ESK IMOS , EVANG EL ISM and ECOLOGY
ings, cut through fur-lined clothing, parkas, woolen socks, and heavy boots. There are no roads anywhere and no paved streets. Water is hauled in frozen blocks from rivers or springs. No trees are seen except scragly spruces along river banks, for tree roots can not penetrate the perpetually-frozen earth. Emergency communication to the outside world is limited to short-wave radio. Cargo is shipped from Seattle only twice a year, during the summer. Thus needs must be anticipated and paid for in advance— lumber, machinery, food, clothing, medicines, school supplies— or flown in by expensive air freight. Heating fuel for church and home costs the Shields around $150 a month. Electricity bills run from $90 to $100 in the winter months. In mid-summer, perpetual daylight 36 straight days upsets routines, eating and sleeping. Thawing of plants in the tundra at ground surface causes buildings to shift and crack. The Shields felt a special call to serve the friend ly, good-natured people at the top of the globe. In addition to their need for the love of Christ, a hope, a destination, and purpose in life, the American Eskimos need spiritual guidance through a trying period of transition and adjustment from the primi tive to the space age. And they need personal con tact with Christians who care. Harley Shield has been ministering to Eskimos in Alaska over four years. Each month he travels by plane, outboard, or sno-machine sled to four other villages and to Barrow, the most northern point in Alaska and largest Eskimo village in the world. Before the Shields were called into the ministry, Harley taught school on the Hoopa Indian Reserva tion in northern California. There he was converted, called into the Lord’s service, and worked at the Hoopa Baptist Mission for twelve years. “ Working with Eskimos is similar to working with Indians. My years at the reservation in California proved good training for Arctic bush living. Our chil dren, ages 11 to 21, are well-adjusted to living with natives. Three were born on the Hoope Reservation, and the others were reared there.” The two eldest, Bonnie and Ted, are presently attending collage at Riverside, California. The others attend the 12-grade public school in Kotzebue. They all love the winter sports in Alaska. The family has nothing but praise for their adopted homeland, with one minor exception. The Shields are all musicians. Harley plays the guitar, Martha the piano and accordion, and the children play wind instruments. The Arctic climate is hard on musical instruments, causing sticky keys and un stable pitch, they told me. “ There are no saloons in Kotzebue,” states Mr. Shield, “ no smog, no rioting, demonstrations, strikes, marijuana or LSD. There is beauty in God's heavens: long rosy twilights in spring and fall; a kaleidoscope of vivid colors in the Northern Lights on cold, clear
Harley and Martha Shield
Eskimo grandmother and child
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Brother Shield chatting with church members at a Wednesday fellowship meeting in Kotzebue. by Mildred V andenburgh B efore I visited the Arctic, “ From Greenland’s Icy Mountains” were only words in a song to me. Then when I flew to Alaskan villages north of the Arctic Circle, I wondered why missionary Harley Shield moved his attractive and talented wife, Martha, and their six children from sunny California to Kotzebue, Eskimo trading center and polar bear capital of the world, 35 miles north of the Arctic Circle. With mis sion fields all over the globe, why did he choose Alaska? The Arctic is as rigorous for human life as any place on our planet. Temperatures go down to '50°. Long winters are without sunlight. Howling winds and blizzards, which pack snowdrifts to the tops of build
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THE KING’S BUSINESS
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