When Ellen White returned to the United States from Australia in 1900, she carried in her heart the memory of visions given her in which she was shown places in California suitable for building sanitariums. Now as she traveled in California she recalled these visions.
In August 1901, as she was attending the Los Angeles camp meeting, she began to think in practical terms of securing properties. In a vision of the night she seemed to be in a council meeting in which consideration was being given to establishing a sanitarium in southern California. She described what she saw and heard in this vision and made mention of One who often instructed her at such times: "There was among us One who presented this matter very clearly and with the utmost simplicity. He told us that it would be a mistake to establish a sanitarium within the city limits" (Testimonies for the Church, 7:85).
Her Instructor continued:
A sanitarium should have the advantage of plenty of land, so the invalids can work in the open air. For nervous, gloomy, feeble patients, outdoor work is invaluable. Let them have flower beds to care for. In the use of rake and hoe and spade they will find relief for many of their maladies. Idleness is the cause of many diseases.
Life in the open air is good for body and mind. It is God's medicine for the restoration of health. Pure air, good water, sunshine, the beautiful surroundings of nature--these are His means for restoring the sick to health in natural ways (Ibid.).
Ellen White envisioned sanitariums in the country "surrounded by flowers and trees, orchards and vineyards. Here it is easy for physicians and nurses to draw from the things of nature lessons teaching of God. Let them point the patients to Him whose hand has made the lofty trees, the springing grass, and the beautiful flowers, encouraging them to see in every opening bud and blossoming flower an expression of His love for His children" (Ibid., 7:85, 86).
During the camp meeting itself, where she spoke daily, she went out with some of the brethren to look at two prospective properties. She was instructed that not only in various sections of Los Angeles but in San Diego and in other tourist resorts in southern California, health restaurants and treatment rooms should be established. This visit sparked the revival of concern for the medical missionary work throughout the world, but especially in southern California.
The Paradise Valley Property
After the camp meeting in September 1902, Ellen White went down to San Diego and twice visited the Potts Sanitarium property, about six miles (10 kilometers) south of the city. The buildings had stood idle for years, and the property was available for only a fraction of the original cost.
Here was a well-constructed, three-story building of about fifty rooms, with broad verandas, standing upon a pleasant rise of ground, and overlooking a beautiful valley. Many of the rooms are large and airy....Besides the main building, there is a good stable, and also a six-room cottage, which can be fitted up for helpers.
The property is conveniently located, being less than seven miles [12 kilometers] from San Diego, and about a mile [two kilometers] from the National City post office. There are twenty-two acres [nine hectares] of land. About one half of this had once been planted to fruit trees, but during the long drought that this country has suffered, all the trees died except the ornamental trees and shrubbery around the buildings, and about seventy olive trees on the terraces.... I never saw a building offered for sale that was better adapted for sanitarium work. If this place were fixed up, it would look just like places that have been shown me by the Lord (Special Testimonies, Series B 14:8, 9).
The Southern California Conference felt unable to invest in the enterprise, so Ellen White borrowed $2,000 from the St. Helena Bank at 8 percent interest, and Josephine Gotzian, a close friend, provided the other $2,000 toward the total price of $4,000. The two women "clasped hands in an agreement to unite in helping to purchase the Potts Sanitarium" (Letter 97, 1904). With funds that were put into the enterprise by Prof. E. S. Ballenger and his parents, they paid $300 in back taxes and used $800 to buy eight acres (four hectares) of needed land adjoining the property. There were other expenses that brought the total cost of the property to $5,300. Of course, the two women and the Ballenger family had no intention of keeping the property as theirs. Nor did they have any intention of making it a matter of financial speculation. They purchased it to hold it until the business could be organized and the conference could take control.
