The action to close Battle Creek College, taken by its controlling board in the summer of 1882, signaled a crisis of considerable proportions in the ranks of Seventh-day Adventists. The story is summed up in the statement of the chairman of the board, George I. Butler, published in The Review and Herald, September 12, 1882:
When the matter of opening the college the present year came before the board for consideration, we were thrown into great perplexity. We could see little ground of hope for such a school as the Lord had shown we ought to have, while the present state of things existed.
In three columns of the Review Butler took up the "present state of things," some of which will be mentioned shortly; but it is easily seen that attitudes toward the counsels that had come to the church through the Spirit of Prophecy drew Ellen White prominently into the picture.
The testimony written from Boulder, Colorado, on September 25, which Ellen White intended should be presented at the Michigan camp meeting, was finally read in December, 1881, before the General Conference in session (see Testimonies for the Church, 5:9-21). Also read at that time to a smaller group, including workers in the Review and Herald office, the Sanitarium, and the college, together with some of the delegates meeting in College Hall, was the fifteen-page testimony entitled "Our College" (Ibid., 5:21-36). This solemn message opens with the words:
There is danger that our college will be turned away from its original design. God's purpose has been made known, that our people should have an opportunity to study the sciences and at the same time to learn the requirements of His word.... But for one or two years past there has been an effort to mold our school after other colleges....
I was shown that it is Satan's purpose to prevent the attainment of the very object for which the college was established. Hindered by his devices, its managers reason after the manner of the world and copy its plans and imitate its customs. But in thus doing, they will not meet the mind of the Spirit of God.--Ibid., 5:21-23.
A New President for Battle Creek College
A change in administration at the college that thrust Dr. A. McLearn to the front greatly hastened the degenerating trend. McLearn was placed at the head of Battle Creek College in July, 1881, and school started in the autumn. The move was a hasty one, the result of the resignation, for health reasons, of Sidney Brownsberger. McLearn only recently had been baptized as a Seventh-day Adventist. He was highly educated along conventional lines (holding the degree of Doctor of Divinity). But he had no acquaintance with either the history of the Seventh-day Adventists or the philosophy of their educational work.
This new man had become known to church leaders back in early June, on a Sabbath morning at the Spring Arbor camp meeting. James White, in the Review, wrote of it:
Brother McLearn arose and stated that he was but a young convert, and knew nothing of the past of which others had spoken. The truth was all light to him, and he saw no cause for discouragement. Brother McLearn is a highly educated Christian gentleman. He has made great sacrifices in coming with us. We should be pleased to see him holding a position of importance in the cause.--The Review and Herald, June 7, 1881.
Unwisely for himself and the cause, he was placed in such a position in less than two months, much too soon.
The college did not have dormitories. Students boarded with families in the community or on their own. This exacerbated problems of discipline. Hosts, naturally inclined to sympathize with and to accredit the reports of the respective students who boarded with them, took sides on school-related issues. This brought divisions in the Battle Creek church, itself a church without a pastor.
Goodloe Bell, virtually the founder and father of the school, remained as a teacher. He was an excellent educator, but he lacked good public relations. His insistence on thoroughness of drill, his concepts of methods of education, and his devotion to principles on which the college was founded were in marked contrast with the liberal, compromising policies of McLearn.
Ellen White described the situation in Battle Creek in July, 1881, just before McLearn took over as principal.
I have been shown that there are unruly tongues among the church members at Battle Creek. There are false tongues that feed on mischief. There are sly, whispering tongues. There is tattling, impertinent meddling, adroit quizzing. Among the lovers of gossip, some are actuated by curiosity, others by jealousy, many by hatred against those through whom God has spoken to reprove them. All these discordant elements are at work. Some conceal their real sentiments, while others are eager to publish all they know, or even suspect, of evil against another.
