(1914) Oscar Attends Seminary

Oscar traveled to Sweden via the trans-Siberian railroad1 with Esther Wahlin, and Sten and Signe Lindberg. It was only two months before the "war to end all wars" started. Upon arriving in Sweden Oscar stayed with his father's relatives in Stensnäs, but a couple of months later he left his relatives to attend seminary along with his brother Egron.2 Oscar was assigned the bedroom that formerly was Egron's.

In seminary Oscar had an awful time. He was brought up with the Chinese language as a young boy with a smattering of English, and with the English language at Chefoo School where he lived nine months of out each year for nearly ten years. He lived only three months a year at home where English was more of a natural thing to speak if not Chinese. Swedish was not often spoken at home, and he and his brothers and sisters never studied Swedish as a language. At seminary Oscar did not even have the advantage immigrants to Sweden who learned Swedish in proper Swedish language courses. No Swedish language courses were given in seminary. Everyone was expected to know Swedish. Oscar had his work cut out for him trying to master the Swedish language while taking and trying to pass his classes, all of which were given in Swedish. He had to just jump right in an try to understand what he could until he increased his vocabulary. The teachers and and fellow students were nice and understanding, but it was still difficult.

To increase his vocabulary Oscar did a lot of reading outside of his normal lesson, especially Swedish literature. He was advised to read aloud to himself which he did and which was helpful in becoming more fluent. Learning the Swedish language was difficult in itself, but there was more. Oscar also had to adjust to another culture. For one thing, all the food at the seminary was Swedish. He loved Chinese food, but at seminary there was none to be had. Eating Swedish food day in and day out was a culture shock.

Eventually, Oscar was fluent enough in Swedish to be sent out by the seminary to speak in Swedish churches, but Swedish spoken with a north China coast British accent.

Bethel Seminary was an excellent school with good classes. Though there was enough at the school for the mind and for the soul, there was nothing for the body except for the cutting of wood for the wood pile in the cellar for the stove. During their student days at the British school in Chefoo Egron and Oscar were brought up on sports. One day among the students with no teachers present Egron and Oscar brought up the idea of buying a football [soccer ball] for some games, matches and exercise. Some of the students thought this to be quite extreme, a sin in fact. The students engaged in quite a lively discussion about buying and playing with this worldly object the football. Finally those of the students who wanted to play chipped in what money they had, bought a football and went out to play at Liljan Skogen, the park by Bethel Seminary. They a great time.

The China Front

In 1914 Japanese took over Tsingtao.

Mission Statistics in 1914

The three churches had 774 members. There was also a total of 121 baptisms, 31 evangelists, 7 Bible women, 27 outstations, 32 schools, 469 students both male and female, 34 native teachers, and one dispensary at each of the main mission stations with one native doctor and two assistants each. The medical work in Kiaochow was under Mr. Leander's supervision while the one in Chucheng was under Matilda Persson's. Fourteen in-patients and 6129 out-patients were treated during the year. The medical work was growing quickly toward being self-supporting.

By this time the mission had five missionary families and two single ladies at work. Another single lady was at home on furlough. J.E. Lindberg wrote that it was generally being felt that more attention and resources especially financial should be directed toward evangelism in the support of Chinese evangelists and less toward education.3 Two boarding schools in Kiaochow were reduced to about half what they were before and the boarding school in Chucheng changed into a day school and the responsibility for support given over to the Chinese church, again to cut expenses.

Generally missionaries on the field were not against mixing evangelism and social work to help meet the desperate needs of many of the people. Debate did occur, however, over whether the middle school was really necessary. The argument in favor of the school besides the goal to educate the general public was that the mission would also be educating future leaders in the church.

Edith was still attending school in Chefoo, but with her summers spent in Tsingtao where the family gathered every year to escape the heat of the interior. In the evenings they went to a park (or perhaps a building) down by the strand near the center of town to hear the German band play.4

Several times Johan Alfred was asked by the government to provide help during times of disaster. The first time was in 1914 when a flood came east of the city.5

Dr. Jonathan Goforth and his wife lead revival meeting⁵ Papers of Jonathan Goforth can be found at the Wheaton College Archives & Special Collections.

See: www.wheaton.edu/bgc/archives/GUIDES/188.htm

The following email was sent to the archives by LJH on 11/21/07:
Hello,
I am writing a book about a Swedish missionary family named Rinell who lived and worked in China between 1894 and 1951. In 1913 or 1914, Jonathan Goforth and his wife, apparently, spoke at a revivalist meeting at the Rinell's mission station. I would like to find out if there is any record of this revivalist meeting among Goforth's papers. How can I go about finding out?

Thank you.

Lennart Holmquist Wheaton Graduate School Class of 1978 in Kiaohsien. [Was this the previous year?] 6

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Footnotes