Collection 502 - Geraldine Julia (Hinote) Phillips. T1 Transcript

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Collection 502 - Geraldine Julia (Hinote) Phillips. T1 Transcript

This is a complete and accurate transcript of the tape of the oral history interview of Geraldine Julia (Hinote) Phillips (CN 502, T1) in the Archives of the Billy Graham Center. No spoken words have been omitted, except for any non-English phrases which could not be understood by the transcribers. Foreign terms which are not commonly understood appear in italics. In very few cases words were too unclear to be distinguished. If the transcriber was not completely sure of having gotten what the speaker said, "[?]" was inserted after the word or phrase in question. If the speech was inaudible or indistinguishable, "[unclear]" was inserted. Grunts and verbal hesitations such as "ah" or "um" were usually omitted. Readers should remember that this is a transcript of spoken English, which follows a different rhythm and rule than written English.

... Three dots indicate an interruption or break in the train of thought within the sentence on the part of the speaker.

.... Four dots indicate what the transcriber believes to be the end of an incomplete sentence.

( ) Words in parentheses are asides made by the speaker.

[ ] Words in brackets are comments by the transcriber.

This transcript was made by Christian Sawyer and Evan Kuehn and was completed in May 2005.

Collection 502, T1. Interview of Geraldine Julia (Hinote) Phillips by Robert Shuster, May 20, 1994.

SHUSTER: [unclear] see if it's picking up okay. This is an interview with Mrs. Geraldine Phillips by Robert Shuster for the Archives of the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College. This interview took place at Mrs. Phillips' home in Allentown, PA on February [sic, interview was in May] 20th, 1994 at 8:30 am. Mrs. Phillips, why don't we start with some family background. What were your parents' names?

PHILLIPS: My father was Oscar and my mother Nelly Hinote. Nelly Ogren Hinote. They both knew the Lord and my mother especially. She had wanted to be a missionary before she was married. [static in the background] And that didn't come about, but they were living at the time in Montana and among Indians and she was wanting to be a witness to the Indians there. We learned after her...(she died when I was four and my sisters [Rosalind and Genevieve] were six and eight)...we learned afterward from our stepmother, who was her cousin, that she had ded...they had dedicated us to the Lord and to the missionary service if the Lord so led before our birth. And I thought about it often that that was her prayers and her influence...even at that early age probably had an influence on us. But also our stepmother knew the Lord and continued to teach us the things of the Lord and I'm grateful for their raising ..being raised in a Christian home.

SHUSTER: What was the...what church did your family attend?

PHILLIPS: Presbyterian at one time and then later a Baptist church depending on where we lived and what the evangelical churches were in the area where we lived. We moved to California.... After my mother's death, our maternal grandfather came up to get us and took us back to the family home in California. And they lived on in California...I've lived on in California since...since then.

SHUSTER: You lived with your grandparents?

PHILLIPS: No, my grandmother was...had already gone to be with the Lord, but I lived with an aunt and uncle until our dad remarried three years later and then we lived with them. I lived in two different towns there in southern California, P...Riverside and Pomona. And after graduation from high school, I attended BIOLA. But it was still just an institute, Bible Institute of Los Angeles. And it was in LA [Los Angeles] at the time. And while there, there was great missionary emphasis.

SHUSTER: Why don't we go back a little bit to your...

PHILLIPS: Okay.

SHUSTER: ...to your childhood. I know your mother passed away when you were four. Do...do you have memories of her?

PHILLIPS: Yes, I have a few memories of her. Nothing very outstanding. I remember that...their taking me in to view her body after she had gone. And I remember two or three incidents which we've compared notes with my sister. Just fun things that happened prior to that that were....

SHUSTER: What are the kinds of things you remember?

PHILLIPS: [laughs] There was a flood and a neighbor took us for a...a ride. He was up to the water in...up to his knees, and he took us for a ride in the wash tub. [both laugh]

SHUSTER: Is that your earliest memory...the earliest thing you can recall?

PHILLIPS: Right off hand, yes. I can't remember the other thing...any of the other things right now.

SHUSTER: Now, what were your sisters names? I know you had two sisters, right?

PHILLIPS: My sisters were Rosalind and Genevieve. And I was Geraldine. Later on, friends said, "Tell your mother to never name your...name you girls such similar names again." [both laugh] I do not know, but I know that the [Jonathan and Roslaind] Goforths were active in that part of the country and in missionary work about that time and I've often wondered if I was named after Geraldine Goforth, but I have no assurance that that was so.

SHUSTER: The daughter of the Goforths?

PHILLIPS: Yes. Yeah.

SHUSTER: Did...you mentioned that...a couple things about your mother. Do you think, from what you've...other people have told you about her, do you see any of her characteristics in yourself?

PHILLIPS: Others have said so, yes. [unclear] [laughs]

SHUSTER: What have they seen?

PHILLIPS: Well, she was very steadfast and she was very devoted to the things of the Lord and very anxious that the word get out to other people. And I'm grateful for that influence on my life, wherever it has come from, I'm very grateful for it.

SHUSTER: How would you describe your father?

PHILLIPS: He was a...a large man, physically, and grew spiritually. He did not know our mother or...He did not know the Lord as deeply as our mother or our stepmother did, but he grew in the Lord. Never heard him leading prayer in the family, but we know that he did pray. And in his later life, we know that he was witnessing to his buddies and telling them...because he'd come home and ask questions and then the next day he'd [both laugh] come back and ask some more questions so we know that he was witnessing to others. And for that we're grateful.

SHUSTER: What did he look like? What was his appearance?

PHILLIPS: He was a large man, rather handsome, and a dark complexion (until he turned gray). And.... [pauses, laughs] What else do I say?

SHUSTER: What was his personality like? What...?

PHILLIPS: He was generally very friendly, outgoing. And...loved to pl...play pranks and have jokes on people. [Shuster laughs] And....

SHUSTER: Can you think of an example?

PHILLIPS: Not off hand, I haven't thought about that for a long time.

SHUSTER: Were you close with your sisters?

PHILLIPS: Yes. Yes. Very close with them. Especially the one that was just older than I. And we did the same things together, had the same group of friends, largely, until later in our teenager...teenage years, we had different set of friends. But we did lots of things together. We were both interested in sports. Our older sister was not so interested in sports, but we were both active in sports.

SHUSTER: What kind of sports?

PHILLIPS: Every kind. Every kind, except tennis. And she played tennis. Basketball was my favorite, but we played all the sports. Basketball and volleyball and speedball and hockey in high school. Walked to school, five miles each way, in h...during our high school years. Until...well, for two years, then we got a car.