But with the property in their hands, the next step was to find someone to manage and develop it. For 15 years it had been unoccupied, and there was much to be done. Ellen White speaks of the next step:
Having secured the place, we needed a manager, and we found one ready for the work. Brother E. R. Palmer and his wife, who had spent the winter in Arizona, were in San Diego.... They were willing to take charge of the work of fitting up the sanitarium building for use (The Review and Herald, March 16, 1905 [Special Testimonies, Series B 10:10, 11]).
Elder Palmer arranged to have the building wired for electricity and had it cleaned up and painted outside. Then he began to assemble furniture for the new sanitarium.
He discovered that wealthy businessmen who went to California for the winter would rent a place and buy good-quality furniture for their use. When they wished to return to their homes in the East, they would make the furniture available at very reasonable prices. Thus Palmer was able to secure furniture, some of it bird's-eye maple, for furnishing at least a portion of the new institution.
A well and windmill furnished a limited supply of water, but it was known from the outset that the system could never supply the needs of a sanitarium. Palmer described the water situation: "The twenty-acre [eight-hectare] tract of land on which the building stands was as dry as the hills of Gilboa, with only a remote prospect for water underground" (DF 2a, E. R. Palmer, "The Paradise Valley Sanitarium").
Palmer and his fellow workers knew from their contacts with Ellen White that it was in the providence of God that the institution had been bought. They were confident that God would find a way to meet their needs. Still, through the summer of 1904 they suffered severely from the drought--a drought that had lasted eight or nine years (W. L. Johns and R. H. Utt, eds., The Vision Bold,
p. 147). They watched the trees wither and die, and Mrs. White wrote: "The poor, drying up, dying trees are beseeching us by their appearance for refreshing streams of water" (Manuscript 147, 1904). Palmer referred to their source of confidence in these words: "The Lord had spoken concerning these points, and His servants responded by purchasing the estate" (DF 2a, E. R. Palmer, "The Paradise Valley Sanitarium").
The New Well
Ellen White recommended that Palmer obtain the services of a good Adventist well digger of her acquaintance, Salem Hamilton, who was then living in Nebraska. Accordingly, he was called west to dig the well.
Palmer related:
With what anxiety we surveyed the ground and tried the wizard water stick and discussed the possibilities....
Finally we chose a place and began digging down through the dry earth where the dust flew more than twenty feet [six meters] below the surface (Ibid.).
The site selected was in a hollow just below the institution. Deeper and deeper Mr. Hamilton and his helpers continued to dig.
Ellen White, who was eager to be close to the sanitarium activities, was able to pull herself away from Elmshaven and travel south, arriving at the Potts property on Monday, November 7. Hamilton had reached a depth of 80 feet (24 meters) on the well. From day to day she listened with interest to reports of progress, and frequently talked with Hamilton. One day she asked," 'What are you going to do, Brother Hamilton?'
"'I have a question to ask you,' he answered. 'If you will answer that, I will give you my answer. Did the Lord tell you to buy this property?'
"'Yes! Yes!' Ellen White replied. 'Three times I was shown that we should secure this particular property.'
"'All right,' Mr. Hamilton said, 'I have my answer. The Lord would not give us an elephant without providing water for it to drink'" (Johns and Utt, p. 146). He declared that he would go on digging.
By now he was well past the 80-foot (24-meter) level, and there still was no sign of moisture. But one day he thought he heard the sound of a stream of water in the gravel at the bottom of the well. When Palmer visited the site and looked down the well, Brother Hamilton called up, "'Mr. Palmer, would you be afraid to come down? I think there is water not far away.'" Palmer did go down, and he heard it distinctly, "'like the tinkle of a bell or the sound of a small waterfall in the depths of a forest'" (Ibid., 146, 147).
Hamilton had tunneled in one direction, but to no avail. He now tunneled in another direction, and with a vigorous blow his pick broke through the clay into a fine stream of water as large as a man's arm. The well quickly began to fill. There wasn't even time to get all the tools out. That night the water rose 15 feet (five meters) in the well (Ibid.).
