Concordia College - Corona Borealis Yearbook (Edmonton, Alberta Canada)

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Later, in 1951, came a heartwarming letter from Chaplain Capt. (now Lt. Col. ) G. Wilfred Hyatt: As the end of each school-year draws near, I cannot avoid thinking back to Alma Mater and the wonderful spiritual and social experiences connected with it. As the years pass by, a person realizes more and more how much he owes to Concordia and the faithful teachers who prepared him to serve the Master whether it be among the dying heroes in the muddy rice paddies of Korea or in some stately church on our own good con¬ tinent ... I should like to make $100 a year available to be used as a scholarship for needy young men. The Lord has been very kind to me in this war. Although I am still in Korea, I am no longer in the thick of the fighting. I feel that I have experienced as many miracles as the Apostles. During the war our ministerial graduates had endless difficulties getting into the States. One of them was turned back at Emerson, Manitoba. He could not prove that he was alive! He returned to Winnipeg and with the aid of Mr. T. O. F. Herzer, President of the Canadian Colonization Company, he was, after a number of weeks, finally able to establish his identity. He had been born in war-torn Europe while his parents were fleeing. On Sunday, November 29, 1942, Winston Churchill delivered one of his famous war broadcasts. Practically every ear in Canada was glued to the radio. He went five minutes overtime, and immediately thereafter station CJCA switched over to the popular Sunday program, Church of the Air and introduced the Concordians. As a consequence we had a large audience listening in - at least at the beginning of the program. Quite a number of letters arrived from people unknown to us. One came from a company of soldiers, who had gathered in their barracks around the radio and stayed there until our broadcast came to a close. (Note: Somewhere there still is a recording of that service. If you ever hear it, you will observe a very noticeable bump in the middle of the sermon. That was caused by a child which fell out of bed in the suite of rooms above the funeral chapel from which we were broadcasting. ) Ilness With a lack of suitable remedies and serums and antibiotics such as our world is blessed with today, the care of health among our students in the early years at times caused much anxiety. We repeatedly had to battle with diphtheria and scarlet fever. Suspects were isolated at once in our sick rooms until the doctors had diagnosed the case. If this was positive, the students were transferred to the isolation hospital. In the thirties we had an especially frustrating epidemic of diphtheria. Student after student came down with it. And these were not boys in the same room or at the same table in the dining hall or some who sat close to each other in the classroom. One day it was one in a room on the first floor, then one on the second floor. One day it was a lower classman, the next day an upper classman. One day it was one who sat at one end of the dining hall, the next day one at the other end. The doctor visited us daily. We called in the city health department; we summoned the provincial department. We pleaded with these men to inspect our buildings most thoroughly and to tell us: What is the source of this contagion? They could find no answer. In a desperate attempt to stamp out this pestilence, we finally decided to send a swab from every throat of the college community (teachers ' families included) to the provincial laboratory. Within 24 hours we were told that we had no active diphtheria, but 10 carriers. All students of the second floor were move d to the first floor, and the ten carriers were confined to the second storey, where they were kept in quarantine. Ten days had passed, and we released them in happy anticipation that our worries were over. Within the next week, we had to send three new cases to the isolation hospital. You will understand why we were always interested in the words spoken by our fellow Christians in the general prayer every Sunday: We commend to Thy care all our schools. Sad Losses From 1922-27 we had to carry five of our students to the grave. One of them died at home of diphtheria, another one of a heart condition. During the first summer vacation another was found dead in a field. He was leading a horse by a halter rope which he had tied around his waist while opening a gate. The horse bolted and evidently inflicted mortal injuries. Still another complained of abdominal pains at five o ' clock in the morning. At seven o ' clock our surgeon stated that he had found a ruptured appendix. Later the boy was on the way to recovery and sent back to the college, but had to return to the hospital to undergo two more operations for peritonitis. He passed away shortly before New Year ' s. This was an unusually sad case for the reason that throughout his illness the boy was fervently longing for his first Christmas vacation at home, in southern Saskatchewan. He did spend New Year ' s at home - in heaven.

