This is a complete and accurate transcript of the second oral history interview of Elizabeth (Howard) Warner (CN 75 T3) in the archives of the Billy Graham Center. No spoken words which were recorded are omitted. In a very few cases, the transcribers could not understand what was said, in which case "[unclear]' was inserted. Also, grunts, verbal hesitations such as "ah" or "um" were usually omitted. Readers of this transcript should remember that this is a transcript of spoken English, which follows a different rhythm and even rule than written English.
... Three dots indicate an interruption or break in the train of thought within the sentence of the speaker.
.... Four dots indicate what the transcriber believes to be the end of an incomplete sentence.
() Word in parentheses are asides made by the speaker.
[] Words in brackets are comments made by the transcriber.
This transcript was made by Robert Shuster in October 1992
Collection 75, Tape #T3, Interview with Elizabeth (Howard) Warner by Lois Tressler, December 7, 1978.
TRESSLER: This interview took place on December 7th, 1978, at the time of 10:20 and I am interviewing Mrs. Elizabeth Howard Warner and the interviewer is Lois Tressler. Mrs. Warner, would you tell us some more of what you did when you were in China, your work, what you did?
WARNER: [Pauses] Let's see, what did I tell you before? [both laugh] I was in language school.
TRESSLER: Right.
WARNER: And, of course, at...I had finished...about finished language school when we moved to this place, Taipo, it's called. And here we had to supervise all the changing and set up of our home in this new place. And we led in the devotions and we missionaries had full charge of the handwork in the afternoon: embroidering, sewing, weaving, whatever the girls did. And there were numerous other things. We had constant applications from refugees who needed a place to go, occasionally we'd have a discipline problem to handle. Then we'd had to supervise the...the matrons, the financial end of it, the buying of equipment and all of these things that we needed. And occasionally, about once a month (perhaps it was oftener, I can't recall), we would go into Hong Kong. We had a new committee and we would meet with them for a week...for a periodic meeting - reporting on the work and a time of prayer and advice that they would give us.
TRESSLER: Is this a new committee like a new mission board?
WARNER: Well, some of the ladies that were on the original board had moved to Hong Kong, but some of them had retired by this time or weren't in the area, so we had chosen a number of new ones, some British women and American missionaries who were in Hong Kong, so that it was a little more efficient, being close at hand.
TRESSLER: The refugees you were talking about, now that's from...?
WARNER: They would be from China.
TRESSLER: China. Okay.
WARNER: There were refugees leaving at that time because of the war with the Japanese and there often were children that needed homes.
TRESSLER: Now, was this boys and girls or just girls there?
WARNER: Well, we just took in girls.
TRESSLER: Now is that...did you stay in that same home for the rest of the time you were there in China?
WARNER: Yes.
TRESSLER: Okay. Then you could just continue down with the same kind of work...
WARNER: Right.
TRESSLER: ...the rest of the time.
WARNER: Uh huh.
TRESSLER: Alright. [pauses] Let's see. What was the government's position toward Christian work in China?
WARNER: There was no opposition to Christian work. We had no problem. At least in the area where we were.
TRESSLER: And you had no trouble with keeping the girls that you were keeping?
WARNER: No.
TRESSLER: No one said anything?
WARNER: No, we never had any...any trouble. I can see how there might have been trouble...
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: ...but we never ran into any.
TRESSLER: That's pretty amazing when you were keeping girls from brothels. What was the relationship between the various mission boards in China? Was there cooperation? Conflict? What type of cooperation, what type of conflict took place?
WARNER: In the city of Canton there was cooperation between the different missions. Like ours, we had representatives on the committee with different missions.
TRESSLER: Oh, that's right.
WARNER: And some had hospitals, some had schools. And they seemed to work together pretty well. In Hong Kong too, I don't remember of any problems between any of them.
TRESSLER: What type of missions did you have there?
WARNER: Well, it was probably pretty much the same as Canton. They had schools and there were some hospitals too. Though in Hong Kong they had government hospitals and government schools too, established by the British. So it wasn't quite as necessary for the missions...
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: ...to have these. We used to take our girls to a government dispensary, I remember, if they needed attention.
TRESSLER: And who is...what denominations or types of missions or, you know, names like...like a Methodist Missionary Society or something? [sic] I meant, what was there...who was supporting these missionaries? Do you know? Do you remember?
WARNER: [Pauses] Which...
TRESSLER: Like,...
WARNER: ...missionaries? Do you mean in Canton?
TRESSLER: ...I mean.... Yeah. Okay.
WARNER: Well, the ones I remember especially was the Presbyterian mission there and we were very close to the Southern Baptists and I believe there were Methodist missionaries there too. Those are the ones I remember.
TRESSLER: What...and those were the same ones that were...like, were those the same ones at...?
WARNER: No, in Hong Kong it would have been different ones. [tape recorder turned off and turned on again] In Hong Kong I remember some of the British missions and then the Free Church from the [United] States there. They had a Bible school and there was a...a English missionary quite close to us (she was a little farther out in the New Territories) that had an...an orphanage for babies, little abandoned babies. And I believe that was the one where our girls were sent when the Japanese came in and finally took over. Sent from Mrs. Raetz home.
TRESSLER: Was this the same reason for abandoning...was that the same as for abandoning...abandoning the little girls.
WARNER: Yes, probably. Poverty, the inability to care for them. And sometimes if they just had more children than they wanted, they'd just give them away or just leave them out to die sometimes. And this English woman, she just took in lots and lots of these babies.
TRESSLER: What types or...of different people did you come in contact when [sic] you were there in China? [Cuckoo clock chimes once]
WARNER: You mean of the Chinese?
TRESSLER: Yes.
WARNER: Well, mostly the poorer class, except when you visited the schools. Then you'd have some of the educated. When I was a child it was all the higher class, the students that came to school. But then when you're in this kind of work and among the boat people too [section of the poor who lived on small junks and other boats in Hong Kong harbor] (we had some contact with boat people) they were the lowest class. In fact, they were considered a class all to themselves, beneath...
TRESSLER: Yes.
WARNER: ...the...the other classes in society. But these girls that came into the home, they were from the lower class and their families wouldn't be educated probably.
TRESSLER: Was there a radical change in relationships or did you still relate in the same way or...? Were you looked at [sic] more...more...you were...you were Americans and richer or...?
WARNER: Uh....
TRESSLER: Than you were when you were a child? Or was there any difference?
WARNER: No, I think it was about the same.
TRESSLER: About the same.
WARNER: They looked up to foreigners. They...they respected you and yet in a way with many of them there was a little bit of resentment there [chuckles] that foreigners had a higher position in their society.
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: They felt that a lot of the foreigners took advantage of them and it is true that many of them did in business and so on. Naturally they would resent that.
TRESSLER: Did they still...?
WARNER: They felt that especially in Hong Kong where the British took over everything and the Chinese were under them.
TRESSLER: Did you still...did they still look up to you, though, as being really super rich and you had all the money in the world?
WARNER: Oh, they thought...yeah, they'd think Americans were made out of money. [laughs]
TRESSLER: Even when you ran the mission, like?
WARNER: Well, they always thought you had plenty of money, sure.