SHUSTER: You mentioned that after your mother passed away then your grandfather came and took you to live with your aunt and uncle?

PHILLIPS: That's right.

SHUSTER: Now, why was that?

PHILLIPS: Because there was nobody to care for us in Montana, except our father. Nobody....

SHUSTER: So no woman in the house?

PHILLIPS: No woman there. No woman...no woman in the family.

SHUSTER: What were your aunt and uncle like?

PHILLIPS: Lovely, lovely people. I....

SHUSTER: [talking over Phillips] What were their names, by the way?

PHILLIPS: Charles and Flora Knowld [?]. And I honor their...their memory. They were very good to us. Looking back, we had a very happy childhood. They disciplined us, for which we're thankful, now. And they had also taken in another of my aunt's sister's children aft...after her death and so we were five children in the family. They had no children of their own. We were five children in the family, and a boy and a girl. We were all like sisters and brothers together for the years we were with them. Then started in...then after dad remarried, we moved in...we moved with them. And we would still see them because we were in the same town.

SHUSTER: What did your dad do for a living?

PHILLIPS: He...in the m...he in...in his earlier years he had been an engineer on the train. And I often wished in later years that I'd asked more questions while he was living, but...I...I deci...a lot of an...a lot of things I don't have answers to about his early life, but I know that he was an engineer on a train because he had pictures of him, and he told us this, that he was...pictures of him as an engineer driving the train. And I've often wondered if it was about the time that he homesteaded...took out a homestead in Montana was about the time that this "Go West, Young Man" fever was evidently striking many Americans. He plotted out this homestead in the southeastern Montana. Laurel was the area, post office. And [he] never made a very good go of it there. So after he was able to sell the property after our mother's death he moved on to California and continued there. My uncle was a...uncle with whom we were living was a contractor, and he became one of the carpenters that worked with him in the carpentry work.

SHUSTER: Do you...what was your relation...relationship with your father like?

PHILLIPS: We were close. When you see young people today, maybe not that close, but we were...we were..we were not afraid of him. [laughs] And...well, I guess or grand...our stepmother had more...more influence on...we had more conversation with her because she was around more, he was away working.

SHUSTER: Do you see parts of your father in yourself? Do you...?

PHILLIPS: Yes.

SHUSTER: What kind...in what ways do you resemble him?

PHILLIPS: Well, I think I resembled him a lot in appearance and (he was large)...and his jolly nature, I think I may have inherited that. And outgoing personality. Though I used to be very timid, but I've overcome that.

SHUSTER: Growing up as a child, what things were important to you, what were the main...your main areas of interest?

PHILLIPS: I enjoyed school and friendships there and projects that we had in school, art and so forth, going on trips.

SHUSTER: What did you like in school? What was your favorite subject?

PHILLIPS: History and Geography I enjoyed very much and English, English literature. And reading, I did a lot of reading. And used to visit the library [coughs] used to visit the library, often I'd bring home a stack full of books...an arm full of books.

SHUSTER: Who were some of your favorite authors?

PHILLIPS: Zane Grey comes to mind [laughs], but I don't want that to go down in history! I loved...at one stage it was western stories, but then I liked Gene Stratton-Porter and...the one that wrote Lit...Little Women....

SHUSTER: Louisa May Alcott?

PHILLIPS: Uh-huh. Alcott. I read her books. And those kinds of things.

SHUSTER: You mentioned your stepmother a couple of times, what was her name?

PHILLIPS: Name was Lillian, Lillian Shafley. She had also graduated...she had graduated from BIOLA, and had been in Jewish work in New York with Joseph Cohen for...before her marriage. But [she] was always very interested in Jewish work and had a big influence on our lives and our attitude toward the Jewish people as a result of that.

SHUSTER: How did she meet your father?

PHILLIPS: Well, she had visited up in Montana when we were there. I don't know what other contacts they had had, but she was a cousin to our...first cousins, they were...my mother and stepmother were first cousins. We act...we have a picture of the two of them in the same picture with us as children. And what contacts they had beyond that I do not know.

SHUSTER: What...what was your stepmother like? How would you describe her personality?

PHILLIPS: She was a schoolteacher. She'd been a schoolteacher and she was [static from microphone] very strict and that was one of the things as...as we look back that we remember very much for her...about her. But I'm so glad that she and I lived long enough...I lived long enough to have...get some sense, and she lived long enough so I could tell her and express our appreciation for that. It couldn't have been easy for her to take us on at ages 7, 9, and 11.

SHUSTER: So you had some conflicts or some...?

PHILLIPS: Oh, just childhood conflicts. Nothing...nothing great. My two older sisters more than I.. I was the third one and more docile at the time and needed, as I remember, other influences as much as they did, nor was I as strong-willed as they were.

SHUSTER: You mentioned school and sports as things that you like to do. What part did church play in your mind?

PHILLIPS: A great part. And we were in a bible club. I thought of that a bit ago when you said that...in an active bible club. There in southern California there's a group known as [unclear] club for high school...junior high and high school students, and then a Eteri club...E-T-E-R-I,, which means the Greek word for "others", for those over high school, and we were ver...all of us were very active in those groups during our school years. And active in Sunday School and church. Baptized when I was in [pauses] my teens, twelve, fourteen, I guess.

SHUSTER: What...When did you come to accept Christ as your Savior?

PHILLIPS: I'm not sure. In the earlier years. But I know that when I was a student at BIOLA, we were challenged by.... Gypsy Smith was speaking at special meetings, and we were challenged by him that if we weren't sure...if we didn't know the date, to make sure that day. So I went back to my room and I said, "Lord, if I haven't done it before, I do it now and I accept you as my Savior." And John 1:12 was the verse on which I rested my salvation, "As many as received him, to them he gave [pauses]...gave the power to become the children of God." And there was a great transformation I know in my life at that time. I really handed my life to the Lord and from then on there was a rapid growth that had not been there before and love for the Lord and love for the things of the Lord.

SHUSTER: About how old were you then?

PHILLIPS: Seventeen.

SHUSTER: When you were a girl growing up, what did you think about that? You mentioned you went to...active in Bible Club, but what was your idea of God?

