanging from the ears, necks and wrists of so many sophisticated American women surpasses the adornment of African pagans.” Some of the rhythms blared out of jukeboxes, he added, seem adaptations of the nervous beat of jungle drums. “I believe,” declared cleric Coon, “the average West Africa schoolboy knows more about the Bible than does his counterpart in America.”—Aberdeen, Scotland, Evening Express, October 13, 1955.