I saw that the very spirit of perjury that would turn truth into falsehood, good into evil, and innocence into crime is now active, doing a work which savors of hell rather than of heaven. Satan exults over the condition of God's professed people. While they are neglecting their own souls, many eagerly watch for an opportunity to criticize and condemn one to whom God has entrusted responsibilities in his work. All have defects of character, and it is not hard to find something that jealousy can interpret to his injury.--Testimony for the Battle Creek Church, 80.
In such an atmosphere, and with the contrasting positions of two prominent men in the college, the conservative Bell was crowded out. He was not without some weaknesses and defects, of course. The published 1872 Testimony to the Church at Battle Creek, based on Ellen White's vision of December 10, 1871, makes this clear. But he was also the subject of many words of commendation from Ellen White, of which the following is typical:
The Lord has shown me the value of Brother Bell's labors. The Lord has commended his thoroughness as a teacher, both in the college and in the Sabbath school. When it was suggested that Brother Bell travel and labor in the Sabbath school interest in different States, I said at once that I did not see how he could be spared from the college.--Ibid., 31.
The College Problems Enumerated
As Butler gave his report in the Review of the action to close Battle Creek College, he designated some of the problems that led to the traumatic move. He stated that for some time a cloud had been gathering which threatened to destroy the usefulness of the college in performing the special work for which it was brought into existence. There was a lack of "cordial cooperation" on the part of a portion of the church with the authorities of the college in sustaining right influences and proper discipline. He continued:
The policy of the school was gradually changing, becoming more like that of the worldly schools around it. This, of course, is the natural tendency unless a strong religious influence is maintained.... The past year this tendency has been more marked. New policies have prevailed. The discipline has been lowered. Insubordination became manifest among students, and to some degree among teachers also. The matters came to a crisis.
The board of directors whom the stockholders placed in control found themselves powerless to hold in check these influences.... A majority of the faculty, sustained by a large portion of the church, threatened to resign in a body if certain measures taken by the board were not retracted. Mass meetings of the students were held to sustain their favorites in the faculty.... The board virtually had nothing to do with the management of the college for months during the past year....
The tide ran so high that those teachers who had done most in founding the college lost their influence, and were looked upon with dislike. Their lot was made very hard, and stories were circulated against some of them which were calculated to ruin their reputation as Christians, and even as moral men, and these have been circulated through the land.--The Review and Herald, September 12, 1882.
Faced with these conditions and unable to see the possibility of operating "such a school as the Lord had shown we ought to have" with the present state existing, "the board finally [during the summer recess] decided to close the college," with no definite plan to reopen. It was a sad day.
New Schools in the East and the West
But in the East and the West was a brighter picture. Four months before the Battle Creek College board acted to close, two new Adventist schools were opened--South Lancaster Academy, in Massachusetts, under the guiding hand of the seasoned S. N. Haskell, and Healdsburg Academy, in California, something less than a hundred miles north of the Bay cities of San Francisco and Oakland. The founders of both schools were determined to profit by the experience of Battle Creek College.
Haskell brought Goodloe Bell to the Massachusetts school. W. C. White led in forming the Healdsburg school. His mother, who lived nearby, took a special interest in establishing this school according to the educational principles set before Adventists through the light God had given to her.
The Healdsburg School
The starting of the school in the West was marked with earnestness. As noted earlier, on October 20, 1881, at the camp meeting held at Sacramento, which was attended by Ellen White, the delegates took action to establish an educational institution in California. A school committee of seven was appointed four days later. W. C. White, as chairman, was authorized, among other responsibilities, to "select a building at some eligible point in the State [in northern California]." Before a month had passed, a well-built school building was found at Healdsburg. It cost $10,000, but could be secured, with furniture, for $3,750.