PHILLIPS: Interestingly enough, people used to ask me if I was going to be a missionary, and I said no. I didn't want to be. And then after I really gave my life to the Lord, I very much wanted to be and was afraid He wouldn't call me. And as I prayed about it through my BIOLA years, very definitely He led me into home mission work. He didn't say no to the [foreign] field, but very definitely He led me into home mission work. Beth Spooner, who later was one of the leaders in founding the Rehoboth Mountain Mission in...near Jackson, Kentucky, in Brethuck County, eastern Kentucky, had been my Sunday School teacher, had a big influence on my life as a teenager, and she was in that mission, and we'd hear often from her and...of the needs there. And they needed somebody very much at the time so I applied and was accepted and went back by train, back to the mountains, and lived there for five years, from �34-�39, doing scripture memory work in the schools. We walked to many schools. It was very rural and very undeveloped at that time. And....

SHUSTER: What.... Sorry, but when you were growing up as a child, what did you think about that?

PHILLIPS: About missions?

SHUSTER: About God.

PHILLIPS: Oh, about God. I loved Him. I reverenced Him. Prayed. [pauses]

SHUSTER: You mentioned that you hadn't wanted to be a missionary until you went to BIOLA. Why was that?

PHILLIPS: Well, strong influences. And I felt that was the thing to do. I just felt it was...I don't know if I could have put it into words at that time, but, looking back, I think that the Lord was showing me that's what I should do.

SHUSTER: But before you said you hadn't wanted to be a missionary.

PHILLIPS: Oh. When people asked me, it made me mad [laughs] because they expected me to be a missionary. And I just...what they wanted me to do, I didn't want to do. Contrariness, I guess.

SHUSTER: Why did they expect that? Why did they expect you to be a missionary?

PHILLIPS: I don't know. Whether it was what I said or what I did, my interest in missions and so forth. We had many missionaries in our home, our stepmother having been a...at BIOLA, and she was very missions minded. And so we had many missionaries in our home all the time. And I was very interested in every one of them. And they in us. And I presume all of that had an influence. And I possibly talked about it, I don't know, but when people asked me if I was going to be that, then I said, no I didn't [laughs].

SHUSTER: What was your picture of a missionary at that time? What did you think a missionary life was like?

PHILLIPS: Well, two missionaries that stand out in my memory at that time, one was from...it was Martha Ponert [?] from camp...China. The other was Edith Zimmer...Zimmerman was her name, who was with the Navajos. And they were both very attractive, not necessarily physically, but their life and their joy in the Lord and their walk with the Lord and what the Lord had done through them was very attractive to me. But there were many others.

SHUSTER: We've talked about some of the people that influenced you as a child. Are there other people we haven't mentioned? Who else was...stands out in your mind from your childhood? Or is there anyone else?

PHILLIPS: I should have thought along this line ahead of time. I don't recall just now.

SHUSTER: How did you come to go to BIOLA?

PHILLIPS: Well, it was the bible school that was nearest us, and we'd heard a lot about it, and our stepmother had gone there, and it just seemed kind of natural to go there. Others in our...others in our circle of friends were attending there, had attended there, or were attending there.

SHUSTER: What was your expectation at that time, what did you think you were going to be doing with the rest of your life?

PHILLIPS: In Christian work.

SHUSTER: But not as a missionary.

PHILLIPS: Depending. [laughs]

SHUSTER: And so, that's why you...is that why you went to BIOLA, to get preparation?

PHILLIPS: Yes, yes, preparation.

SHUSTER: What was BIOLA like?

PHILLIPS: It was a much smaller school, of course, then, in the early days (that was in the early �30s) than it is today.

SHUSTER: About how many students there, roughly?

PHILLIPS: I would guess maybe six to eight hundred. Not...it was not a large school, then. And made lots of friends. We were in the dormitory, we had lots of fun in the dormitory. [laughs]

SHUSTER: What kinds of things did you do?

PHILLIPS: Play pranks and....

SHUSTER: Can you recall an example?

PHILLIPS: My memory's gone on that. I don't remember. But I remember we had very happy times together. And we had retreats. We went to retreats away from the school, too. We had gym every morning, up on the roof...the building was a thirteen story building, and there on the roof garden was flat and that's where we had our recreation. It was right in the heart of the city at Sixth and Hope Street in Los Angeles. And....

SHUSTER: And, let's see, so you went to...you started at BIOLA at about....

PHILLIPS: �30.

SHUSTER: 1930.

PHILLIPS: I graduated from high school that year and went that fall. And was there, took the two year course, graduated in �32, and then took an additional missionary medical course for another additional year and graduated in �33. In �34, I and four other girls were on a gospel team in Arizona for three months, having classes for women and children. And then [coughs] I applied to Kentuck...Kentucky, the mission in Kentucky, Rehoboth Mountain Mission, and was accepted and went back there in �34.

SHUSTER: What was the campus at BIOLA like? What was...?

PHILLIPS: There was no campus, except right on the...the....

SHUSTER: It was the one building.

PHILLIPS: The one building. We used to go take walks in the library, the city library was right next door to it and we liked to go over there for walks and so forth. And there was...Echo Park wasn't too far away, we'd often go by bus there and walks and recreation.

SHUSTER: Who are some of the teachers at BIOLA that you remember, that were...?

PHILLIPS: Dr. John Hubbard and Dr. John Page and Miss Mabel Culter. She was our dean of women, had a great influence on all of the students....

SHUSTER: In what way?

PHILLIPS: For the Lord, for walking with the Lord, and for missions. She had been a missionary in China.

SHUSTER: How did she have this influence? I mean what...?

PHILLIPS: Dean of Women. We had devotions every morning and she led...she usually led them. And then in the classes; our doctrine and our synthesis in all of the classes we had, there was strong influence there. And by the teachers, and biblical teaching, and reading the word of God. I and most of the students worked our way through. It was during the Depression and we worked for a lot of our board and keep. Part of my time I worked in the hotel. The BIOLA students were on the upper floors. The lower floors of the institute were...was the hotel, for the lower three or four floors. And I did maid work...maid service work in...on that. And then worked...at different hours, worked in a cafeteria. [shuffling noise]

SHUSTER: You mentioned the devotions that you had early in the morning. What did they use to consist of? What were some of the things talked about?

PHILLIPS: Very challenging messages. Maybe just a verse or part of a verse, but challenging to our everyday life. Our relationship to the Lord, our relationship to each other, in love and friendship, and not quarreling, and forgiveness, and such things.

SHUSTER: Did...you mentioned some of these teachers, what were some of the subjects that you enjoyed or had influence on you while you were at BIOLA?

PHILLIPS: We had different book studies from time to time and doctrine.

SHUSTER: Books of the Bible?

