Thus, on December 18, 1945, during the darkest and coldest time of the year, Brother Knorr together with his secretary, Milton G. Henschel, and a Northern European Office representative, William Dey, arrived by boat from Sweden. This is how their diary of travel reads: “About seventeen hours from the time it left Stockholm the Bore V entered the waters of the Finnish bay near Turku and seemed almost glad it had weathered the trip and could be in its home waters, there to push about the six-inch [15 cm] slabs of ice that filled the harbor.” A group of smiling brothers from the Helsinki Bethel family welcomed them.

Brother Knorr looked into the problems resulting from the war. The Society had sent Finland donated clothing from Sweden, which was distributed to pioneers and others in need. Although Finland was a notable producer of paper at that time, the government wanted to export all the paper in order to get foreign currency into Finland. Would the printing of our magazines grind to a halt because of the difficulty in obtaining paper? To economize, Brother Knorr decided to discontinue the printing of the Consolation magazine for the time being. The paper for The Watchtower would be bought by headquarters with U.S. dollars, which Finland readily accepted. Thus, the printing of the main channel for spiritual food, The Watchtower, continued.

During his visit, Brother Knorr related the exciting news about the recent opening of the Watchtower Bible School of Gilead for missionary training. His diary shows the reaction of the Finnish brothers: “No greater enthusiasm for the Watchtower College had been displayed anywhere else on the journey. . . . Twenty-two full-time workers filed their names.”

Postwar Growth

The year 1947 found Brothers Knorr and Henschel back in Finland. Although only a year and a half had passed since their previous visit, they noticed the remarkable progress that had been made in the meantime.

During the postwar period, Finland began to print all the Society’s books on their own presses. It was troublesome to get cover material and to prepare hard covers for the books, though, so in the early 1950’s, they used plain cardboard covers, which proved to be too weak. As a result, when Brother Knorr visited in 1951 and in 1955, he advised them as to how they could improve the quality of their books.

[Picture on page 181]

N. H. Knorr and M. G. Henschel in 1955, one of many visits to encourage the brothers