Just at this point the chairman had to leave for Battle Creek and the General Conference session. But he was back in time to attend a meeting of the school board held in Healdsburg January 28 and 29, 1882. Five of the seven members, W. C. White, John Morrison, J. H. Waggoner, T. M. Chapman, and William Saunders, were present. Ellen White was invited to meet with them. The minutes record:
At the first meeting, Mrs. E. G. White made appropriate remarks upon what should be the aims and ends of a denominational school, such as is purposed to be established in this State by Seventh-day Adventists, the gist of which was that "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom," and that it was necessary to have a school of our own in order to take the children away from the evil influences found in nearly all the common schools and colleges of the day.--The Signs of the Times, February 16, 1882.
Appropriate actions were taken toward an early opening of the school. Professor Sidney Brownsberger, now recovered from his illness, was invited to take charge, and his wife was asked to become one of the teachers. Without delay, earnest Adventist families started moving to Healdsburg to take advantage of the academy. It was announced to open Tuesday, April 11 (Ibid., April 6, 1882). That first day twenty-six students were on hand to register, more than had been expected (Ibid., April 20, 1882). The whole school enterprise was carried forward on a wave of enthusiasm and good will among its constituents and also among the community of Healdsburg.
On Monday, April 24, the annual meeting of the Pacific SDA Publishing Association was held in Oakland, bringing together a good representation from the churches. Time was found at that meeting for the discussion of the school project. At two-thirty in the afternoon, less than two weeks after the opening of the school, a large group assembled in the Oakland church to hear reports and review plans for the new enterprise. Sidney Brownsberger reported on the rather phenomenal progress being made, W. C. White on the good fortune in being able to assemble such a capable faculty, and Ellen White on the time and need for the school. Her remarks were addressed to a resolution calling for a pledge to labor for the success of the school, and the encouragement of a good attendance:
It is the purpose of managers and teachers, not so much to copy the plans and methods of other institutions of learning, as to make this school such as God can approve. We trust that a high moral and religious standard will be maintained, and that Healdsburg Academy will be free from those pernicious influences which are so prevalent in popular schools.--Ibid., May 4, 1882
Near the close of her address she employed words familiar to us today, apparently something she had found in Good Health, March, 1879, titled "Oh, for a Man!" and credited to the Louisville Commercial. (See also "Men Wanted," The Review and Herald, January 24, 1871.)
The greatest want of this age is the want of men--men who will not be bought or sold, men who are true and honest in their inmost souls; men who will not fear to call sin by its right name, and to condemn it, in themselves or in others; men whose conscience is as true to duty as the needle to the pole; men who will stand for the right though the heavens fall.--The Signs of the Times, May 4, 1882.
To attain some of the objectives set forth by Ellen White called for some departures from the program at the Battle Creek school: (1) There must be regular classes in Bible study, not just chapel lectures; (2) there must be a school home, or dormitory; (3) there must be a program that would provide physical activity with study--in other words, an industrial program. These were basic in the planning for the Healdsburg Academy. It would take time to implement some of the elements, particularly the providing of a school home.
The first twenty-week term closed in mid-June with an enrollment of thirty-eight (Ibid., June 8, 1882). By that time a five-acre tract two blocks from the school building had been secured and plans for a school home were under way.
When the second term opened July 26, the fledgling institution had undergone a change in name. Acting on a popular request of the community, the board had named the school "Healdsburg College" (Ibid., July 13, 1882). By this time also, an Adventist woman of some means had made a gift of $5,000, and work could begin on the school home, or "boardinghouse", as it was known. In the basement would be the kitchen, laundry, and bakery. On the first floor, classrooms and a working parlor. The second story would accommodate the young ladies, and the third would be a dormitory for the young men (Ibid., October 26, 1882).