Excitedly E. R. Palmer and W. C. White hastened to Ellen White's room to announce the good news. Writing of it the next day to her grandchildren, she said:
"Yesterday morning Brother Palmer came to my room in company with your father ... and told us there was fifteen feet [five meters] of water in the well. This morning there is twenty feet of water and their tools at the bottom of the well. I cannot express to you how glad we all are made. Plenty of water for all purposes! This cannot be estimated by gold or by silver. Water means life.... The Lord has answered all our expectations, and we shall have reason for thanksgiving.... I want to praise the Lord with heart and soul and will" (Ibid., 147).
She wrote in her diary:
The water is now a certainty. The trees shall have their refreshing portion. Brother Palmer was so pleased. He expressed his gratitude to God for this great blessing, that labor and money invested for machinery for the water plant had brought returns (Manuscript 147, 1904).
On the Thursday before the breakthrough in the well, a group from the sanitarium, including W. C. White, E. S. Ballenger, H. E. Osborne, and Mrs. Josephine Gotzian, set out to solicit financial support for the project. They drove 20 miles (32 kilometers) to San Pasqual, and then to Escondido, visiting families and churches and telling of the needs and providences of God in connection with the proposed sanitarium. They were able to raise $1,600 in cash to help carry the enterprise forward. Half that amount they were able to take home with them. They had also solicited material help that the farmers could provide from their land. They were glad for the cash because, in anticipation of a prosperous well, Palmer had purchased an engine, pipes, and pumps, and he needed money to pay the overdue bill.
When the party returned from Escondido on Tuesday, they were met by the cheering report that the well diggers had found an abundant flow of pure water. A few days later a four-horse team drawing a large, heavy wagon drove up to the sanitarium, bringing gifts from the churches of San Pasqual and Escondido. This timely donation included potatoes, squash, and canned fruit. Of special importance, the gift included two fine "Jersey cows" (Ibid., March 16, 1905).
As to the organization for handling the business of the newly established sanitarium, various propositions were made and discussed, and counsel was sought from the conference brethren. It was finally decided to establish a stock company, not for profit but for managing the business, and to encourage those who could do so to make an investment in the institution. The plan was followed with some adjustments during the next two or three years until the Southern California Conference was in a position to take over the management and responsibility of the Paradise Valley Sanitarium.
Thus Ellen White, through the insights that came to her through the visions, through her persistence, through her soliciting the cooperation of those who had confidence that the Lord was speaking through her, and through heavy personal financial investment, led out in the establishment of this first Adventist sanitarium in southern California.
The Glendale Sanitarium
At Glendale J. A. Burden was leading out in the establishment of a second sanitarium in southern California. He was the manager of the St. Helena Sanitarium when Ellen White returned from Australia in late 1900. Shortly, however, he responded to a call to Australia to help lead out in the establishment of institutions there.
The Burdens returned to the States in February 1904. He picked up the words from Ellen White's pen that "a sanitarium should be established near Los Angeles" and "it is the expressed will of God that this shall be done" (Letter 211, 1904). To Burden this was a challenge. He knew that she had also written:
Light has been given me that a sanitarium should be established near Los Angeles, in some rural district. For years the need of such an institution has been kept before our people in southern California. Had the brethren there heeded the warnings given by the Lord, to guard them from making mistakes, they would not now be tied up as they are. But they have not followed the instruction given. They have not gone forward in faith to establish a sanitarium near Los Angeles (Letter 147, 1904).
In response to her urging, Burden looked around for likely properties in southern California that could be secured for a reasonable sum. In the late 1880s many establishments had been built for tourists and health resorts, but the businesses had failed.
The building that now seemed most likely to provide what was needed was the castle like Glendale Hotel, built in 1886 and situated on a five-acre (two hectare) tract of land bordered by dirt roads. At that time Glendale was a country settlement of 500 inhabitants, eight miles (13 kilometers) from Los Angeles.