TRESSLER: Huh!
WARNER: I remember they asked me when I was going home on furlough and I said, "Well, I have to wait until I get enough money." I could see the expression on their faces. [both laugh] "She doesn't have...?! She has plenty of money!" And of course compared with them...
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: ...with the lower class Chinese, we did have a lot. Our living standard was so much higher than theirs.
TRESSLER: Was it still at the mission a lot higher than theirs?
WARNER: Well, we had more than they did in the way of clothing and things like this, more than they would outside.
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: Of course, we'd try to provide them with everything that they needed there.
TRESSLER: Did you have more luxuries, such as, I don't know, more different kinds of food and stuff like that than they did?
WARNER: Yes, we ate our type of food. Though we used the...the native food, but we cooked it in our style. I suppose...it's hard to live down to their level...
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: ...and have them see you as being on the same level.
TRESSLER: Did you dress in American clothes...
WARNER: Yes.
TRESSLER: ...or...?
WARNER: Yes. Most missionaries do. I had some friends that dressed in the native style. The owner of the house that we lived on in the island, she and the people of her mission, they all dressed like the Chinese and lived in houses like them. But, unfortunately, this was rather rare.
TRESSLER: How did the Chinese react to that? Did they...?
WARNER: I think they accepted them more as equals when they did.
TRESSLER: Uh huh. But they still had a good ministry among they people?
WARNER: Oh yes. They had a wonderful ministry there. They just made themselves part of the people.
TRESSLER: What was your relationship to evangelism and to other activities such as education or medical work? What was your relationship or...? The missions around you, did they want...I guess we sort of covered that in some ways, that they ran schools.
WARNER: Yes, and they were cooperative. If we needed the help of the hospitals, they would take care of our...
TRESSLER: The government hospitals?
WARNER: ...girls....
TRESSLER: Or the mission hospitals?
WARNER: Well, I was thinking back into Canton now. In Hong Kong, as I said we went to the government dispensaries and so on. I can't remember having to send any girls into the hospital. But if we had, I'm sure the government hospitals would have been very cooperative.
TRESSLER: Now the mission...the mission had to pay for that, didn't they?
WARNER: Yes, we would have to pay. In these dispensaries, though, those were free to the poor people.
TRESSLER: Oh!
WARNER: And one thing that I always remembered is that you had to take your own bottle along, if you had one, and if you'd go for a refill, be sure and bring your bottle back, because all of these things were not as plentiful over there as here. But we were entitled to go and take them free.
TRESSLER: But you didn't get free medical work done on you?
WARNER: No, no.
TRESSLER: I didn't think so.
WARNER: We had to pay for it ourselves.
TRESSLER: That's what I thought. [laughs] Did you find that you had to make changes in talking to them about the Gospel, oh, like, change the way of explaining it to them more than you would in America or...?
WARNER: In some ways, yes. And then of course you had to be conscious of the differences in the language, their expressions and.... Like the King James [version of the English Bible]. [laughs] Even in our country nowadays, people don't...don't...
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: ...understand it. And you cross over to another culture and while this...while the Bible is not from an American culture, yet our understanding (a lot of it) is. And you have to kind of interpert it to them, their way of looking at things.
TRESSLER: Uh huh. I've talked to a girl that went last year to Japan and she said it was really hard telling them about God and Jesus because they had so many different gods that He was just another god and might as well...we'll follow Him too, just as we follow our other gods. Now is that the same situation in China or not?
WARNER: No, I don't think that it was. While they do have all their idols, yet they don't seem to have the difficulty in realizing that He's one God.
TRESSLER: The one God above all their gods?
WARNER: Uh huh. Some of them did.
TRESSLER: Did they...did they...they didn't...did they worship a lot of different kinds of gods or just one...did they just have one main god that they worshiped?
WARNER: No, no, they had various ones too. And you notice if you go into their homes, they usually have a idol sitting at the doorway, the family idol, and they would give it some offerings every day. No, they have a lot of different gods too. Then they're sort of...while it's Buddhism, it's almost like animism because they...they believe that there are some spirits of certain...certain different animals and creation and so on.
TRESSLER: What...what was some of the typical reactions to the Gospel?
WARNER: Well, with our Door of Hope girls (those were the ones we were dealing with mostly) they...it wasn't too hard for them to just accept it as it was given to them because they had been kind of isolated from their own families.
TRESSLER: That's true.
WARNER: And to find somebody that loved then and to be told that there was a God that loved them and was willing to accept them. It was very easy for them to respond. And most of them...I can't think of any of them that didn't respond to the Gospel.
TRESSLER: Did you work with people...did you ever witness to people outside of the mission, like when you went downtown shopping with the matrons.
WARNER: Sometimes and sometimes there were opportunities. And occasionally the girls would have a chance to go out and witness somewhere too, and that was a good opportunity for them.
TRESSLER: What were the reactions to things like that?
WARNER: Well, people will listen. Of course, you have to talk to them a good deal before they understand and are really ready to respond, unless they've had some background and know something about Christianity. It's so foreign to them.
TRESSLER: What, so you've got to tell them a number of times...
WARNER: Yes.
TRESSLER: ...before it really makes any sense.
WARNER: Yes. I remember one little girl at the Door of Hope and we were having some of the girls baptized and we and the native workers were talking to the different ones. This one little girl, oh, she wanted to be baptized. She hadn't been there very long. We weren't quite sure about her, if she understood what it was all about. "Oh yes," she said. She believed. While she believed the first time she had heard and everything that she had been told, she believed it right away. But that was a little unusual. [laughs] Of course, she was there in the home and she heard the Bible every day.
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: But her heart was really open.
TRESSLER: Okay. What was the...now did you have...you had church services, didn't you?
WARNER: We did not have church services ourselves, no. We took the girls out to a Chinese church.
TRESSLER: Now what was the typical service like?
WARNER: Very similar to ours, except that it was rather informal. I remember going into a little Chinese church and...and in the middle of the service a woman would come to the back and call to her little child to say out loud [?], "Time to come home," so the child would get up and walk out. [both laugh]
TRESSLER: Didn't that bother the pastor at all?
WARNER: No, he was used to it. And then if they didn't hear what...what hymn number was called, they'd say, "What number?" [Tressler laughs] They'd tell them again. They were just not used to our type of services. In their Buddhist religion, they would go to the temples of their own and offer sacrifices and they would kneel down before the Buddha and pray, but they didn't have services, so this is something entirely new. [laughs]
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: And yet it sounds as if it were very noisy and undisciplined, but really the children would sit through a service much better than ours because they aren't so [slight pause] uptight. [both laugh] Wiggly to start with. And they're use to just sitting there and listening, to be very quiet. And in any services that are held, if you have anything like flannelgraph [a type of board on which cloth figures are placed to tell a story] or pictures, oh, they're so intrigued with this because they don't have that all the time.
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: It's very unusual for them. All children see so much of that that its hard to get their attention.
TRESSLER: Entertain them, right. Did...did the Chinese people [unclear] special to them too? Did the adults have any flannelgraphs? Or did they see more pictures and things like that?
WARNER: Well, anything like that would interest them too, yeah. They just don't have those things in other countries...