PHILLIPS: Books of the Bible. Old Testament and New Testament. And doctrine. And homiletics. And synthesis. That's a long time ago! [laughs]

SHUSTER: You mentioned you were planning to go into Christian work. How were you preparing yourself? What, particularly, were trying to...?

PHILLIPS: They had...they gave Christian Education courses, as well. They had many missionary speakers and more and more my interest came...my interest in mission became strong. After I gave my life to the Lord, which is at the beginning of the first school year, I was opened to whatever the Lord had and I was very interested in missions. We had mission prayer events once every Saturday afternoon...every Saturday evening. And we had devotions every morning, and we had these retreats. My third year I was leader...president of the King's Daughters. King's Daughters were the organization for all the girls of the school. And my older sister had been president before me, the year before. And our activities there and our committee meetings and so forth, planning to help...doing things to help the other girls on the different corridors. There were corridors on which we lived. We had corridor prayer meetings once a...once a week when we remembered the needs of the families often...the needs of the families of the different girls there. And we formed some very close friendships through that.

SHUSTER: Who were some of the friends you made at BIOLA?

PHILLIPS: Wilda Miller, who later became Wilda Matthews, married to Arthur Matthews of CIM [China Inland Mission]. And Ruth Ender, one of my dear friends still. Wilda is with the Lord. Ruth, later, became a school teacher in Oregon and then back in California and at Brethren High in Long Beach. And we're still good friends. And many others, some of whom are with the Lord now. After our graduation, we continued a round-robin letter from our prayer groups and that has...that was for a very pleasant experience, too. I was in Africa, and Wilda was in Africa...Wilda was in China and one of the girls was in India, but our letters made it through most of the war [World War II], back and forth.

SHUSTER: Do you still continue?

PHILLIPS: No. Many of them are with the Lord. We haven't done it for several years.

SHUSTER: How do you think being at BIOLA prepared you for your later work, or did it?

PHILLIPS: Oh yes. I think it made a great impact upon my life. Studying the Bible for yourself, and your parents' faith becomes your own, and you have to make decisions on this, that, and the other. And a lot of...a lot of input into our lives. Through other friends as well as through our teachers and staff at the school.

SHUSTER: Were there things you wish you had learned at BIOLA that you didn't? I mean, were there things that would have been helpful in your later work that you did not pick up there?

PHILLIPS: I wish I had applied myself more and memorized more than I did.

SHUSTER: Memorize more scripture?

PHILLIPS: More scripture. I'm grateful for what I did. But I wish I spent more time on...not so much time fooling around. Which I suppose is probably the experience of most students at that age. Later I attended Columbia Bible College, and I was older by that time and had had some experience in Christian work, and it was...it was a different story in my applying the truths to my life.

SHUSTER: You mentioned the missionary courses you took. What did they consist of? How were people prepared to be missionaries in those courses?

PHILLIPS: We had missionaries among those teachers who taught us. We also had dentistry, that would be the very simply processes, procedures for dental work, extracting teeth and so forth, giving injections. And learned the anatomy, and learned first aid, and those kind of things as far as the medical part went. And the missionary part, by having Dr. McCleary [?], I should have mentioned him among the teachers, Dr. Albert McCleary was one of the teachers, he taught missions. And he also taught in that...gave us classes in that, to tell us about the practical things of living on the mission field. He had been a missionary in the Sudan.

SHUSTER: Hmmm. That's very appropriate for you.

PHILLIPS: Yes, very appropriate.

SHUSTER: What were some of the practical things he told you?

PHILLIPS: I can't remember now where I learned what, but I know that it was very practical at the time.

SHUSTER: You mentioned hearing Gypsy Smith preach at BIOLA, in your first year there. Had you heard him before, or was that the only time?

PHILLIPS: That was the only time I ever heard him.

SHUSTER: What kind of preacher was he?

PHILLIPS: Fiery, dynamic. Lots of stories, lots of illustrations, but they illustrated. [pauses] Gave his own testimony of course, his own background.

SHUSTER: Uh-huh. Did he sing as well?

PHILLIPS: Did he sing? I don't remember that.

SHUSTER: How would you describe him as a preacher?

PHILLIPS: A go...good preacher. Held the interest of his audience. Got the message across.

SHUSTER: Were...was his sermon...his sermon was...what was the topic of his sermon?

PHILLIPS: Pardon?

SHUSTER: What was he talking about, what was his topic?

PHILLIPS: No, I don't remember that.

SHUSTER: But you did mention that he said that if you don't know a date when you were saved....

PHILLIPS: Yes, at the close of his message he gave that invitation. And I learned later, probably much later, that some of the other students had made decisions that same night, that I did. Of course, I didn't know that at the time.

SHUSTER: Did you hear other great preachers, while you were at BIOLA?

PHILLIPS: Many, many. Dr. [Roland] Bingham the founder of SIM, and speakers from AIM, and from China, Legters (?), and Cameron Townsend, and many other well know missionaries were speaking.

SHUSTER: What was Roland Bingham like as a speaker?

PHILLIPS: Very very good. Very very good. And he always gave a Bible message along with his missionary challenge. And [pauses] Dr. Lambey [?].

SHUSTER: With Roland Bingham, what made him a good speaker, how did he communicate?

PHILLIPS: He had a very deep voice. But that wasn't the main thing, the main thrust was that you could just tell that he walked with the Lord. And he gave a Bible message along with his missionary challenge, and told illustrations from Africa. [clock in the background]

SHUSTER: What was his physical appearance, what did he look like?

PHILLIPS: He wasn't a very handsome man, but you were just very impressed by his walk with the Lord. A bit stooped, and big jowled and mustache. Did he have a mustache?

ANOTHER PERSON: It was not very....on the upper lip.

PHILLIPS: Okay. A broad upper lip.

SHUSTER: Was he demonstrative as a speaker, or did he stay in one spot? Was he...?

PHILLIPS: I doubt if he stayed in one spot, but that I don't remember.

SHUSTER: Did you ever go to hear Aimee Semple McPherson when you were a student?

PHILLIPS: Yes, yes I did once.

SHUSTER: And what was that like?

PHILLIPS: Very dramatic. Very dramatic.

SHUSTER: In what way?

PHILLIPS: Her clothing, her appearance, her...everything around her full of light, and trumpets, and glamour. And....

SHUSTER: What did she talk about?

PHILLIPS: About herself, but about the Lord. She gave a good message. She gave...I think she...I think she started out well. I think the power probably got...went to her head, and changed her ministry.

SHUSTER: And this was at Angelus Temple, that you heard her?