A 75-room, unfurnished structure that had cost $60,000 was available. Because of the business failures in southern California, it had never been used as a hotel. It served for four years as an Episcopal school for girls; then in 1901 and 1902 it was used as a public high school.
On the property were shade trees and orchards. Around it were chicken ranches and a scattering of modest homes. In 1904 a real-estate developer, Leslie C. Brand, controlled the property. The asking price was $26,000, which Burden knew was far out of his reach.
As he sat in his buggy looking over the hotel grounds, Burden decided that if he could buy it for $15,000 he would regard this as a sign of divine approval. Taking several of his brethren with him, he approached Mr. Brand and explained, "'Our money will have to come from church members. Can you help us by reducing the price?'"
Brand thought a moment and then asked, "'How does $12,500 sound?'" Burden responded that it sounded fine. He took a $20 bill and gave it to Brand as a deposit on the purchase (Johns and Utt, p. 163).
At the conference headquarters Burden was dealing with the same administrators who had hesitated so long about investing in the Paradise Valley Sanitarium. The conference lacked even the $1,000 needed for a down payment on the Glendale property. The president of the Pacific Union Conference had made it clear to the local conference administration that there must be a stop to increasing indebtedness, and there must be a turnaround in financial affairs of the Southern California Conference.
Burden took the matter to the constituency at the camp meeting in September 1904, and, to his disappointment, they rejected the purchase for lack of money.
At last Elder Burden was able to enlist the help of Clarence Santee, the conference president. The two men decided to advance the money for the down payment out of their own pockets. Just at this time Mrs. White sent a message urging in strong terms the purchase of the property, and Elder Santee read it to the conference delegates in session.
"Why is this work delayed?" she asked. She also persuaded two of the church members to advance $1,000 each toward the purchase of the institution. The delegates rallied and pledged $5,200 to buy the Glendale Hotel. A cash payment of $4,500 was made, and a three-year mortgage was agreed upon for the balance. A board of trustees was set up, with Elder Santee as chairman. The board took steps at once to develop the institution.
This was the situation when Ellen White stopped at the new Glendale institution. She went through all the rooms of the new sanitarium, many of which were freshly painted. She wished there were more land than the five acres (two hectares) connected with the building, but she observed, "It is certainly in the country, for there are no buildings very near it. It is surrounded by large fields of strawberries, and by orange orchards" (Letter 311, 1904).
Loma Linda, The Hill Beautiful
Place: Elmshaven, living room.
Time: April 1905.
Those present: Ellen G. White; W. C. White; John Burden; the president of the California Conference; and one of his committee members.
Ellen White: "There is a sanitarium waiting near Riverside or Redlands, nearer Redlands, I think. You can find it if you really want to." (See DF8, J. A. Burden, "The Location and Development of Loma Linda," p. 96.)
In response to repeated messages from Ellen White, a committee was appointed to look for such a site. They felt it must be the Loma Linda resort hotel they had visited earlier, but as it carried a price tag of $85,000, they had turned from it. Now the hotel had failed and closed up on April 1; the committee found it could be bought for $45,000.
Elder Burden had hoped that Mrs. White, on her way to attend the 1905 General Conference session in Washington, would be able to stop long enough in Los Angeles to hear what they had learned about the Loma Linda property. Her party included her son W. C. White, his wife, May; and Maggie Hare. On Thursday, May 4, when the eastbound train stopped at the Los Angeles station, a few of the brethren, including Elder Burden, boarded the car to tell Mrs. White about Loma Linda. She was immediately interested and excitedly urged, "Look up all the particulars and write me at once in Washington" (Ibid.).
The conference-bound party reached Washington on Tuesday morning, May 9. The session opened Thursday morning. Friday afternoon, May 12, the promised letter describing Loma Linda was placed in Ellen White's hands.
She read it aloud to her son W. C. White. It read, in part:
I am sending you a little pamphlet that contains a few views and a brief description of the property, but words and pictures can but faintly describe its beauty. It is simply ideal and grand for a sanitarium.