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: ...the way they do here.
TRESSLER: Did a lot of the time...would the people ask the pastor a question? Like, if he said something, would they call out and ask him a question about it...
WARNER: No...
TRESSLER: ...about what he was talking about?
WARNER: ...I never heard them do that in a church service. They would probably wait and talk to him afterwards.
TRESSLER: Did you have like a song time before or...?
WARNER: Yes, they'd sing some song and a prayer and then the...
TRESSLER: Sermon.
WARNER: ...sermon.
TRESSLER: ...and then close like in a song or something?
WARNER: Uh huh. Very similar to our services, because they're patterned after ours. They had no...no church services to pattern them after.
TRESSLER: Did they ask people to come forward [to the front of the church at the end of the sermon] if they wanted to make a decision [to accept Christ as Savior and join the church] at all.
WARNER: Sometimes.
TRESSLER: Okay. [long pause] Let's see. [pauses] What were some of the par...par...particular problems that you...or opportunities for evangelism where you were stationed?
WARNER: [pauses] Well, I guess it was mainly just the day to day contact with people, and of course through the schools and handing out tracts (if you had tracts), Those would be very eagerly received. I think that is true in...in all other countries. They don't have all the literature we have here...
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: ...and they'd be very happy if.... I shouldn't say all countries.
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: Not communist countries...
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: ...but those that are open.
TRESSLER: Now, who produced this literature? Was that...it wasn't through you mission but it was through some other mission that you got the literature?
WARNER: No. Well, literature, as I recall from when I was there, wasn't too common. And it would be...there would be some printed by some of the missions there in Canton and in Hong Kong. There were Christian bookstores in Hong Kong where you could get literature.
TRESSLER: And did you see any special problems in talking to people about Christ? You said that you had to ask them, like, had to tell them two or three times, but were there any other things, like would you get...would they stop listening to you right away or...?
WARNER: No, they were usually willing to listen.
TRESSLER: Okay. Could you tell us...could you tell me any of the theological patterns in China?
WARNER: Well, I'm not exactly a theologian. [laughs] Of course, they have the...the Confucian religion, which is more of philosophy of life. And then Buddhism. And that was the worship of the idols and also it involved worship of their ancestors. And this was very important in their lives. They had to carry on the family...not only the family name but the family tradition of worshiping the ancestors. Very important to have a son and other sons to carry this on, 'cause they were the ones who did it. And, usually in their home, they would have this little set of plaques sitting up there, one for each of the ancestors.
TRESSLER: What, pictures of them?
WARNER: No, no. They were just little...little pieces of metal or wood with some writing on them, but each one represented...
TRESSLER: Huh!
WARNER: ...one of the ancestors. And they would have them all arranged and in one area of the home and at certain intervals (I don't remember just how often this had to be done) but you'd have offered things up for these ancestors.
TRESSLER: What kind of things?
WARNER: Well, they would give food or...and at the time...I think you asked me that before.
TRESSLER: Yes.
WARNER: But they would give food or things that they might need in their afterlife.
TRESSLER: What did they do, just give the food in their home to these idols...I meant to these ancestors and just left it out?
WARNER: Yes. And to Buddha himself, they thought he still needed food.
TRESSLER: Did a...this might be a questionable thought or whatever but somehow you always get the idea that they saved ashes. Now, did they save the ashes of their ancestors and worship those too or not? Or burn...? Or did they bury them?
WARNER: They...they...some...that's more in Japan, where they have the ashes. In China they buried them and they'd have these...they didn't have regular cemeteries, like ours, where they would have care, but they'd build these graves out on the hillside. If they were well-to-do, they'd have a huge sort of a horseshoe shaped grave. You could see it out there.
TRESSLER: What, it was...?
WARNER: If they....
TRESSLER: What did they...?
WARNER: Made of cement.
TRESSLER: Oh. And they'd put the person in...
WARNER: Yeah, the person went down...
TRESSLER: ...and then cover it.
WARNER: ...underground, they just had this sort of frame around it.
TRESSLER: Huh!
WARNER: And then often you would just see a jar, with bones inside it, just sitting under a tree or somewhere. They would often dig them up afterwards and just keep the bones.
TRESSLER: And leave them in jars?
WARNER: Yes.
TRESSLER: What was the purpose of that?
WARNER: I don't know [laughs]?
TRESSLER: It sounds pretty strange.
WARNER: I saw all these things when I was a child and I didn't think to...
TRESSLER: Ask?
WARNER: ...inquire into all the...
TRESSLER: Yes.
WARNER: ...background of everything.
TRESSLER: I can see why. [laughs] No, it just sounds really unusual.
WARNER: Yeah, it really was.
TRESSLER: Was there like a lot of them all over or just in certain places?
WARNER: Oh, occasionally you would see these bones.
TRESSLER: Was there, like...what kind of jar was it in?
WARNER: Oh, a big cement jar.
TRESSLER: Oh, a cement jar. So you really wouldn't...it wouldn't look real obvious?
WARNER: No.
TRESSLER: I mean, it sort of would but....
WARNER: You would have to go over and look into them to see the bones.
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: Oh course we children liked to look in to see them. [laughs]
TRESSLER: That's something else. Did...?
WARNER: I think they didn't have...well, they had so many people they didn't have space, for one thing, for...
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: ...cemeteries. Often they'd dig them up and then they would use the space for burying someone else.
TRESSLER: Is that why they probably didn't go and worship their ancestors at their burial spot...burial place.
WARNER: Probably, yes.
TRESSLER: What types of mission schools were in that area, in Canton and in Hong Kong?
WARNER: Well, they had primary schools and high schools and then we had the university there in Canton.
TRESSLER: Right.
WARNER: We called it a college. But it had an agricultural school so it was sort of a university. And there were probably other colleges. I don't remember offhand. They also had some special schools, like for blind and for deaf. They had a school for blind and the girls knit these long black wool stockings we used to wear...
TRESSLER: Oh.
WARNER: ...as children, other things. They would knit things to sell. They learned different handcrafts that they could do.
TRESSLER: Did they also...what else did they learn at these schools? I mean....
WARNER: Braille, you mean?
TRESSLER: Yeah,
WARNER: Yes. I...I never looked into that much...
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: ...but I assume that they learned to read...
TRESSLER: Okay.
WARNER: ...as much as they could.
TRESSLER: That's what I was wondering.
WARNER: And they would teach them the Gospel too. I don't know how much Braille material was available to them at that time.
TRESSLER: Yeah, that's what I was wondering too. Literature was short, anyway.
WARNER: Yes, so that they may not have learned to read. But at least they learned to...something to support themselves and they did learn...
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: ...the Gospel.
TRESSLER: What were the attitudes of some of the students?
WARNER: [pauses] Toward Christianity?
TRESSLER: And towards the schools.
WARNER: Oh, they were...they really liked school. You don't find any criticisms of schools over there. Maybe now, but [chuckles] not in those days. If they had a chance to go to school, that was a great thing, because only the upper classes had a chance, so they were glad to learn. As far as Christianity goes, they were taught that. Not all of them became Christians, of course. That was voluntary. But they were very loyal to the school and very glad to have a education.