Ellen White Finds a Home Base
The school in Healdsburg was initiated and commenced its work during a period of physical weakness and frustration on the part of Ellen White. It was a full year after James White's death in early August, 1881, before she was sufficiently recovered from physical prostration, grief, and overwhelming concern for Battle Creek to engage in a consistent program of book preparation. After traveling out from Oakland to visit among the churches in northern California through the early winter months, she decided that she would make Healdsburg her California headquarters. She and James had built a home on a little farm on West Dry Creek Road, about three miles from the village, which had not been sold. On February 7, 1882, she wrote to Willie, who was managing the Pacific Press in Oakland:
Now I am decided to go to my Healdsburg place.... I shall not move much at present. Shall get me a cheap secondhand stove and a little cheap furniture and commence living for myself at present. In my Healdsburg house I have all the conveniences I wish.... I like the water. I can keep a cow and hens and chickens. I can get vegetables cheap and fruit cheap, but best of all I have a place that pleases me and that I want to live in.
I believe some way will be provided for me. I do not get suitable food going around.... It is my right to make myself comfortable and place myself under the very best circumstances healthwise....
After staying a while on my place without making any great parade or expense, I can test the matter fully whether my health is better. If not, my next step will be to go to St. Helena. I do not wish to put up a house in St. Helena and be to more expense if I can live in Healdsburg near the school.--Letter 1a, 1882.
On Thursday, February 23, her personal belongings and some furniture arrived from Oakland and were moved into the little home on the farm. The next day her letter addressed to Willie and Mary in Oakland carried the dateline of "White's Ranch," Healdsburg, California, February 24, 1882. And in the Signs of the Times for March 9 was a notice that she requested to have published, "The post office address of Mrs. E. G. White is Healdsburg, Sonoma County, California." She drew in her family of literary and home helpers, hoping soon to settle down to a serious program of writing. But this she found hard to do. She took pleasure in scouting around the country, buying grain and hay, chickens, a cow with its calf, and horses for transportation and to work the place. One horse was Dolly, of which she wrote on April 2:
George [a hired man] thinks that Dolly may work into plowing or harrowing. She is awkward, but she tries to learn. She will see what Katy does and will try to do just as she does. Everything is odd to her now, and she stares at the mountains and hills as if she was a tourist viewing the scenery. I think she enjoys the change.--Letter 4, 1882.
April was a busy month for gardening. From the Italian garden nearby they secured a large number of strawberry plants. She and Addie Walling joined Brother Bellow in planting them. A good many grapevines were also set out (Letter 8, 1882). A few days later she secured from the Italian garden beet and spinach plants to transplant. Also she helped in planting seeds for parsnips, cabbage, carrots, and beets. "We shall have quite a garden," she wrote, "if the Lord favors us." May and Addie Walling were living with her and attended the public school. She drove them to the school in the morning and picked them up in the afternoon. She pictured her home situation:
My health is good. I have some trouble in sleeping all I want to. I exercise considerably, picking up wood, and if it were not for weak ankles, would exercise more. I put rubber bandages on my ankles and this helps them. I feel then I can walk anywhere.--Ibid.
In a letter written April 16, in which she mentioned some of the afflictions of those about her, she said, "I find, after all, your mother can endure about as much as the younger people."--Letter 9, 1882. But up to this point, she had to force herself to her writing. This was limited more or less to the Battle Creek situation, some work on Spirit of Prophecy, volume 4, and the touches she must give to the articles prepared for the Signs and the Review. Many of the latter were drawn by her literary assistants from her earlier writings, published and in manuscript. The Signs for the year 1882 carried fifty-seven articles from her pen. Some were on Old Testament history, some reported her work among the churches, and a number were on practical subjects (some of the latter were reprinted from earlier issues of the Review and Herald). Quite naturally, at this time some articles on education-related topics were also published. The Review published twenty-three E. G. White articles in 1882, dealing mostly with practical subjects.
The Battle Creek Church, Uriah Smith, and the Testimonies
Particularly painful to her was the stance taken by Review editor Uriah Smith in connection with the deteriorating Battle Creek College situation.