The buildings are in excellent condition, well furnished, heated with steam heat, and lighted with electricity. Everything is complete to begin business at once. The main building has forty-six rooms, and there are four cottages having four rooms each, with bath and toilet. Three of these cottages have four porches each, with broad windows, so that beds can be wheeled right out on the porch and patients can sleep in the open air. There is another beautiful building--a two-story cottage of nine rooms, with bath and toilet. Another building which has been used as a recreation pavilion, and has four nice rooms, would make a fine gymnasium and chapel.
There are barns and sheds, and a house for the workmen. There are ten acres (four hectares) of good bearing orange orchard, fifteen acres (six hectares) of alfalfa, eight acres (three hectares) of apricots, plums, and almonds. The rest of the grounds are beautifully laid out in lawns, drives, and walks, there being more than a mile of cement walk. The principal buildings are on a beautiful knoll about 125 feet (38 meters) above the valley. The main building is surrounded with pepper-wood trees from thirty to forty feet (12 meters) high.
There are five horses, four cows, 150 chickens, thirty-five turkeys, some hogs, farm implements, buggies, carriages, and wagons.
The place has an ample supply of water from the mountains. An artesian well, which has a good pumping plant, yields an abundance of water, if for any reason the mountain water should fail. The water is piped all over the seventy-six acres (30 hectares).
The place cost the present owners $150,000. They have tried to run it as a tourist hotel, but it was a failure, and they lost money, so it was closed the first of April. The stockholders are financially embarrassed, and have ordered the property sold for $40,000. The furnishings in the building cost $12,000, and have been used for only about two years and a half.
A number of us went to see the place today, and we were deeply impressed that this is the place which the Lord has shown you, near Redlands and Riverside, in which sanitarium work should be carried on. It is five miles (eight kilometers) from Redlands.
The question is, what shall we do? We must act at once, for the company is anxious to sell, and there are others who want it....
We do not wish to move hastily, and we should like to hear from you and the brethren in Washington who have gone from this field, as to how you and they feel about the matter. I wish that if it is at all possible you would take the matter up in council with them, and have them wire us. I do not know how long we can hold the offer open, but will try to do so until we hear from you (J. A. Burden to EGW, May 7, 1905 [Special Testimonies, Series B 3:33-35]).
When she finished reading she told Willie that she believed the place was the one that had been presented to her several years before (28 WCW, p. 442).
The terms offered Elder Burden were $5,000 down and like amounts in August (due July 26), September (due August 26), and December (due December 31), making $20,000. The remaining $20,000 would come due in three years (The Story of Our Health Message, 349, 350).
What could they do? Elder Burden in California wanted an immediate answer. Conference officers and Ellen White were across the continent in Washington, D.C. It seemed that there could not have been a more inopportune time to deal with such a weighty and far-reaching matter. All in Washington were deeply involved in the General Conference session that had just opened. The Southern California Conference with 1,332 members was now involved in an indebtedness of about $75,000, stemming from the recently acquired San Fernando College and Glendale Sanitarium, the longer-established vegetarian restaurant and treatment rooms in Los Angeles, and the health food business there.
Three weeks earlier, at the Southern California constituency meeting, a new president had been chosen--a good man, but far from a seasoned executive. He had been charged to hold the line as far as indebtedness was concerned. The General Conference, too, was facing almost overwhelming financial problems. There was the possibility of having to raise between $75,000 and $90,000 to meet the deficit of the old medical association. So there was little to encourage the hope of help from that source.
"I'll Consult No One," Said Ellen White
Without further ado Ellen White requested Willie to send a telegram to Elder Burden, saying, "Secure the property at once." She followed it with a letter, dated Sunday, May 14:
Your letter has just been read. I had no sooner finished reading it than I said, "I will consult no one; for I have no question at all about the matter." I advised Willie to send you a telegram without spending time to ask the advice of the brethren. Secure the property by all means, so that it can be held, and then obtain all the money you can and make sufficient payments to hold the place. This is the very property that we ought to have. Do not delay; for it is just what is needed....