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The Concordia Platoon of the Second Battalion of the Edmonton Regiment During World War II (1939-45) the National War Services Regulations required all stu¬ dents (17 years of age and older) to report for military training. The implications of this directive were far-reaching. Assuming, for example, that the war would last ten years, we would not at some future date have any ministerial candidates over a period of ten years. Our Board resolved to send a delegation to Ottawa. Its members were Dr. John W. Behnken, president of Synod; Pres. A.H. Schwermann, and Rev. Frank Malinsky, president of the Ontario District. On June 4, 1942, the Hon. Mr. J. T. Thorson, Director of War Services, gave us a sympathetic hearing. He spent about 30 minutes in trying to establish the connection between the Missouri Synod and the churches in Germany (where, of course, there was no connection except that we were in doctrinal agreement with the 13, 000 souls of the small Free Church of Saxony. ) And for the remaining five minutes he listened to our plea for exemption. Self- evidently, such requests came from many church bodies. These representations had the following results: late in 1942 an amendment was added to the Regulations to exempt all bona-f ide students for the ministry, provided they are members of a church body which is eligible to supply chaplains for the armed forces. (About that time our Synod had some 210 full-time chaplains in the American army and navy. ) This amendment came too late for the new school year in 1942, and so we lost a number of students that fall. Henceforth our ministerial students were under no compulsion to enter the armed forces. But when after Pearl Harbor in 1941 the situation began to look grim and the Japanese appeared to be threatening our West Coast, the government thought it imperative to prepare for any kind of emergency. It introduced military training in all schools for students 17 years of age and older. On January 29, 1943, Col. Walter Hale, doubtlessly one of the finest gentlemen in the Canadian army. Commander of the Reserve Army in the Edmonton area, appeared before our Board of Control together with Sargeant Labman; the following agreement was reached: Concordia students will form a unit of the Reserve Army, to be known as the Concordia Platoon, and will have drills twice or three times a week. Their pay will be $1. 30 a day for those over 17 years, and 60 p for those who are younger. Three two-hour drills con¬ stitute a day. Uniforms and full military equipment will be issued free of charge. Members of the Reserve Army will have to take a two weeks ' training course at Sarcee Military Camp near Calgary during the summer months. Henceforth our students appeared as a group of soldiers, in military dress. Instruction was given in and near the college. Occasionally they went out for field practice in an area northwest of the present Clover Bar Bridge, where at times they attacked the enemy and stormed the fort. Japanese Balloons It was most kind of the good Lord that He never did permit the enemy to attack us on the West Coast. The fear was very real, however, and caused the construction of the Alaska Highway. At that time the American army officials wanted to take possession of Concordia for administration purposes. For the students they wanted to build an army hut on the campus. But Mr. Rose, the chairman of the City Housing Committee, assured us: As long as there is any kind of building available in Edmonton, they will not take possession of Concordia College. The only danger which threatened us from Japan was the so-called nuisance balloons, released in the Orient and carried by the winds to the United States and Canada. Some of them were recovered by Canadians in northern Alberta. The parachutes attached to these balloons were made of exquisite silk nylon. A member of our church got possession of one of these parachutes with the consequence that their daughter appeared beautifully arrayed on Concordia ' s stage in a graduation gown made out of Japanese white nylon. In the Armed Forces In 1943, fifty-five of our students and alumni were serving in the armed forces: later more of them joined. Several of our Concordians had responsible positions in the Intelligence Service at Ottawa. Three of them gave the supreme sacrifice: Howard Blatchford, John Hedrich, and Donald Zander. Philip Janz, Herman Klann, Adolf Otke, Robert Schwermann, and E. George Pearce served in the chaplaincy; later also Wilfred Hyatt and Edwin Regal. These boys experienced again and again the truth of the statement, which originated in those years: There are no atheists in fox-holes.