TRESSLER: And there wasn't usually problems between, like, the students and the teachers and...
WARNER: No.
TRESSLER: ...disobedience?
WARNER: No. I don't think so. Though I did hear of one in Hong Kong later. That was a missionary, a Brethren [?] missionary out in the country and after the war started and all these missionaries were brought into Hong Kong. This particular women was teaching in a school there and she really had problems. So this was a different situation. This was the spoiled rich kids and...
TRESSLER: Oh.
WARNER: ...in this school. Oh, she said they were so spoiled. If they didn't like the food, they would just throw it on the floor. And she was so disgusted. She wanted to get back into the country where they really appreciated it. So some places there would be that too. But not in the schools that we were exposed to.
TRESSLER: You never met rich kids that did things like that?
WARNER: [laughs] No, they really were glad to have a chance for education in Can...in the schools in Canton.
TRESSLER: Oh, I was going to ask you...this is going back to what we were talking about before, but you mentioned that you had had to correct discipline problems sometimes in the home that you were in. Now, what were, like, some of the discipline problems?
WARNER: Oh, let's see. It was so long ago. Today is the thirty-seventh anniversary of...of Pearl Harbor [the Japanese attack on the naval base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii that led to the entry of the United States into World War II] and I came home shortly before Pearl Harbor. Oh, just a child that wouldn't obey what the teacher said or what the matron told her to do, so we had those occasionally.
TRESSLER: But they weren't, like, really extreme problems or anything?
WARNER: No, you had to discipline them a little. And if they wouldn't obey, they would bring them to one of us.
TRESSLER: Oh.
WARNER: [laughs] The superior authority.
TRESSLER: Did...okay. What teaching facilities were available and, like, what did they teach them? I think we sort of went through all this when we talked about the university where your dad taught at, but....
WARNER: They had pretty good facilities there. I can't speak for all of the schools. Of course, in our Door of Hope school we didn't have too much and we only had a small group of girls and we taught them the basic fundamentals in the grades.
TRESSLER: Which are?
WARNER: Well,...
TRESSLER: Reading, writing....
WARNER: Reading, writing, arithmetic and...
TRESSLER: Was there anything else.
WARNER: ...Bible. We had a class in Bible too. That we considered important. Then if they finished....
TRESSLER: Did you have any, like, history or geography or...
WARNER: They would have some, yes.
TRESSLER: ...science?
WARNER: Science, probably not. They would have a little history, geography. Just very basic. And if they finished and wanted to go on to school, I think we mentioned that earlier, that we helped them go on to Bible or to nursing school. [coughs] Of course, for nursing school they would have to have a little bit more education than that.
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: But there were probably a few after I left that did go on and have a chance to go to high school. Some of these girls did get into other schools later and did get more education. One of them at least was a nurse and was working at a hospital there in Hong Kong. So she had had to go on and get more education.
TRESSLER: How far did your school take them up through, what grade level?
WARNER: I can't remember...
TRESSLER: Oh.
WARNER: ...exactly. I don't know if we completed the whole system through junior high or not. Of course most of them, even though they were older, had no education when they came.
TRESSLER: Right.
WARNER: So, and if they were with us for six or eight years, they would be able to go to about eighth grade.
TRESSLER: What kind of...did you have good teaching facilities at that time?
WARNER: Well, we had a little room there with little desks, the old fashioned school desks type and a blackboard and some books. We didn't have a great deal. And then....
TRESSLER: Did they have to share a book?
WARNER: I think they had enough books to go around. The teacher...we had just the one teacher, so she would have had to cover an awful lot of area. I don't remember just what her teaching...or her education was, either. So she couldn't have taken them up too high. They would have had to go out to another school to get the rest of their education. When we moved to this place in Hong Kong...it was a very small village and if they wanted more education, they would have had to go into...
TRESSLER: The city?
WARNER: ...Hong Kong to get it, yes.
TRESSLER: Well, would they go on on their own then or would they live with somebody?
WARNER: Well, we would have made arrangements for them to live either in the school (in the dormitory) or to live with somebody that would help them get to and from school, yes,...
TRESSLER: Well, now...
WARNER: ...so there's some Christian influence.
TRESSLER: ...did most of these schools have dormitories or not?
WARNER: Unless it was just a little area school where children came in, it would have dormitories. Christian school mostly had dormitories. Of course a primary school, if you just got children in from the neighborhood.... I remember them going to school at seven o'clock in the morning. I probably told you that earlier too.
TRESSLER: Seven o'clock?!
WARNER: Yes, school started early. And then they would go home for breakfast at ten.
TRESSLER: I....
WARNER: Times have changed though.
TRESSLER: Yeah. Did you...how long did your school day normally last?
WARNER: Well, in the Door of Hope...let's see, those schools where they'd came home for breakfast about ten, those would last until about two in the afternoon, then they would go home. Two or three and they'd have their supper at five. In the Door of Hope, we just had it from, oh, eight or nine. whenever they started. Probably about nine until twelve or one. We'd have the...our devotional hour first. And then they would stop for breakfast. Then they would go on. It might have been later than that, one or two, and then their handcrafts.
TRESSLER: Handcrafts.
WARNER: Yeah, and then their supper would be around five.
TRESSLER: Did they have more equipment than other...like flannelgraphs and things like that than other schools...other mission schools or were each of the mission schools pretty much down to basics as far as just having a blackboard and chairs and desks and things like that?
WARNER: Oh, you mean in the schools.
TRESSLER: Right.
WARNER: Not in the Sunday schools?
TRESSLER: Unh unh [no].
WARNER: Well, I think probably the mission schools, if they were under some denomination, they probably had a little more equipment because the denomination would supply it for them. Some of them had book stores and some of them would even have printing presses perhaps and they would supply more material. We were sort of on our own. We had to get it from anyplace....
TRESSLER: Who supported you?
WARNER: Well, we had our...we had individual supporters. I was supported by College Church in Wheaton and Mrs. Raetz had her...people support her individually. And then there were people who gave to the mission as a whole. Course we needed more than just our individual support. We needed rent for the building...
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: ...and also support for our national workers and the girls.
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: And supplies and so on. So we had gifts that came in every month to take care of it.
TRESSLER: [pauses] Can you give me a description of Chinese hospitals?
WARNER: Well, let's see. You mean native hospitals or...
TRESSLER: I believe so.
WARNER: ...or mission hospitals.
TRESSLER: I believe it's native hospitals...
WARNER: Well....
TRESSLER: ...but why don't you give me a little bit of both. [laughs]
WARNER: Well, I...I'm just trying to think back to ones that I've visited. Out in the country, they would be very, very simple and the mission hospitals would be a little improvement [laughs] because they would have a little more funds to put into it. But the natives' hospitals were very simple and of course, I guess it was the missionaries that started hospitals in the first place. The...the natives would just be sick at home and they'd...they'd get a native doctor or somebody like that to give them herbs, medicine, you know. [laughs]
TRESSLER: Well, is there, like...I mean it wouldn't be a trained doctor at all.
WARNER: Not in the old days, no. And then the mission hospitals would have a trained doctor, but out in the country they would have a very simple hospital. And according to the Chinese tradition, when somebody's sick they need their family around them.