Here is the word of the Lord. Open up every place possible. We are to labor in faith, taking hold of a power that is pledged to do large things for us. We are to reach out in faith in Los Angeles and in Redlands and Riverside (Letter 139, 1905).
In defense of her unprecedented action, she declared: "I considered that the advantages of this location authorized me to speak positively regarding this matter" (Letter 247, 1905).
Here was the situation facing John Burden:
He had been directed to "secure the property"! With what?
The officers of the Southern California Conference had wired from Washington that they could take no responsibility whatever in the matter.
One telegram signed by conference officers and Ellen White urged Burden to delay action till they returned to the West. But circumstances did not warrant this. Burden could delay action on the deal only till Friday, May 26. On that date, if the property was to be held he must make a payment of $1,000 to bind the contract until Thursday, June 15. By then conference officers and Ellen White and her son would be back.
The Search For Money
But there was no money in sight. On Thursday, May 25, Burden and a close friend, R. S. Owen, a Bible teacher at the San Fernando school, took the
interurban electric car down the coast to call on a farmer who was thought to have some means. He lived about a mile and a half (two kilometers) from the car stop. When they got to his cabin, no one was at home. A neighbor thought he was most likely somewhere on the ranch, but search as they would they found no sign of the man. The two men returned to the car stop and waited.
It was dark now, and as the interurban car sped toward them, they failed to signal it for a stop, so it did not even slow up. There would be a two-hour wait for another car, so the men went back to the cabin, which now had a light in it. Finding the farmer, his wife, and daughter, they introduced themselves and soon explained their mission. Elder Burden reports that as the telegram from Mrs. White and the letter that followed were read to the farmer, he suddenly exclaimed, "Praise the Lord!" (The Story of Our Health Message, 355). He had been praying that the Lord would send someone to buy his place. It had been sold a few days before, and now he was ready to make available $2,400 for the Loma Linda enterprise.
The next day Elder Burden phoned the representative of the Loma Linda Association that he was ready to do business. The $1,000 was paid, and work was begun on a contract. This was finished the following Monday. Four thousand dollars more had to be on hand by June 15 to make up the first payment of $5,000, or the deposit would be lost. And this was only the first of four $5,000 payments that Burden had agreed upon. He was eager for Ellen White and the conference officers to see the property.
Ellen White Inspects Loma Linda
Travel plans called for Ellen White and her party to reach Redlands at 10:00 a.m. on Monday, June 12. Local and union conference workers would come out from Los Angeles and meet them at Loma Linda. A great deal depended on this meeting. Would approving action be taken, or would Elder Burden lose the borrowed $1,000 given to bind the contract?
Elder Burden, his wife, and fellow workers were inspecting the grounds and the buildings as the express wagon from Redlands drove up carrying Ellen White, W. C. White and his wife, and others. Mrs. White's gaze was fixed on the main building.
"Willie, I have been here before," she said as she stepped down from the wagon.
"No, Mother," he replied, "you have never been here."
"Then this is the very place the Lord has shown me," she said, "for it is all familiar."
She turned to one of the ministers and declared, "We must have this place. We should reason from cause to effect. The Lord has not given us this property for any common purpose." As they looked over the grounds and buildings, she said again and again, "This is the very place the Lord has shown me." Following Elder Burden into the recreation building, she commented:
This building will be of great value to us. A school will be established here. Redlands will become a center as also will Loma Linda. Battle Creek is going down. God will reestablish His medical work at this place (Johns and R. H. Utt, p. 179).
It was past noon, and the representatives of the Loma Linda Association invited the entire party into the dining room to partake of a sumptuous vegetarian dinner. Then the manager opened a door and ushered the group into the parlor. All were waiting eagerly to hear from Ellen White; she did not disappoint them. She spoke on the work of the true medical missionary. Burden reports: "I think I never heard her paint in such glowing terms the work of the true medical missionary."