PHILLIPS: Angelus Temple. Just that once I went. A group of us went together.

SHUSTER: What does Angelus Temple look like? What was it....

PHILLIPS: A nice looking building, but not all that glamorous on the outside. But inside there were lots of lights, and....

SHUSTER: You mean like spotlights or...?

PHILLIPS: No, just lights. I don't....

SHUSTER: Ceiling lights.

PHILLIPS: Ceiling lights. It wasn't so common in churches in those days.

SHUSTER: You mentioned she was a very dramatic speaker. How do you mean that?

PHILLIPS: Well, in her actions and in her appearance. She wore white a lot. And often white with...with...kind of....

SHUSTER: Long sleeves.

PHILLIPS: yeah, with long sleeves, and....

SHUSTER: Flowing robes.

PHILLIPS: You'd be very aware of what she had on, as well as what she was saying.

SHUSTER: Did you perchance ever here Paul Rader, when he was in Los Angeles?

PHILLIPS: I don't recall. Possibly did. I don't recall. John MacArthur was just beginning to come into popularity then.

SHUSTER: What was the social life like at BIOLA?

PHILLIPS: What?

SHUSTER: What was the social life like at BIOLA?

PHILLIPS: They had socials every Friday night, and different...they took different forms. And we participated and sometimes put on skits and sometimes the students had charge of it, and playing games, and...again, I don't recall the details of it beyond that.

SHUSTER: Of course, when you went to BIOLA in 1930, the Great Depression was just starting.

PHILLIPS: Uh- huh.

PHILLIPS: Did that affect life at the school?

PHILLIPS: I'm sure it did, I'm sure it did. It affected what we had to play with, what we had to work with, what we had to do. Most of the students were working their way [through school]. Not all, but most. Or part way. That cut down on our free time too, and that also cut down on our time for studies.

SHUSTER: Uh-huh. Anything else about BIOLA that you want to remember, or that we haven't covered, that you'd like to talk about?

PHILLIPS: I praise the Lord for leading me there, and for the effects it had on my life and getting me started in the right direction.

SHUSTER: You mentioned that after BIOLA you were part of a gospel team...

PHILLIPS: Yes.

SHUSTER: ...of four women. How did that get started?

PHILLIPS: One of the men there, Mr. Hillis. What was his first name? He was the father of Dick and Don, of fame in China and India. I forget what his name was. He was on the extension for BIOLA, and there was this need over in Arizona, and so he arranged our trip over there for three months.

SHUSTER: What was the need?

PHILLIPS: Pardon?

SHUSTER: What was the need?

PHILLIPS: Of having classes and trying to stimulate interest in churches, and get more people attending. So we did visitation in homes. And we were...we were...he plotted it out. We were in different towns, and he made arrangements for us for where we would stay, the church that would be our host church where we would stay. Then we did visitation in the morning, and we had classes for women and children in the afternoon in different sections of different towns where we would be.

SHUSTER: Uh-huh. How did...?

PHILLIPS: Our musical...we were a musical group too. Sang. One of us was a pianist and the other four of us sang. Quartet.

SHUSTER: How did...I mean you say there was this need, but how did it get expressed? Did a church or pastors ask for teams to come out, or....

PHILLIPS: Mr. Hillis made those contacts, I do not know. I presumed it came through the pastors. Possibly he initiated it, I do not know, if he wrote to them and said we have students available. There was a boys team out too, and then we were the girls team.

SHUSTER: What was it like as a young woman traveling with the team?

PHILLIPS: We had some very very interesting and new experiences in going ino...and some of them were rural areas. And the people were very poor. It was still in the Depression, or getting out of it. And it was a new experience for us. We had to spend a lot of time on our knees praying about the situation that we were in, the people, hearts would be open to the things of the Lord. In some areas we found a better response than others, (which I suppose is true for all over), and usually the host family...the host individual or the host family, were very helpful to us, and then often people in the community would bring food to that person or to us. Sometimes we were in a house by ourselves and did our own housekeeping, sometimes we were guests in homes...different homes. Sometimes...don't think anytime where we all...we as guests...all five of us ended as guests in one home.

SHUSTER: How often were you in one town, usually?

PHILLIPS: One or two weeks at a time, as I remember it. Tucson and Phoenix, and Glendale, and Hila Bend are the ones that I remember, but there were other...other towns too.

SHUSTER: Was it something you enjoyed? Was this an important experience in your life?

PHILLIPS: It was. It was frightening and challenging and enjoyable.

SHUSTER: What was...what about it did you enjoy?

PHILLIPS: Well meeting new friends and the challenges, and the response. When the response comes. We kept up friendship with some of those that we met during that trip for years afterward, until...until I guess until they went to be with the Lord.

SHUSTER: You mentioned also it was frightening. What frightened you?

PHILLIPS: Going in to a strange...strange area like that, not knowing anybody, not knowing...we'd never done...none of us had ever done anything like this before. Just kids. [laughs] I guess we were nineteen by that time, some were a bit older. And the first...the early...the firstness of it. The beginning of it.

SHUSTER: How did you begin? You came to a new town, what was the first thing that you did?
PHILLIPS: I don't remember exactly, but I imagine we were introduced in the church. The church...the host church. And then were assigned to different people and we got assigned to different families.

SHUSTER: The people you were staying with.

PHILLIPS: Yes, the people we were staying with, and others. Some were friendly.

SHUSTER: And then what?

PHILLIPS: We did...we did a bit of sight-seeing on the edge...around the edge. Western farm, a western ranch. I remember one place we were taken we were given...for the lunch we had a steak on [portion of tape is blank] and delicious. We went to the mission, there was a mission there, Catholic Mission. And it so happened that it was one that was opened to the public to view, with the Mexicans coming in. There was a funeral that went on during...while we were there looking, just sight-seeing. And that made a deep, deep impression on us: the hopelessness of the message, the hopelessness in the lives of the people and on their faces. And that's what impressed us all the more, the urgency of our task of leading people to know the Lord. Though basically we were not working among Spanish speaking people, we were just amongst Anglos.

SHUSTER: And mostly poor Anglos?

PHILLIPS: Both. In Tucson it was more, Tucson...some parts of Phoenix it was more sophisticated people, but in some of the areas, yes, they was very rural people.

SHUSTER: And how did you begin, what did you do when you came to a town, besides...after sight-seeing?

PHILLIPS: I think we started out with visitation of names that were given us, and then some directed us. And then gradually the listing grew. Again that's so long ago I do not remember the details.