TRESSLER: [laughs]
WARNER: And they would have to have the facilities for the people...the families to come in to be there during the day, maybe even somebody staying there at night. And they would bring food and feed them and so on. So they would have to have a little bit more space for them, but they didn't have to have all this cooking, either.
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: In the mission hospitals, they were a little bit more like ours, though very simple. They'd just have a...a bed and some of their family would be there during the day to feed them and so forth.
TRESSLER: So the hospitals weren't big or were they just, like....
WARNER: Not too big, no. But then of course if they had funds they would expand them. The government hospitals in Hong Kong...I don't believe they had government hospitals in Canton [cuckoo clock in background chimes eleven times] (I could be wrong on some of these things, if somebody ever corrects them, just cross me out [laughs] because this wasn't exactly my field) but in Hong Kong they had the government hospitals and they were more like ours [in the United States]. If someone was sick, you could send them in there.
TRESSLER: Okay. Do you remember any Chinese medical practices or traditions? You mentioned some of those, like, a tradition, like, of having the family around. Do you remember anything more like that?
WARNER: Well, I know the doctors themselves, they had different herbs and so, teas, things.
TRESSLER: Did you ever...?
WARNER: I never ran into acupuncture. [laughs]
TRESSLER: Oh, you didn't?
WARNER: I'm sure they practiced it, but we never heard anything about it in those days.
TRESSLER: Do you remember anything like a certain herb that they used for some disease or something?
WARNER: Well, we didn't use that. We...we would go to foreign doctors, so I don't really know...
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: ...too much about it.
TRESSLER: Do you remember any of the practices they used to do at all, like, I don't know, like what they used to do for, like, having a appendicitis or something like that?
WARNER: I can't think of anything off hand.
TRESSLER: Okay.
WARNER: If I had been out in the country, I probably would have run into it quite often.
TRESSLER: What kind of diseases were most...?
WARNER: Well, malaria was a very common one and then typhoid, cholera, smallpox.
TRESSLER: Why did those run so rampant?
WARNER: Well...
TRESSLER: Because they had no control of them?
WARNER: ...because they had no control over any of them. And mosquitos were everywhere. We always used mosquito net.
TRESSLER: Even when you went to bed?
WARNER: Yes.
TRESSLER: I didn't know they used that in China.
WARNER: Oh yeah. Oh yeah.
TRESSLER: Did you...?
WARNER: And you were careful about going out in the evening too, because you might be bitten by mosquitos after dark.
TRESSLER: So what, you had screens on your windows then?
WARNER: Oh yes. I forgot to mention the screens. Yeah. Always screens. The Chinese didn't always, but we always did. [Coughs]
TRESSLER: Did you...?
WARNER: I caught malaria in spite of it.
TRESSLER: Oh, did you?
WARNER: Yes.
TRESSLER: How was it? Was that bad?
WARNER: Well, every so often, then you have these fevers and chills. I was in the hospital in Hong Kong twice for it but couldn't quite get cured.
TRESSLER: Well, what was...do you remember any typical medical problems of the missionaries and of the Chinese? Either one.
WARNER: Well, just that they would get malaria all the time.
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: I don't remember missionaries getting the other diseases. Of course we had small pox inoculations back in those days....
TRESSLER: Right.
WARNER: ...so that was not so common. And the cholera and typhoid, the things to be careful of there are hygiene, especially in connection with your food. So don't eat anything raw, bananas that you can peel, fruit that you can peel, but no raw vegetables.
TRESSLER: So you'd cook things longer and have more preparation with food?
WARNER: Some people would eat lettuce [phone rings] or some raw vegetable if washed in a very strong disinfectant, I can't remember the name of it. Typical medical problems? But we didn't have all the childhood diseases. Where I was a child, we didn't have them.
TRESSLER: So didn't they spread around China at all?
WARNER: Well, I thought that they didn't have them. The only one...somebody had whooping cough and whooped once. All the rest of us...all of the other children coughed, so we assumed we had whooping cough. The only other childhood disease I had was chicken pox and I got that while on furlough in the [United] States.
TRESSLER: Oh! [laughs]
WARNER: But I remember some of the girls at the Door of Hope had measles or something one time. But that's the only time I heard of a childhood disease.
TRESSLER: How come they didn't spread around there?
WARNER: I don't know.
TRESSLER: That's strange.
WARNER: But they did have these more serious things.
TRESSLER: Do you remember anything about the style of Western life in the treaty ports [cities where the citizens of various Western nations had special, extraterritorial rights]?
WARNER: Well, most of them lived pretty much like...as they do in their own countries. And of course this is much higher style that the nationals. So they feel as if we're rich. That's where they get the impression that we're made of money.
TRESSLER: Did people live extra well there? I meant, better than they probably would have in the United States?
WARNER: No, I don't think so. Probably about the same. But they're used to...some of them were used to having their own food and would import some things.
TRESSLER: Like?
WARNER: The missionaries don't live that high, but still the missionaries' standard of living is above that of the average native and so it seems as if they live high. But most of the missionaries just live on whatever food grows there. They don't rely on imported things.
TRESSLER: What did some Westerners import?
WARNER: Oh, some of them liked to import butter. I remember tinned butter. Did you ever hear of tinned butter?
TRESSLER: Hunh huh [no].
WARNER: Comes from England or Australia [laughs]. And milk there is not common at all. We had milk at the University when I was a child because we had our own cows. But some of them would have canned milk and things of that sort, cheese.
TRESSLER: Why isn't milk that common? They just don't...?
WARNER: They just don't have that...don't raise that many cattle and the ones that they do, they use for farming and they eat, too, beef. Rather tough beef after farming. [Tressler laughs] But it's not a dairy country.
TRESSLER: Then they...everybody wore U.S., Western clothing?
WARNER: Yes.
TRESSLER: Did everybody have Chinese cooks to cook their food and stuff like that?
WARNER: Yes.
TRESSLER: Or did they...did part of them have American cooks that would come in...?
WARNER: No, I don't know anybody that had American cooks.
TRESSLER: Then most people had servants to get along...
WARNER: Yes.
TRESSLER: ...and get everything done.
WARNER: Of course, this wasn't all bad, because it did give jobs to Chinese people who needed jobs.
TRESSLER: Did they pay them very well or was the pay pretty poor?
WARNER: Well, I can't remember what we paid them, but as their wages went, I think it was probably pretty good, because they were jobs that they wanted. You'd have to pay them according to the pay that they would get for other jobs.
TRESSLER: Were there very many Chinese people at the same level as Americans or as the Western people or...?
WARNER: Some of the business people, the educated, the higher class, yes. They lived high too, like the boys I mentioned in that school that threw their food on the floor if they didn't like it. [laughs] They lived high.
TRESSLER: What were the relations of the Chinese to the Asian people...to other Asian people? Did they like them?
WARNER: Well, they seemed to get along pretty well. There weren't too many other Asians in Canton, only the people of the embassies. In Hong Kong we ran into more. A lot of Indians there. The policemen were all Indians, Sikhs. A tall tribe. They wore their turbans. They were about half as big again as most of the Chinese, so the British chose them for policemen. They just looked ferocious, scared them. [laughs]
TRESSLER: How did...how did the Indians get over there?
