INVESTING IN LIVES
the Zuni people, but Rehoboth was full. The mission told the people there that if they built a building, the mission would furnish the teacher. That teacher was Gertrude. “Now that was a challenge,” Gertrude says. “I had found my place at Rehoboth and was very happy there. This would put me all alone—I’d be the only teacher teaching grades 1-6 as the school became established.” Even her pastor advised that it didn’t seem like the right fit for her personality. “But the requests kept coming, and when I finally said yes, the burden just fell away right away. I knew it was right.” For the next six years, Gertrude lived in the hills of New Mexico, but she says those somewhat solitary years as an only-teacher were also beautiful. “I really picked up the culture there and got to know the families of those children well,” she says.
all eight grades and high school. I would just be teaching one grade. This was very different than what I was used to.” Once Gertrude arrived, more families came to the school, and they needed more teachers. She soon became emotionally attached to the country, the staff, and students, staying on to teach for many years. Many of them came to school by plane, and whenever she had a break from teaching, she’d visit the stations where the children lived. After a 5-year break from missions to care for her aging parents, Gertrude returned to Africa, eventually finding herself in Liberia teaching the children of six families. When a coup broke out, the missionaries were forced to leave. Gertrude then moved to Sierra Leone to be a personal teacher to a missionary’s son who was struggling in the traditional classroom. Under Gertrude’s teaching and support, that boy became a good reader and a fine student. “I just started from where he was at and I helped him grow,” she says. “He just needed a teacher to get him over that hump.”
NEW MEXICO Gertrude settled in at Rehoboth as a 1st and 2nd grade teacher, working with children who came to the school directly from their Navajo reservation. She remembers fondly those years, calling them a “wonderful time.” She taught many children, even one who went on to become the vice chairman for the Navajo nation. The two remained friends throughout the rest of his life. Later, another group of Christians in Gallup, New Mexico, wanted Christian education for Above, Gertrude in 1946, the year she moved to New Mexico. Below, Gertrude at 102 in her apartment at Royal Atrium Inn.
AFRICA
When the school in New Mexico closed, she accepted an assignment in Nigeria, Africa. Gertrude arrived in Nigeria and found a much larger school run by 12 different missions. “They had
18 PROVIDENCE MAGAZINE | Issue No. 2
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