SHUSTER: But you would just go to somebody's house and start talking to them about coming to church, or going to the Bible studies?

PHILLIPS: Invite or tell them about the classes we were going to have. Or maybe there were some even going on and we just added to it.

SHUSTER: What kind of responses did you get?

PHILLIPS: Varied. Doors slammed in our faces and some were very open, and some were hungry-hearted and we had....

SHUSTER: How many people...I mean, not how many, but roughly what percentage of people would you say responded favorably?

PHILLIPS: There were never any large groups. They were smaller groups. [phone rings, footsteps]

SHUSTER: What...was...was this... you were about six months on visitation, you said.

PHILLIPS: We were there three months.

SHUSTER: Three months.

PHILLIPS: Three months.

SHUSTER: And then you went to the mission in Kentucky?

PHILLIPS: Yeah, then we went back home, and then the papers were coming through all right about my...going back to Kentucky. So I went back by train.

SHUSTER: You say the papers....

PHILLIPS: Well, just the application papers, and reference papers and all like that. It was a small mission, and in the early days things were not very complicated like they are now to join.

SHUSTER: As a young single woman going on the visitation in Arizona and then to a mission, was it difficult for you getting into Christian work? Was it unusual?

PHILLIPS: No, it was not unusual. No. Others...others...others did also. It's much more pleasant. Especially now that I'm married, it's much more pleasant certainly to not be alone. But it's...it's acceptable culturewise.

SHUSTER: And people accepted you as a woman...

PHILLIPS: Yes.

SHUSTER: ...ministering the gospel?

PHILLIPS: Uh-huh, uh- huh.

SHUSTER: How did you come to hear about the mission in Kentucky?

PHILLIPS: One of the leaders in the work had been my Sunday School teacher. And that's how I heard about it. And she would write back, and we'd been praying for her for a long time.

SHUSTER: What was it about this mission that caused you to apply there?

PHILLIPS: [background noise] Ministry to children, mostly middle school. And of just the challenge of getting out the Word.

SHUSTER: But weren't there ministries in Los Angeles or in other places that were doing things....

PHILLIPS: Yes, but I felt the Lord was leading me to Kentucky, guiding me there.

SHUSTER: What was...do you recall your first...how did you travel to Kentucky? [pauses] How did you travel to Kentucky?

PHILLIPS: I went by train to Chicago and tran...got on another train and got to Jackson, the county seat. And I had been delayed a day for some reason, sent a telegram, they didn't get it until I had been there for a week, but...to tell them I was late. They had gone over the mountains...borrowed horses and had gone over the mountains to bring me back that night, but the train arrived about ten o'clock that night. And had I arrived on time, I would have ridden horseback in the moonlight that first night, [laughs] never having been on horse before.

SHUSTER: Probably would not have been the best introduction.

PHILLIPS: Pardon?

SHUSTER: Probably would not have been the best introduction, I guess

PHILLIPS: Well, it would have been interesting. [Tape stopped and started again]

SHUSTER: Now you were saying you walked the last few miles?

PHILLIPS: Yes, we walked the last two miles. And left the luggage, and a neighbor went down with a sled and brought the luggage up later.

SHUSTER: Do you recall what your first impression of Kentucky was, of the place you arrived at?

PHILLIPS: Yes, it was beautiful, and it was in October, the leaves were turning. Coming from California where we didn't have much of that. The leaves were turned and it was...vegetation was rampant and it was very very pretty. The people were very friendly, and [pauses] I knew, already knew...the...our...my main senior worker was already a dear friend.

SHUSTER: What was her name?

PHILLIPS: Elizabeth Spooner. She was from the state of Maine. She was a school teacher in the Powana[?] California School System. And she when resigned to go back into mountain mission work, to go back and help start the mission, the superintendent of the school said that she was the best teacher that he had, and she really was an excellent teacher. And she taught us good teaching principles, and for that we were very grateful. For teaching the Bible in the schools.

SHUSTER: The stereotype of mountain people, of course, is that they're very clannish. Did you find that to be true, or....

PHILLIPS: Very true, very true. Blood is thick. Blood is very thick.

SHUSTER: Was it difficult for you as an outsider to make a place for yourself?

PHILLIPS: Yes, you have to prove yourself. They don't accept you just because you want to be their friend. They're quite a while to break through that prejudice. Some were more open than others. The younger ones were more open. And I was only twenty-one by then, and so I had a good in with a lot of the young people, more so than a lot of the older ones. But many of them became very very dear friends. They are real people. I just really did admire them. Scotch ancestry, and had really high values.

SHUSTER: You mentioned you had to prove yourself, what did you mean by that?

PHILLIPS: Well, they accepted the others who had been there longer. You could tell that they accepted them much more readily, what they had to say than what I had to say. And as a friend, but gradually, gradually they included me too and you could see that the bars were down, and I wasn't just a visitor, and I really loved them. I mean, I think love's an international language. You don't have to say it. You don't always have to say it.

SHUSTER: What kind of person would be successful for working with mountain people in Kentucky? What kinds of qualities do you think are needed?

PHILLIPS: Love and friendship, and stick-to-it-tivness, and patience. Line upon line, there as always, and I felt that it was a very good preparation for my major service in Africa.

SHUSTER: Why was that?

PHILLIPS: Well, for one thing the physical things. We carried our water and cooked on wood stoves and split our wood. Raised our garden, raised chickens. Killed them and canned them for our...canned our beans and tomatoes and corn for the winter supplies. And our area where we were we had a hillside garden too. It depended on the rain for the...for the irrigation of it. And a neighbor man would come and plow it every year for us. We planted it. Good hard work hoeing in the sun, get rid of the wind...weeds. And the house was not completely finished when we got there, the house in which we were living. The fra...outer frame was there, but there...and then there's just the two by fours and blue paper (building paper) was around the walls. So after school, week after week after week we'd come home...some classes if you'd get home before...well, never mind, when we got home, but often if we got home before dark, we'd have a longer period of it. We would cut what we'd call celotex then, and nail it up to the ceilings and to the walls.

SHUSTER: Celotex?

PHILLIPS: Celotex, it's that...you may not even know what it is now.

SHUSTER: No, I've never heard of it.