WARNER: Oh, the Indians are everywhere. Everywhere you go there are lots of Indians. There are too many Indians for their own country. They're in business all over the world. We were in Africa this last summer and the Indians are everywhere there.
TRESSLER: In the business?
WARNER: Yeah.
TRESSLER: Do you remember anything about the relationship of the Chinese to the former parts of the...of her empire?
WARNER: Relationship of the Chinese to...
TRESSLER: Former parts.
WARNER: ...former parts of the empire? No, I'm afraid I don't know anything about that.
TRESSLER: Okay. Do you know anything about anti-Westernism or anti-foreign...foreign feelings?
WARNER: Well, that was beginning during our first term out there. And that was what called our two trips...leaving in a hurry...
TRESSLER: Right.
WARNER: ...because it was beginning. And you could see how they would resent having foreigners living well and they would feel that we were taking advantage of them, making a living off of their land, the things that they should have. But a lot the Communist influence was beginning to be felt in there, though we didn't recognize it really at the time. We did know that there were some Russians there. But they were beginning to try to push us out.
TRESSLER: Did you have, like, any catcalls made toward you as you walked down the street or anything like that?
WARNER: No, no, nothing like that.
TRESSLER: Or was this more or less an attitude or a matter of staring at you or something?
WARNER: Uh huh. No, any calls that we got along the street were beggars wanting us to give them money.
TRESSLER: What other ways did they show anti-foreign feeling besides...? Were there any other...?
WARNER: Well, there were...we began to have some trouble in the school. You asked about schools. In the university there they did have at the time that we had to leave. There was definitely anti-foreign feeling there and kind of an uprising in the schools against the foreign teachers. There were Chinese professors there too and the foreigners had to [last couple words drowned out by Tressler's next question]....
TRESSLER: How did they do an uprising against them, what was that?
WARNER: Well, they would sort of have a demonstration, a parade or something like that. Like what we have in our country. And you never knew what might happen when they get into something like that, you know. If somebody has a gun, you never know if somebody's going to shoot. There weren't many that had them but [coughs] it was just safer to get out and avoid the possibility. But we could also feel it and I felt it a lot in Hong Kong. There the British were really in control. [coughs] Excuse me. I have a hoarse throat today. In Canton, we were foreigners there and we didn't have any control of anything, except as we were permitted to come in and work, but in Hong Kong they [the British government] had rented this land [from the Chinese government] for ninety-nine years and they were really in control. And often I would see some of this attitude. There were...some of these British people really showed a superior attitude to the Chinese people working under them and you could see the feeling of hostility and anger in some of them.
TRESSLER: I suppose this is just tied in, but what is the Chinese attitude toward imperialism?
WARNER: Well, yes, that will be tied in.
TRESSLER: Pretty much the same.
WARNER: Yes. They felt that we wanted to take over and run their country. Or the British...they felt the British did and also the Americans. They resented our being there too and they felt that we were trying to get a foothold and take a little bit too much.
TRESSLER: Now, was that just toward the missionaries or...
WARNER: No.
TRESSLER: ...more toward the...
WARNER: No, that was more toward...
TRESSLER: ...business people?
WARNER: ...the business people.
TRESSLER: Not missionaries.
WARNER: Not missionaries, although of course we were foreigners and sometimes they would be suspicious of missionaries and what their motives were in coming in there, if they had underhanded motives. [tape recorder turned off and turned on]
TRESSLER: [both laughing] What were your contacts with the revolutionary movement?
WARNER: Contact with the revolutionary movement. [pauses] Well, I'm sure in Canton when we finally had to leave, that was the revolutionary movement starting and they were trying to get rid of all the foreigners. [ca. 1927] And there were an awful lot of foreigners that got out too. We went to this island in Hong Kong and we were there for three months before we left that time and the island was just full to overflowing with missionaries from all over China. And most of them went home, a few went back gradually a little later. But there was just trouble all the time for quite a few years. And they were trying to get us all out. Then things got a little more settled by the time that I went back. 'Cause how many years passed in there? From '27 to '36 was nine years. Things were pretty settled by then and missionaries were going back and were reestablishing their work. And then it went along pretty well until...until the World War II started. Of course the Japanese came in.
TRESSLER: Do you remember...what were the impressions that...of social backgrounds of the Nationalists, Communists or the Christians?
WARNER: Well....
TRESSLER: You said you didn't have much contact with the Communists, right?
WARNER: No. That was later. Let's see Nationalists and Christians. Most of the people that were won over to Christianity were people of a lower social background except for the schools. Some exceptions were the Christian in the schools. But usually missionaries going to another country, they contact the poor, the down and out, the sick, the needy. And those are the ones (they speak of them as rice Christians) the ones who become Christians because they are fed and their needs are met. So that would be their social background. Then those Christians through the schools, of course, they would be from the upper level. And in China there was no middle class.
TRESSLER: Oh.
WARNER: But I would say that the majority were probably from the lower level. They're a little easier to reach and...because they respond to having their needs supplied and even in the Christian schools, not all of the students that came...some of them would become Christians, but of course not all.
TRESSLER: Did you run into any Nationalists at all? How was...?
WARNER: [pauses] Not...not personally, not myself, no. Though the influence was there and this was in the revolution, but we didn't really run into them personally.
TRESSLER: What was the reaction...your reaction or the reaction of people around you to the Nanking incident in the war with Japan? [Japanese air attacks on Nanking and Canton begining September 19, 1937, which marked the begining of the escalation of the conflict between Japan and China to total war]
WARNER: Well, I think I probably covered that pretty well already.
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: We were in Hong Kong at the time. Not right at...at the moment, but I mean when it...when the problem reached Canton and began to affect us.
TRESSLER: Right.
WARNER: The war with Japan. Then we moved out. I don't know if we would have if we hadn't had all these girls that we were responsible for. We probably would have stayed there [in Hong Kong] if they had been living in their homes and just coming by the day.
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: The boat mission stayed there. Of course, all their people were there. They stayed until they were forced out by the Japanese later. Some of them were interned and then finally they were sent home when all of the Americans were sent home by the Japanese.
TRESSLER: Did you know mostly what was going on or was it just by...what was going on as far as the Japanese attacking and stuff like that, did the missionaries know at all?
WARNER: Yes, they knew pretty much.
TRESSLER: Was that through, like a...a...some government official told you or...?
WARNER: No, you just heard what was going on through the news.
TRESSLER: What was the involvement that you or other missions around you with the war effort?
WARNER: Well, actually the only involvement that we had was the appeal of these little refugees to take them in. And we took in a number of them, [coughs] as many as we had room for.
TRESSLER: Did you have any contact with the Japanese army at all or...?
WARNER: No. I did take a riverboat and go up to Canton one time after they were in charge there, had taken over. [Canton was occupied by the Japanese army on October 21, 1938.] And the Japanese were running the boat, which had been run by the Chinese before. But there was no problem. They let me come and go, being an American. We weren't involved in the war yet, so....
TRESSLER: Oh. What about internment? You never went on internment?
