In the meantime, while preaching at Koki market in Port Moresby, Don Fielder met several fishermen interested in the truth. The men came from Hula, a coastal village about 60 miles [100 km] to the east. To help them and their families further, Don, along with Athol (Dap) Robson and some interested Hula people, set sail for Hula in Don’s new 26-foot [8 m] twin-hull canoe. They stayed in Hula for three days and established a small study group there.

Soon afterward, Don moved to Hula as a special pioneer, taking his wife, Shirley, and their two-year-old daughter, Debbie, with him. “We built a small hut and began preaching in the five villages in the area,” relates Don. “This involved walking a circuit of about eight miles [12 km] every day. It was physically taxing but spiritually refreshing, as we started many Bible studies and soon had eight new publishers working along with us.”

Don and Shirley’s preaching aroused the ire of the local United Church minister, who pressured their landlord to order their hut off his land. “When people from a nearby village heard about this, they were very angry because they did not want us to leave,” says Don. “About 20 of them helped us to move our hut​—foundations and all—​to a new plot of land owned by their village.”

The irate clergyman refused to give up. He lobbied the Port Moresby authorities to ban the Fielders from locating their hut anywhere in the district. “Rather than leave our assignment,” says Don, “we asked Alf Green, a skilled carpenter, to salvage wood from our hut and build a small room on our twin-hull canoe. We then anchored the canoe in a mangrove swamp near the mouth of a nearby river. There, among swarming mosquitoes and lurking crocodiles, we lived, while pioneering, for the next two and a half years.” When their second daughter, Vicki, was born, the Fielders returned to Port Moresby. They later shared in the traveling work, and Don served on the Branch Committee.

[Pictures on page 93]

Left: Shirley, Debbie, and Don Fielder; right: Don and his canoe