Smith's children attending the school sided with the liberal element, which was critical of Bell; evidently Smith's sympathies tended in the same direction. During this period an occasional interchange of letters took place between him and Ellen White. In her testimonies relating to Battle Creek, the church, and the college, she had probed the matter and given counsel based on her insights into the conflict and the attitude of various individuals. One key to the problem came to light later by way of Smith's letter to her written August 10, 1882:
The ground of my hesitancy to regard that part of your communication referring to the special school trouble as a "testimony" was the fact that I had always supposed that a testimony was based on a vision, and I did not understand that you had had any vision since the recent trouble in the college commenced; hence I did not see how there could be any "testimony," in the common acceptation of that term, concerning these special matters. At the same time I said that if you should claim that it was a testimony, I would accept the situation; and so I do.
Hiding behind this philosophy, Smith attributed what she wrote concerning school matters in her letters of reproof and counsel to reports Ellen White had received and to her own opinions. He overlooked the fact that God reveals His will to His prophets in diverse manners. Also overlooked was the fact that she wrote stern messages of rebuke only as she was led by the Spirit of God to do so. In the course of time this led Ellen White to make some very plain and revealing statements about her work. These were published first in a pamphlet of eighty-four pages, and in somewhat reduced form in Testimonies for the Church, volume 5.
On March 28, 1882, she wrote a letter to Smith that opened:
Dear Brother Smith,
Your letter was received in due time. While I was glad to hear from you, I was made sad as I read its contents. I had received similar letters from Sister Amadon, and from Brother Lockwood. But I have had no communications from Professor Bell or anyone who sustains him....
I am not surprised that such a state of things should exist in Battle Creek, but I am pained to find you, my much esteemed brother, involved in this matter, on the wrong side, with those whom I know God is not leading. Some of these persons are honest, but they are deceived. They have received their impressions from another source than the Spirit of God.--Letter 2a, 1882 (published in Testimony for the Battle Creek Church, 19, 20).
Ellen White then reviewed the history of the declining course of the college and declared that she dare not longer remain silent. "I speak to you and to the church at Battle Creek.... You are responsible for the influence you have exerted upon the college. Peace has come, because the students have had their own way."--Ibid. She continued:
God has given us, as a people, warnings, reproofs, and cautions on the right hand and on the left, to lead us away from worldly customs and worldly policy. He requires us to be peculiar in faith and in character, to meet a standard far in advance of worldlings. Professor McLearn came among you, unacquainted with the Lord's dealings with us. Having newly come to the faith, he had almost everything to learn. Yet you have unhesitatingly placed your children under his guardianship, to be molded by his views and opinions. You have coincided with his judgment. You have sanctioned in him a spirit and course of action that have naught of Christ.--Ibid. (see also Ibid., 30).
Professors and teachers have not understood the design of the college. We have put in means and thought and labor to make it what God would have it. The will and judgment of a man who is almost wholly ignorant of the way in which God has led us as a people should not have a controlling influence in that college. The Lord has repeatedly shown me that we should not pattern after the popular schools.--Ibid. (see also Ibid., 39, 40).
At one point in this cutting testimony she declared: "A few weeks since, I was in a dream brought into one of your meetings for investigation. I heard testimonies borne by students against Professor Bell."--Ibid. It was these painful insights imparted to her by divine revelation that brought such distress of soul. To get the matter before the Battle Creek church, for it was the church that was so deeply involved, she asked Uriah Smith to read the testimony to the church. This he hesitated to do, for he was not in agreement with its contents.
On May 30, 1882, ignoring the tempest, Smith observed in the Review that the spring term at the college would close on June 15, and reported, "Everything has moved along pleasantly, and the students are well pleased with their advantages and advancement."
Not all saw it that way. Butler later reported that the school was clear out of hand. Ellen White, writing to the church in Battle Creek on June 20, came right to the point:
Dear Brethren and Sisters in Battle Creek,
I understand that the testimony which I sent to Elder Smith [dated March 28; see Ibid., 19-41] with the request that it be read to the church was withheld from you for several weeks after it was received by him. Before sending that testimony my mind was so impressed by the Spirit of God that I had no rest day or night until I wrote to you. It was not a work that I would have chosen for myself.--Ibid., 41.