WARNER: [unclear] No, I left shortly before, for my furlough [in 1941]. But Mrs. Raetz was interned, with the girls in the home there. Some of the missionaries were taken and put into internment camps, but they were not. They were just allowed to stay there. They weren't free to come and go. They weren't allowed to go out and get supplies, but some of the workers...I think the matron was able to come and go to some extent. At least she was able to bring things in, so they didn't go hungry. They were able to get food and supplies. It was a little village where they were and the food stores, markets were not very far away, so that wasn't any great problem. But there was no freedom to come and go. [pauses] You want me to explain what an internment camp is?
TRESSLER: Yes, that might be interesting to those of us that don't understand. [laughs]
WARNER: Well, some of them were taken and put in in a certain area and were kept there as prisoners. It wasn't a regular prison, but they had to stay there. They weren't free to come and go. And they were able to get some supplies. Oh, I remember some of the boat missionaries told about walking around and getting pine needles and cooking them in water for something to eat, so they didn't have too much.
TRESSLER: No.
WARNER: They wanted to get a few vitamins. They had a very limited diet, probably just rice and, oh maybe a...
TRESSLER: Was that...
WARNER: ...potato.
TRESSLER: ...was that provided by the Japanese?
WARNER: Not having been in one, I can't remember.
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: But they at least made it possible for them to get some. Now, Mrs. Raetz and the girls were just kept...they called it interned. They were just kept in the quarters where they were living. They were not free to come and go. And Mr. Raetz same, in Canton. He...he had to stay where he was living and some of the others in that way.
TRESSLER: So those were just guarded then? Their places were guarded?
WARNER: Yeah, uh huh. They were prisoners but they were not treated the way they were in concentration camps.
TRESSLER: What kind of economy was in Canton and also in Hong Kong during...well, I guess during your childhood and also when you were an adult?
WARNER: [softly to herself] Type of economy. Not being an economic major [both laugh] I don't know much about the economy, but you mean how the city was run by the government and so?
TRESSLER: I guess, but...well, I guess you already talked about it somewhat when you were saying they had different streets where they'd sell different...
WARNER: Oh, yeah.
TRESSLER: ...things like that. Did there...was there...was agriculture the main...was that a main way of getting money or...
WARNER: Well, of course...
TRESSLER: ...they maybe raised their own food so...?
WARNER: ...this was in the country. They mainly raised their foods outside of the city and those would be brought in and sold in little open stores along the street. And the meat. Did I tell you about the meat before?
TRESSLER: I don't think so.
WARNER: They'd just hang their hang their raw meat in the stores. You'd walk along there, here's some pieces of beef hanging up or chickens hanging up by their legs and so forth. Of course, that would have been one of the main things, supplying food. But then these things that they manufactured...I don't mean manufactured, handmade things for the most part. They would sell those embroidery and carvings on certain streets.
TRESSLER: Was that...regular Chinese people didn't buy those, did they? It was just for foreign....
WARNER: Yes, they did.
TRESSLER: They did?
WARNER: They bought some of them, yes.
TRESSLER: What was...?
WARNER: But some...some of the embroideries and things like that, they were hoping to get foreigners to buy those. But the...the richer people would buy those too.
TRESSLER: To decorate their homes?
WARNER: Un huh. Or some of the clothes, they would wear those. Embroidered...
TRESSLER: They embroidered the clothes.
WARNER: ...silks and so on.
TRESSLER: I see.
WARNER: Their dress up clothes, not for everyday.
TRESSLER: What, even for the poor people?
WARNER: No, just for the rich.
TRESSLER: The rich.
WARNER: No, the poor people wore very, very simple clothes.
TRESSLER: Did they...now, I imagine in Hong Kong there were lots of businesses and stuff like that. Was that a correct viewpoint...
WARNER: Uh huh.
TRESSLER: ...correct idea?
WARNER: They had a lot of businesses by Indians [chuckles] and Chinese, hotels and restaurants. Restaurants in Canton too. Even on the boats. They even had boat restaurants.
TRESSLER: Oh!
WARNER: You'd go out and have dinner on a boat, one of the big ones. And fishing. In Hong Kong a lot of fishing too. And foods where they raised them. Hong Kong is a...a peak, a mountain peak. But around...on...on the mainland they would raise crops and then there were some parts of the island where they could have some crops raised too and there was a ferry across to the city. Oh they had many kinds of business there, also a lot of imports. There were travelers in those days. Tourism wasn't quite the business it is now, but they did have people coming in and they liked to buy things there, Indian things and from Great Britain, imported things.
TRESSLER: And there were other things, like insurance companies and stuff like that?
WARNER: I suppose. I wasn't so interested in insurance in those days. [Tressler laughs] And some banks.
TRESSLER: There was car places and stuff like that. Like sales [?]. Did they sell a lot cars [[Cuckoo clock sound once]
WARNER: Some. They were not anywhere as near common as they are now. Oh, they had some, of course. And they had buses around the city. Streetcars.
TRESSLER: Uh huh.
WARNER: Street cars more than buses.
TRESSLER: What was the effect of Buddhism on the China...in China and on the Chinese?
WARNER: The effect of what, Buddha?
TRESSLER: Buddh...Buddha, yeah.
WARNER: Well, Buddhism was their national religion and everybody was supposed to be Buddhist. Just sort of a way of life. As I mentioned before, they'd have their little idol, maybe just a little piece of wood by their gate or in the front of the house that they offered something to every day. There'd always be a little cup of water or tea and a little (tea probably) a little bowl of rice sitting there, for the Buddha.
TRESSLER: What did they do, just throw it out the next day and refill it then?
WARNER: I think they might eat the rice [both chuckle], then refill it.
TRESSLER: Did they have any problem with rats and things like that...
WARNER: Oh yes, oh yes.
TRESSLER: ...when they left food out?
WARNER: They had rats anyway. They did not have the kind of houses where you keep the rats out.
TRESSLER: Yeah, that's what I mean.
WARNER: Lot of mice and cockroaches, flies, mosquitos.
TRESSLER: Do you remember any Chinese superstitions? I remember reading in...I think I wrote a...I think I...I believe it was you, that I read a letter that you wrote to the school or something about how the girls were scared at night and stuff, scared of dead people or that. Was that...do you remember any...I don't know if I am remembering right or not.
WARNER: I don't remember the letter [laughs] but of course with these false religions there are fears, fears of the dead and also fear of not treating their ancestors right and what might happen to them.
TRESSLER: Why, what do they think, that the ancestors could do something to them?
WARNER: Well, maybe not the ancestors but the gods could do something to them, so they had to....
TRESSLER: What now? They would do something to them, like...
WARNER: Well, illnesses...
TRESSLER: ...in their present life or in their future life?
WARNER: ...illnesses were often thought to be brought on them by the gods as punishment. I think many heathen people think that, don't they, that illness is the result of your sins or shortcoming and so you have to pray and you have to give your offerings to the gods. Oh, and there were also...maybe what I wrote in that letter was, if somebody dies in a certain place, they are afraid to sleep in that bed or even in that room. They have a feeling that it's...that that spirit might still be there.