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The fifth was a boy who came into the office during - a morning recess for an aspirin. He complained of a headache and sore throat. He wanted to return to the classroom, but was told to gc to the sickroom. At noon the doctor diagnosed it as diphtheria. The boy was sent to the isolation hospital, and his parents were notified. During the night his condition worsened. The doctor attended him again the next morning. Unable to help, the doctor prayed the Lord ' s prayer, and before he had ended the prayer the angels had carried the boy ' s soul into Abraham ' s bosom. These were some of the inscrutable ways of the Lord during the first five years. Often we asked ourselves the question: Why? We shall receive the answer in eternal life. But we could never rid ourselves of the thought that in those years in which the foundations were laid for all the future of Concordia, the Lord wanted to burn into our souls the stark truth that our students, too, have immortal souls. And students can die and do die. And hence the very highest and foremost duty of Concordia, far above all other considerations, must ever be to prepare its students for a blessed departure from this world into the bliss of heaven through faith in Christ, the crucified and risen Redeemer. Failing to do this as an institution of our church, it forfeits its right to exist. Medical Aid Our first college doctor was the very able Dr. Turcot, who after leaving for the East, was followed by Dr. Quesnel. And then began our most pleasant association with Dr. J. O. Baker, about 1923. When we became acquainted with Him through an R. N. , Miss Mary Hennig, he had a small one-man office in the McLeod Building. His practice developed into the highly reputable Baker Clinic, composed today of 22 specialists in five departments. Upon the passing of Dr. Baker in 1956, Dr. A. M. H. McLennan became chief of the Clinic, and since his death last year the renowned surgeon Dr. Walter Anderson is director. Dr. Baker and his associates impressed us lastingly with the conscientious care which they gave to the students of Concordia - and are doing so to this day. We, of course, guarded ourselves against taking undue advantage of them, for one can hardly deny that doctors, too, are subject to fatigue. Often there appeared to be no good reason to call medical aid when a student complained of some distress - especially before an examination or dur¬ ing a delinquency! But when careful surveillance of the patient dictated medical examination, the doctor came, unfailingly. And when in the Hungry Thirties surgery was performed on students whose parents did not know where the next meal was coming from, the Clinic forgot that these people had outstanding accounts. The medical care of our students never gave us worries. Friends in Need As in many other institutions, financial difficulties gave us no small measure of concern. An ever recurring question was: Where can we save? Where can we obtain funds? True, throughout all the years our church, the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod, never deserted us. Generously and promptly we received funds from headquarters in St. Louis for salaries and for construction and maintenance of buildings. Yet there were many other needs to be supplied. In all these circumstances perhaps no group in our church gave us so much support as the good women, not only in western Canada, but even in the East. Away back in the twenties, the women in Edmonton formed a College Sewing Circle and came to the college once a month to mend clothes. They invited the students into their homes for Sunday dinner. They did laundry for the boys - first the women in Edmonton and later those in Stony Plain and even Golden Spike and Nisku. In those days when electric washers, dryers, and irons were unknown, this work often required much labor and a real sacrifice. If you know, was the statement in one report, that this work together with the own family laundry has required the ironing of as many as 19 and 20 shirts per week, in one instance even up to 40, then you will begin to realize just how much of a sacrifice these good-hearted souls have brought for our students. Especially during the Great Depression which lasted to about 1941, longer than in the U. S. , life was becoming ever more grim. Farm products decreased in value. Our overhead ' went upward, the enrollment downward. In 1941 it had reached an all-time low with 28 students. (Voices were heard that Concordia ought to be closed; mission work in western Canada should be discontinued because the field is barren. ) Parents could not make their payments. Our debt with wholesalers rose until they ultimately demanded cash on delivery. Such con¬ ditions were not exactly conducive to high spirits! Under such circumstances particularly the women came to our assistance. In 1933 they introduced the so-called Shower Day or Donation Day, which since that time has become a semi-annual institution. Provisions for our kitchen have been and are still being supplied