# Synodical Conference Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1916_S83
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

of the Ev. Luth. Synodical Conference of North America. 1916. 83

the same station; 3. Teacher Daniel Meibohm, who in November 1893 entered upon his office at the Mount Zion School.

To our workers, thank God, the testimony can be given that they work faithfully. Seventeen missionaries, some of whom serve two to four stations, in addition regularly hold school.

People ask at times: "How are our colored workers doing?" This question can be answered favorably on the whole. Their congregations give them the testimony that they work faithfully and shine before them and their children with a godly walk. On this account, and because of their good education, they are also held in esteem among the Negroes who are out there and are also respected by the better class of the whites. To be sure, they too must suffer, along with their fellow countrymen, more or less under race prejudice. — In this connection it may be mentioned that the treatment of the Negroes by the whites seems to be improving a little, at least on the part of the white businessmen. That may, however, come simply from the fact that the colored businessman has appeared as a competitor to be feared.

The ostracism under which our white workers and their families formerly had to suffer severely seems likewise to be on the wane. An earlier report of the commission contains the lament: "Our missionaries, with their wives, because of this their divine office among the Negroes, are outcasts and outlaws from the better, that is, more refined, population of the South. The hotels refuse them a seat at their table, a bed for the night's rest. No friendly greeting is given to their wives on the street." That is no longer the case today to the same degree. Precisely the better, more educated class of white Southerners treats our workers decently and admires their self-denial. Only the lower class, the so-called "white trash," still shows them contempt. At Meherrin, Va., last May a leading white businessman said to the undersigned: "Your missionaries have won the respect of the whites here. We have seen how they have morally uplifted the colored population in this region." In a larger city in North Carolina the daughter of one of our white workers was appointed as a teacher in the public school for white children, and after about a year she was even appointed in the high school, and no one makes her feel that her father is only a worker among Negroes. Something like that would hardly have been possible in former years.

In May of this year an inspection trip was undertaken by two members of the commission. Rev. Wisler visited the southern territory and the undersigned the southeastern field. Both gained on this trip the conviction that our colored workers should almost without exception receive a salary supplement.