She pointed out that Smith, as a leading officer in the church, was exercising his own judgment in the matter of following the counsel given him through the testimonies. In agony of soul she reviewed some history:
When I went to Colorado, I was so burdened for you, that, in my weakness, I wrote [in September, 1881] many pages to be read at your camp meeting. Weak and trembling, I arose at three o'clock in the morning, to write to you. God was speaking through clay. But the document was entirely forgotten; the camp meeting passed, and it was not read until the General Conference. You might say that it was only a letter. Yes, it was a letter, but prompted by the Spirit of God, to bring before your minds things that had been shown me....
While visiting Healdsburg last winter, I was much in prayer, and burdened with anxiety and grief. But the Lord swept back the darkness at one time while I was in prayer, and a great light filled the room. An angel of God was by my side, and I seemed to be in Battle Creek. I was in your councils; I heard words uttered, I saw and heard things that, if God willed, I wish could be forever blotted from my memory. My soul was so wounded, I knew not what to do or what to say. Some things I cannot mention. I was bidden to let no one know in regard to this, for much was yet to be developed.
I was told to gather up the light that had been given me, and let its rays shine forth to God's people. I have been doing this in articles in the papers.... Again, while in prayer, the Lord revealed Himself. I was once more in Battle Creek. I was in many houses. I heard your words around your tables, and was sick at heart, burdened, and disgusted. The particulars, I have no liberty now to relate. I hope never to be called to mention them. I had also several most striking dreams.
After I wrote you the long letter which has been belittled by Elder Smith as merely an expression of my own opinion, while at the southern California camp meeting [Hanford, May 4-15], the Lord partially removed the restriction, and I write as I do. I dare not say more now, lest I go beyond what the Spirit of the Lord has permitted me.--Ibid., 49, 50.
In the testimonies sent to Battle Creek, I have given you the light God has given to me. In no case have I given my own judgment or opinion. I have enough to write of what has been shown me, without falling back on my own opinions.--Ibid., 58.
These few excerpts from letters written in the early months of 1882 give a glimpse of a crisis over the validity of the testimonies and Smith's involvement. So often in the case of personal testimonies that touched the course of action and the life of the individual, it was hard to see the matter in its true light. How true is the Scripture observation "Every way of a man is right in his own eyes."
Smith felt that he was misunderstood by Ellen White and that he was fully justified in the course of action he was taking. In this matter his experience of wavering over the Spirit of Prophecy was not unique, and he wrote of it some years later in a statement appearing in The Review and Herald, Extra, December, 1887. Under the heading, "Personal," he introduces his statement:
Considerable handle, I understand, is being made in some directions of the fact that the editor of the Review has been troubled over the question of the visions, has been unsound on that question, and at one time came very near giving them up. It strikes me that this is quite a small amount of capital to work up much of a trade on--"came very near giving them up"--but didn't!
I also, at one time, came very near getting run over by the cars, and rolled into jelly; but I didn't, and so continue to this day. Some have met just such a catastrophe. The difference between them and myself is that they did, and I didn't. Some have given up the visions. The difference between them and myself is the same--they did, and I didn't. [See appendix for his full statement.]
The crisis in Battle Creek in which the college figured is treated at some length in the opening chapters of Testimonies for the Church, volume 5.
When these testimonies were written, typewriters and carbon paper had not come into common use. Each document had to be painstakingly copied by hand. If several copies were needed, it was a most forbidding task. The only alternative was to set the matter in type and run off copies on the press. In late June, Ellen White decided to return to Oakland and resort to this latter means of making a limited number of copies to be used in the Battle Creek situation. These were printed in a pamphlet of eighty-four pages, which was given the title Testimony for the Battle Creek Church. Because of its twenty-one-page central article, the pamphlet is at times referred to as "An Important Testimony." It carries an introduction addressed "To the Reader," stating, "The following pages contain instruction, warning, and admonition of special importance to the Battle Creek Church at the present crisis." The promise was made that extracts would be published in the forthcoming Testimony, No. 31, then in preparation. This was eventually done, and appear in Testimonies, volume 5.