PHILLIPS: It's a thick wallboard. And the house had been built with rough timber that had not been seasoned. So it was like iron, they were all...they weren't necessarily true, so you couldn't put up a square piece...an oblong piece with square corners you'd have to fit and fit and fit. And lift it up. But there were about three or four of us at that time, four is a guess. Every piece of furniture...every piece of celotex we'd get...sometimes we'd get up two or three a day, or an evening, and then we'd get our supper and fall in to bed. Later on, our first couple years we walked or went by horseback everywhere we went. And later on we had a car. A Model A [Ford], and we could drive to some of the places. And we got...we got there quicker, and weren't as tired as when we got there if we'd walked or gone by horseback.

SHUSTER: Did you become a good horsewoman?

PHILLIPS: I don't know, but I enjoyed it. I don't know how well I did. We had donkey...we had mules (not donkeys) we had mules and horses at different times, different ones. And for a while we had...for a couple years we had a great big black horse by the name of Snip. He belonged to a doctor previously. The doctor had trained him so that as soon as he put his foot in one stirrup, the horse started out, [laughs] and that took some....

SHUSTER: You had to be quick to get on that one!

PHILLIPS: But he had a very good gait, and I just loved to ride him. Very comfortable.

SHUSTER: How large was the circuit you had to travel, I mean what, how much....

PHILLIPS: An area of about twenty miles. Our nearest...the school was fifteen miles, and then the area around about that. And we went...we did that once a week. And other schools were ten and twelve and five. The two and five mile ones we'd walk, usually. But the further ones we went by horseback (horse or mule back). And we had a regular circuit on different days. If weather hindered us we might alter it a day or two. And the schoolteachers were all very grateful for our coming, wanted us to come. Because it made a difference in the attitude of the children, naturally. And we had Bible...scripture memory work, and whole Bible stories, and a scripture memory work where they earned points, and if they learned twenty-five verses they were given a Gospel of John (these verses were printed out for them). They were given a Gospel of John and then if they learned a hundred verses, they were given a Bible. And then they learned more verses beyond that, they could get a free week at camp. And this was a real incentive and they were very eager for it, and a large number would do it. Not all, but a large number of them. And we had camps for two different ages, the younger ones and the older ones. The older ones would be in their teens.

SHUSTER: About how many students were usually in a school that you visited?

PHILLIPS: It varied, because of the...depending on the area. I suppose fifty in the closest one, and fifteen or twenty in some of the further ones. All different ages.

SHUSTER: All together in a one room school?

PHILLIPS: All together in one room. Occasionally there were two room. But usually it was one room.

SHUSTER: And these were of course rural families?

PHILLIPS: All rural families, all rural families.

SHUSTER: Poor?

PHILLIPS: Nearly all of them poor. I'll take that back, one place where we went two miles away was a much larger school. They had maybe two...they must have had six or eight classrooms. They had high school there too, though. No, they didn't have class...they didn't have high school. But they had either one class in a room or not more than two classes in a room.

SHUSTER: All white?

PHILLIPS: A few black, but not many. And no...no other variety.

SHUSTER: How did you...? You mentioned that Ms. Spooner showed you, taught you her principles of teaching, which were very helpful to you. What were those principles?

PHILLIPS: Begin with the known. Building on what you teach them and the way you teach them.

SHUSTER: How do you mean begin with the known?

PHILLIPS: With what they know. And use illustrations that are round about them. And go on from there to teach them things that they don't know. And refer to things in their common life when you're teaching them Bible truths or Bible characters. If there is something similar in their lives than what the Bible characters did, to relate it to that, to be more meaningful to them. It's all so intangible now, I....

SHUSTER: Can you think of an example of how you did that, or how she did that?

PHILLIPS: No. I do remember that they are great actors, and they love to work out...we often do it with pantomime or pageant, acting out plays or acting out the story to enforce the story. Of course the memory work, and they all loved that. And of those that came to school, they were most of them very eager to learn, very eager to get ahead.

SHUSTER: What kind of stories did they act out?

PHILLIPS: The action stories of the Old Testament or the New Testament. The Old Testament was less familiar to them. And they loved the stories of Daniel and David. [pauses] and the Old Testament characters.

SHUSTER: How would they act that out?

PHILLIPS: Impersonating the different ones. Like children do any place. Very, very amateur, but it impressed the story upon them.

SHUSTER: So during the school year you would visit classrooms once a week, is that....

PHILLIPS: Yes. The near school we used to go every a day, then after a while we'd go two or three times a week.

SHUSTER: And you went through the whole Bible each year, or what was your curriculum?

PHILLIPS: No, we had an agenda. I do not remember now what it was but we had an agenda. I think in some schools it would take several years to get through the whole Bible. To get through the stories, the main stories of the Bible.

SHUSTER: Of course, you'd be seeing the same students year after year since they're all together in the same room.

PHILLIPS: Yes, yes many of them. And many of them went...attended the camp. And many of them went on to Bible school, and some of them became missionaries all over the world. It's very encouraging.

SHUSTER: How many people were at the mission altogether? How many people were out teaching.

PHILLIPS: It varied. We were from three, our...our early years there were three, and then we became five and it fluctuated from time to time. It was not a big mission. We just had the one station. But build on principles, and they long ago turned it over to the local people, they trained them, as...on a...like on overseas you're working to work yourself out of a job. I forget how long ago it's been, but it's been a long time ago that they turned it over to the nationals. I was just there, though, five years, but I went back to visit every furlough. And they took on some of my support, maybe ten dollars, ten dollars a month, but it was very precious. I consider them among some of my dearest friends.

SHUSTER: What...did you ever have any kind of discipline problems?

PHILLIPS: Yes, yes, there were. The teach...school teachers usually took care of those. And when they came to the mission property, and if there were additional problems, Ms. Spooner usually took care of that through the men. The men in the community, the men in the church.

SHUSTER: How do you mean she took care of it through the men?

PHILLIPS: Well, we would talk to them about it and they would care for the problem. We had socials for the young people about once a month, at the mission station. And then a lot of the men...a lot of the young boys (young men) would come in who did not ordinarily come to Sunday School and church. And they might become a bit rowdy, either they'd had something to drink, or there would be a quarrel between the two families, two sections, two clans. But never any, any serious problems. It's incidental, human relationship things only.

SHUSTER: You mentioned the quarrel between clans. Was feuding important?

PHILLIPS: Feuding was very common there.

SHUSTER: Did it affect your work?

PHILLIPS: We tread softly. We know that there was a still up in the...of course moonshining went on there and we knew there was a still up the hill behind the property there. We'd often hear the Whippoorwill [a type of bird] call, and that was their call, their signal. And we heard that frequently. And occasionally we would see men going and coming from there. But they respected Ms. Spooner, they respected us. They respected the Lord. Most mountain people have a regard for the Lord, a respect for the Lord, even if they don't know him. They're "religious".