TRESSLER: Uh huh. It was just mainly dead...with the idea of death that they had superstitions or were they...did they have things like, if you step on a crack, you break your mother's back and stuff like that? [laughs]
WARNER: I don't remember that.
TRESSLER: Any little things like that?
WARNER: They must have some, but I can't remember any right now. But I do remember their fear of...
TRESSLER: Death?
WARNER: ...the place where someone has died, yeah.
TRESSLER: Did...was there a movement to nationalize the churches at all?
WARNER: Yes, there was, especially when I went back the last time, because people had had to...the missionaries had to pick up and leave on such short notice and there was a feeling that it might come again or that it definitely would come again and that we should be ready to step out and...and leave them ready to carry on by themselves. So they were definitely trying to do this and trying to train the national leaders so that they could carry on and gradually turn the work, the supervision over to them. Yes, it think through the Bible schools and then in the churches too.
TRESSLER: They had seminaries and then things like that...
WARNER: Uh huh.
TRESSLER: ...to train the pastors? Was there a great deal of pastors? Or just [unclear]?
WARNER: Well, of course you could always use more.
TRESSLER: Right.
WARNER: But there were the seminaries and in the boat mission [South China Boat Mission] I know, they had...had a number of pastors who were taking over the work. They didn't have too many missionaries and they tried to have native pastors and Bible women. They had a lot of Bible women there.
TRESSLER: What do you mean by....
WARNER: Expressing, you know, here...here....a woman who had also had Bible training and she'd go out and visit in homes and follow up on people that came to the church and try and teach them and help them to learn more about the Bible, be a little better gr
ounded in it. Really to build up the...in the system the pastor's work. He couldn't do it all himself.
TRESSLER: So they were pastors in a way.
WARNER: Yes.
TRESSLER: That's interesting.
WARNER: They're like...
TRESSLER: Did...?
WARNER: ...pastor...parish workers in our country.
TRESSLER: Did she work mainly with women or with men too or...?
WARNER: Well, she would work with men too in...in groups, but mainly to go out and work with the women, who didn't have much chance for education. And sometimes, it comes to mind, we had a...a Bible women that came to our little school when I was child and taught us Chinese. I forgot how many times a week we'd have Chinese class. And also my mother had a Bible women who tried to teach her Chinese. And they helped many of the missionaries in this way too. They needed some help with their Chinese.
TRESSLER: Now you departed just because you went on furlough, is that correct?
WARNER: Yes, now I had not expected to leave until the following year [1942], so I probably would have been interned too, but the Raetzes wanted to come home for some reason one year earlier. It was supposed to be a seven year term. So they asked me to come home in five years and then go back the next year, so they could come home. As it worked out, we all came home. Both of them were interned and then sent home a year later. [tape recorder turned off and turned on again]
TRESSLER: Now what...have you done any...I don't exactly know what they mean by post-China work but have you worked with any missions since you have been away from China?
WARNER: Not really. During the war I was in Washington and went to a Chinese church and taught in their Sunday school, helping some of the women to learn some English too and teaching Bible. Actually I have...and then I have been on the...with the Boat Mission we had a women's auxiliary, its headquarters was in the Chicago area. I was with that for many years and then it was moved to the east coast. But we kept together and prayed for the work and...through correspondence and so on. I haven't kept up with the Door of Hope too much. The girls were sent to this orphanage in the next little town and were put there and gradually as they grew older, some of them went on to school and...some have been to Bible school and in different fields and I think most of them are living in the Chicago area. They didn't want to go back into China and they've lost contact with their relatives and so on, anyway. And I have not had any personal contact with them, such as reports...
TRESSLER: I don't....
WARNER: ...about what happened to them.
TRESSLER: I don't think I understand. Now, what happened to them. Now, they came over with the Raetzes?
WARNER: No. No, they stayed there. The Raetzes were sent home by the Japanese when they came in and took Hong Kong. [The Japanese army took Hong Kong from the British on Decemeber 25, 1941. The British reoccupied the city on August 30, 1945.] And then these girls were put in this orphanage...
TRESSLER: Right.
WARNER: ...where they had all these little babies that came in. And they stayed there for several years. Mr...Mr. and Mrs. Raetz both went back later during the war with World Vision [Christian relief and community development agency] and they were in Hong Kong from time to time. [Almost certainly she means after the war, since World Vision was not founded until after World War II] And they sort of kept contact with these girls. But the Door of Hope, as such, was never revived. But the girls were helped through this British missions. I forgot to mention this British mission, so it remained there and they were helped through different missions, different missionaries to get into to school and go on on their own. As far as I know, they are all Christians and all living in the area.
TRESSLER: What were the attitudes of the American people you have found toward China or since you...or immediately when you came back?
WARNER: Oh, they were very sympathetic, of course. All the ones that I ran into, to the Japanese taking over. Then of course we got involved in the war very shortly after that, so we were on the other side too.
TRESSLER: Did you...since that time period, did you see a change in the attitude of the people toward the Chinese?
WARNER: Toward China...toward Chinese? Well, of course, toward the Communist government.
TRESSLER: Right.
WARNER: But what I have run into most recently, not directly but through literature from different missions that I have read, they are so optimistic about getting into China and things are changing there a little, from the reports we hear in the paper and getting a little more liberal, a little more open and letting people come in. Not towards the Gospel...
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: ...but toward the rest of the world. And there are a number of Christian broadcasts that are getting in all the time. How many people are able to hear them we don't know. But they're just hopeful of not only getting broadcasts in but that overseas Chinese Christians will be able to get in too.
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: And that eventually they'll be evangelized. Don't get too much word about the underground church there but I know there is one. I heard somebody say just recently (I don't remember just who) that when China is able to...the Chinese Christian are able to, they'll evangelize the world, because the ones that are Christians are real Christians. They've been through so much persecution. Its the real thing with them.
TRESSLER: Do you see...do you have any...see any expectations for China or the Chinese people? That's sort of covered in what you last said but....
WARNER: Yeah, I am very hopeful for it. Of course, I don't have any proof of anything but...
TRESSLER: Yeah.
WARNER: ...I just feel that there are an awful lot of people that are praying for it and that are looking forward to it. And the Christians that are there, we get some reports on them occasionally, but they are really strong and are really standing up for the Lord and...though they can't evangelize openly, but underground they are still going on. [coughs]
TRESSLER: That's good. [Tape recorder turned off and turned back on.]
WARNER: I just feel that it has been a real privilege for me to have spent so many years in China as a child and a few as an adult and I just wish I could have been back some more years later. But as I look back and as I think of the future and all the problems that China has gone through during all of these years, I just have a real feeling of optimism that the Lord is going to work there. When I think of those that are praying for the land and as I pray for it myself, for the people there, that the Lord really is going to give them another opportunity. The hugest country in the world, the hugest population and we think how much the Lord loves them and wants to bring them the message of salvation. Its just bound to come one of these days.
TRESSLER: Thank you very much.
WARNER: Thank you for the opportunity. I just wish I had a little bit more up-to-date information for you but...
TRESSLER: That's fine.
WARNER: ...I'm kind of obsolete and so many things I have forgotten.
TRESSLER: Makes history, though. [both laugh] Okay.
END OF TAPE