The Fourth of July Picnic
On Monday, July 3, Ellen White broke away from Oakland to make a quick trip to Healdsburg to gather up some of her writings needed in connection with what she was preparing for publication. Just before noon on Tuesday, the fourth of July, a man with a carriage came to the home and urged her to accompany him to the grove in the redwoods about six miles away where about fifty of the Healdsburg believers and some church officers and members of the school board had assembled for a picnic. She had already turned down an invitation, explaining that she was too pressed with work to attend. Now the word was that she would not be excused, but must come. "So, as usual," she explained in a letter, "I had no heart to say No, and I went."--Letter 30, 1882.
Refreshments were placed upon the table linen which was spread upon the grass. Thanksgiving was offered to the gracious Giver of all our mercies, and then the hungry company ate with relish the good food abundantly prepared to supply a much larger number. After this was the exercise of singing, and intercession was made to God for His blessing.--Ibid
Ellen White then described a unique and most encouraging experience, one that must have cheered her heart as she was wrestling with the problems at Battle Creek.
While seated in this beautiful retired park, free from all confusion and bustle, a sweet peace came over my spirits. I seemed to be taken away from myself, and the bright home of the saints was presented vividly before me. In imagination I gathered with the saints around the wide-spreading tree of life. Friends and dear home relatives who had been separated from us by death were gathered there. The redeemed, white-robed multitude, who had washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb, were there. No flaming guard stood around the tree of life, barring our approach. With happy, joyous songs of praise, the voices were blended in perfect harmony as we plucked of the fruit from the tree of life.
For a time I lost all thought of time, of place, of occasion--of everything earthly. Heaven was the subject of my contemplation--heaven, the much-longed-for heaven. I seemed to be there, where all was peace, where no stormy conflicts of earth could ever come.--Ibid.
"No gloom of doubt casts its baleful shadow upon its happy inhabitants," she noted as she continued the description. "No voices of contention mar the sweet and perfect peace of heaven.... All is in perfect harmony, in perfect order and perfect bliss.... Love reigns there. There are no jarring elements, no discord or contentions or war of words."--Ibid.
A day or two after the picnic she returned to Oakland to continue in getting the messages from the God of heaven before the church, and particularly the church in trouble in Battle Creek. During July she wrote five hundred pages of manuscript, traveled considerably, and preached ten times in nearby churches. It was a heavy strain, but she was pressing to get out Testimony No. 31.
The E. G. White Home in the Town of Healdsburg
The home on the little farm on West Dry Creek Road was several miles from the town of Healdsburg. Mrs. White wanted to be close to the college. Early in August she bought a two-story house on Powell Street, which bordered the town. It stood on a 21/2-acre tract of good land with an orchard of fruit trees of choice varieties. As the college's "boardinghouse" was under construction, her house was at once fitted up to board the carpenters. A heavy yield of plums and peaches was canned for the college and the Health Retreat at St. Helena. W. C. White reported that "Mother engaged in this work with great interest, saying, in answer to our cautions, that it was a rest to her weary brain" (The Review and Herald, September 26, 1882). When she was on the West Coast, this was her home until she went to Australia in 1891.
In late August, while in Oakland, Ellen White suffered a severe chill followed by fever. This serious illness lasted several weeks. As she began to recover, she pleaded to be taken to the Health Retreat at St. Helena. She was taken there on September 15 in a reclining wheelchair in the baggage cars of the two trains in which the journey was made. But she did not improve at the Retreat. As the time for the California camp meeting to be held at Healdsburg drew near, she pleaded to be taken back to her Healdsburg home. She hoped to be strong enough to bear her testimony at the camp meeting and to work for the support of the new school. Resting on a mattress in the back of a carriage driven by her son Willie, and accompanied by Jenny Ings, she started out on the trip to Healdsburg.