SHUSTER: I've read that in many rural communities, the school year's often a lot shorter because the kids help with the crops, etc. Is that true?

PHILLIPS: That's true. Weather and crops govern it. About six months.

SHUSTER: When school wasn't in session, what did...what were people in the mission doing?

PHILLIPS: Well, we had our own housework and garden work to do, part of that time, and then we were doing visitation. And camp, and preparing for camp, in the summer weeks when we had the camps. When the schools were out we had the camp. And we had Vacation Bible School in all of these areas too.

SHUSTER: What was visitation like? What did you do during visitation?

PHILLIPS: We had (how many acres?) I think two or three acres, part of it was on the hillside, as I mentioned. The home there, and the barn, and later becoming a garage when we got a car. And the chicken house, and the garden, about two acres. Some of it was...lay fallow, and part of it was cultivated.

SHUSTER: And what did you do during visitation?

PHILLIPS: We would go in to the homes usually two by two. And possibly the other person stayed home and did canning or did this, that, and the other thing. Visit with them a while and learn their needs, and get near to them and their relationship to the Lord. And pray with them. And sometimes have a...well, always have a Bible reading but sometimes have a Bible study with individuals if they were shut ins. Sometimes we were able to do several in a community in a day, and sometimes just one person. You don't hurry them. You don't hurry them in anything. It takes patience.

SHUSTER: Did...you say you'd find out your needs. What were some typical needs you'd find with people you'd visit?

PHILLIPS: Unsaved relatives, particularly husbands and sons. And sickness, and sometimes problems with their children, teenagers. Promiscuous living. And they had high standards, but like our whole society today they didn't always stand up to them. There were teenage pregnancies there too. And just regular home family needs like you'd find anyplace.

SHUSTER: What was the life of a woman like in rural Kentucky?

PHILLIPS: Hard. Carrying water, chopping wood. Sometimes the men chopped the wood. The men did the plowing, and they did the harvesting. And sometimes they would do the hoeing too. But the women did a large brunt of that. And the canning, the washing by hand, heating the water, caring for the children. The men did the construction of the homes. And sometimes they worked away in the mines or worked away in some other place and then would come home only occasionally. [pauses]

SHUSTER: Were women regarded as equal men?

PHILLIPS: Hardly. [pauses]

SHUSTER: How....

PHILLIPS: Like the general attitude, I suppose, only even more backward than the rest of the country at that time. I understand the migration of the settlers in America went West, and when the group...the ancestors of the people that we were with were from Scotland. When they got there it was so like their Scottish hills that they just stayed, didn't go on West. And progress stopped at the place that they were when they came there. And life went on pretty much they way it had been back in...in Scotland. Rural conditions or so forth. I don't know if you've heard the book or read...seen the film Christie, but the condition's very like that. Christie's a story written by Catherine Marshall about her mother, who had gone into the mountains as a young woman, a schoolteacher. Conditions very much like that.

SHUSTER: How do you think your work there affected you? [banging in background]

PHILLIPS: As I mentioned, it was a great preparation for the ruggedness of the south Sudan, and the things that we learned to do, and had to do. And I think it affected my...the urgency of the task of getting the Word of God out to other people, and see lives changed. And it was wonderful to see the lives changed and....

SHUSTER: Can you think of some examples of lives you saw changed? Can you think of some examples of lives you saw change?

PHILLIPS: Yes. One young woman, she remained single for most of her life. She married in later life also, brought a great change in her life and then she became a Sunday School teacher, and an active worker amongst others. And others...to see when some...some of the men came to the Lord, it really made a difference in their home, and their attitude to their family and their wives. Their care of the family and their concern for the family, where before they had been, "So what?" That they were all for his enjoyment, and his pleasure. So there were great...great change came in many many homes as a result of the gospel and as a result of their accepting Christ.

SHUSTER: When....

PHILLIPS: And joy. And joy. Their lives were joyless. But we could see a great change in their really enjoying the Lord and enjoying each other, more than the drab, mundane, day after day the same.

SHUSTER: What...How did that joy show itself?

PHILLIPS: In their facial expression, in their attitude, and in their liberation. Then the women would come out more, and the men would be more tolerant of the women taking time off to attend classes (Bible classes, and handcraft classes). And they had a Homemaker's Club...I understand the Homemaker's Club is still going on in rural sections all over America. And that was a very active group, and that brought out...oh, we had maybe twenty or thirty women in that group. And [pauses] it...it liberated them so that they didn't have to be at the wash tub and the house all the time. And brought joy in their expression of their lives, as well as their speech.

SHUSTER: You've mentioned...is it Elizabeth Spooner?

PHILLIPS: Yes, Elizabeth Spooner.

SHUSTER: You've mentioned Elizabeth Spooner a couple of times. How would you describe her?

PHILLIPS: A lovely woman. Sweet in appearance, average height. And always thinking of others, and always very outgoing. And slow and deliberate in her speech, but everything she said was worthwhile listening to. And greatly loved by the people. Greatly loved by everyone who knew her.

SHUSTER: What kind of leader was she?

PHILLIPS: What kind of leader? A very good leader. Didn't assert authority, you just gave it to her. She...I say demanded it, but you know, demanded in a good way. She...you respected her, and you wanted to do what she wanted you to do.

SHUSTER: Was she herself from Kentucky?

PHILLIPS: No, she was from the state of Maine.

SHUSTER: How did she come to begin to work there, do you know?

PHILLIPS: She had also attended BIOLA, and had heard of the need through another woman by the name of Miss Bethke, and had gone to work with her for a year or year and a half, and while she was working with Miss Bethke on one creek, people came from the area [unclear]. Later she started to ask if they could send some people over there. And after they prayed about it for a while, both she and Miss Bethke felt that it was right for her to leave and start the work over there. So she got a board, and a group of people praying and working, and other coworkers, and then it was opened.

SHUSTER: Was that Bethkey? B-E-T-H-K- E-Y?

PHILLIPS: K-E.

SHUSTER: K-E. How was the mission supported?

PHILLIPS: By volunteer...all...it was by faith...a faith mission. The church to which both Beth and I belonged helped a great deal, but other churches also. The board members were made up from people from many states, men and women. And they contributed, and then from their home ar...home constituencies too. Then Beth had done some deputation work. And we all did.

SHUSTER: What did the deputation look like?

PHILLIPS: Going to the churches who had invited us to speak, and speaking, and whatever the response was for this we were grateful.

END OF TAPE

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