# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1911_S292
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

— 78 —

1. Our school at Red Springs had nearly died out altogether. The
previous commission had, in the winter of 1908, "had to close it for
the time being for lack of schoolchildren." (See the Report of the
1908 Delegate Synod, p. 102.)

2. Formerly the children who had a very long way to go to school
had been lodged with Christian Indian families. These families,
however, no longer wished to house other people's children in the
future. So we had to have a farm building as soon as possible if we
were not to lose these children for our mission.

3. The government, the Roman Catholics, and the sister synod of
the Norwegians maintain boarding schools in nearby towns on the
reservation. If we, therefore, wished not merely to avoid losing the
children of our Indians but rather to bring quite a number of them
under the pastoral care of our missionary, we had to offer them what
they could obtain in the immediate vicinity. But such a boarding
school, in which we would board and house the children, could not be
brought into being by us without a suitable farm building for the
purpose.

4. Only by erecting a farm building and maintaining a boarding
school could we hope to achieve cleanliness, punctuality, and regular
school attendance among the children.

5. Only in this way did it seem possible to work effectively
against the Presbyterians, who had again begun a mission in
opposition to ours among the Stockbridge Indians.

This was made known to our Christians in detail at the time in the
*Lutheraner* and in the *Kinder- und Jugendblatt* [Children's and
Youth Paper]. The success we have had to record in our mission since
that time justifies this step we took. Formerly the number of pupils
in our school had never risen above 40. We too began our school in
the fall of 1909 with only 24 pupils. But then, when the farm
building was completed and put into use at the New Year of 1909, the
number of pupils rose within a few weeks to 79. The school year
1909–1910 had an enrollment of 63, and that of 1910–1911 a number of
59. Our missionary's wife presides over the school with faithfulness
and skill. Pastor J. D. Larsen, our missionary, gives religious
instruction to all the classes and helps out in the school as much as
his time allows. In other respects, too, the faithful God has
visibly blessed our missionary's work and owned it. The adults
diligently attend the worship services, commune often, and, under the
prevailing circumstances, lead a quite Christian life. As early as
July 1909 the Presbyterian missionary found himself compelled, for
lack of resources, to abandon the field. Since the fall of 1910,
however, another man of the same church body has again been active,