The day grew very warm. As W. C. White later recounted the experience to members of his family, he told how his mother, in time, failed to answer his questions; he knew she had lapsed into unconsciousness. He urged the horses on, hoping to reach Healdsburg with his mother still alive. They did, and in her own home she rallied a bit. It was her hope and the hope of her family that in the environment of the camp meeting she might experience a renewal of life and strength. Camp meeting opened in early October in a grove about half a mile from her home. Although very feeble and hardly able to leave her bed, at noon on the first Sabbath she gave instruction:
Prepare me a place in the large tent where I can hear the speaker. Possibly the sound of the speaker's voice will prove a blessing to me. I am hoping for something to bring new life.--Life Sketches of Ellen G. White, 262.
Healed at the Camp Meeting
A sofa was arranged for her on the broad speaker's stand, and she was carried into the big tent and placed upon it. Those close by observed not only her weakness but also the deathly paleness of her face. Recalling the experience some years later, Ellen White said that not only was the large tent full, but "it seemed as if nearly all Healdsburg was present."--Letter 82, 1906.
J. H. Waggoner, editor of the Signs of the Times, spoke that Sabbath afternoon "on the rise and early work of the message, and its progress and present state" (The Signs of the Times, October 26, 1882). When Waggoner had finished his address, Ellen White turned to Willie and Mrs. Ings, who were at her side, and said, "Will you help me up, and assist me to stand on my feet while I say a few words?" They aided her to the desk. "For five minutes I stood there," she later recalled, "trying to speak, and thinking that it was the last speech I should ever make--my farewell message." With both hands she steadied herself at the pulpit. She relates:
All at once I felt a power come upon me, like a shock of electricity. It passed through my body and up to my head. The people said that they plainly saw the blood mounting to my lips, my ears, my cheeks, my forehead.--Letter 82, 1906.
Every eye in the audience seemed fixed on her. Mr. Montrose, a businessman from the town, stood to his feet and exclaimed, "We are seeing a miracle performed before our eyes; Mrs. White is healed!" (WCW account). Her voice strengthened, her sentences came clear and full, and she bore a testimony such as the audience had never before heard. Waggoner filled out the story in his report in the Signs:
Her voice and appearance changed, and she spoke for some time with clearness and energy. She then invited those who wished to make a start in the service of God, and those who were far backslidden, to come forward, and a goodly number answered to the call.--The Signs of the Times, October 26, 1882.
Smith, who was present, in his report in the Review and Herald published October 31, mentioned that after the miraculous healing "she was able to attend meetings ...as usual, and spoke six times with her ordinary strength of voice and clearness of thought." Referring to the experience, Ellen White said, "It was as if one had been raised from the dead.... This sign the people in Healdsburg were to have as a witness for the truth."--Letter 82, 1906.
This event, which seemed to be a turning point in her physical condition, opened the way for a strong ministry. In reporting her two-month illness, she remarked that she had expected it would gradually pass. Instead, she was healed instantaneously. She affirmed:
It cannot be attributed to imagination. The people saw me in my feebleness, and many remarked that to all appearances I was a candidate for the grave. Nearly all present marked the changes which took place in me while I was addressing them.... I testify to all who read these words, that the Lord has healed me.... My whole system was imbued with new strength and vigor. A new tide of emotions, a new and elevated faith, took possession of my soul.--Signs of the Times, November 2, 1882.
She was glad to be in the large group that during the camp meeting went to see the new college. First was the visit to the new building--the boardinghouse under construction--and then the school building. A brief dedication service was held in the "audience room," which could not contain all the visitors. After Waggoner offered the dedicatory prayer, Ellen called for singing a verse of "Hold the Fort," in which the whole congregation heartily joined.