The manager of the Loma Linda Association stayed by Burden's side. Tears flowed down his cheeks. As Ellen White finished, he turned to Burden and said: "I would give the world to be with you people in a work such as this. It was what we had in mind, but we did not know how to carry it out. I am glad you people are obtaining this property, as I know our plans will now be realized." Burden invited him to stay and help carry forward the work."Impossible!" he replied."Only Christians of the highest ideals could carry out such a work" (DF 8, J. A. Burden, "The Location and Development of Loma Linda," p. 110).
In spite of the evidences of God's leading, both in circumstances and in Ellen White's counsel, the group facing such a stupendous project were unready to come to any decision. The financial problems loomed too large.
So before taking any steps, they felt that the matter should be placed before the Los Angeles Carr Street church, the largest in the conference. The meeting was called for 10:00 the next morning, June 12.
By 10:00 a.m. Monday, the church on Carr Street was crowded. Ellen White reviewed what had been revealed to her of the medical missionary work that should be carried forward in southern California. She told the audience that Loma Linda recalled to her mind visions of properties that ought to be secured for sanitarium work. The church members voted in favor of securing the property for a sanitarium.
The First $5,000 Payment
However, the officers of the Southern California Conference felt that more than one church should be heard from before the conference could be brought into it. June 20 was set for a delegated meeting of the conference as a time for the decision. In the meantime June 14 would come with its payment of $4,000 due. It took considerable faith and courage just then to meet the payment to complete the first installment on the $40,000. The farmer down the coast had provided $2,400. Elder Burden talked with another church member, Belle Baker. She could see no reason to hesitate and said she would put up $1,000."You may lose it," Burden suggested."I'll risk it," she replied (Ibid., 356).
Then Burden conferred with his friend, R. S. Owen."I don't have the money," Owen declared, "but I'll mortgage my house for it." He was able to get an unsecured loan for the needed amount, and the June payment was made on schedule.
Five days later, on June 20, the constituency of the Southern California Conference met. They were faced with the matter of whether Loma Linda should be purchased, and, if so, whether it would be operated "by private corporation or by the conference assuming the financial responsibility of the enterprise" (Pacific Union Recorder, July 13, 1905). Ellen White was on hand for the meeting. She spoke for more than an hour on the work that should be done in southern California and urged that the Loma Linda property be secured, as it fully met the descriptions of the properties shown to her in vision. She declared, "This is the very property that we ought to have" (Ibid.).
Still the leading officers of the Southern California Conference hesitated. How, with the heavy debt on the conference, could they become further involved in securing properties and starting sanitariums? Conference officers cautioned the delegates to move guardedly.
Then G. A. Irwin, the newly elected General Conference vice president, rose to speak. He was on a mission to California, and while passing through Los Angeles had been urged to visit Loma Linda. He had just that morning come from there, and now spoke in favor of securing that institution. He rehearsed a number of incidents in which, when Mrs. White's counsel was followed and workers and church members responded to the guiding messages, God signally blessed and success came to the work.
The audience listened attentively as Elder Irwin spoke with measured words: "Although the conference is heavily in debt, I believe it to be to the glory of God that the conference should assume this responsibility" (Ibid.).
Elder Irwin's speech, exuding confidence in the Spirit of Prophecy counsels and urging action, turned the tide. The constituency voted unanimously in favor of securing the Loma Linda property and opening a third sanitarium in southern California. Cash and pledges totaling $1,100 were offered in support of the action.
Faith Rewarded: Meeting The Payments
July 26, the fateful day when the second payment on the Loma Linda property was due, dawned with still no money in sight. If the payment was not made by 2:00 p.m., the property and the initial $5,000 would be lost. Would deliverance come, or would the enemy succeed in bringing defeat? A meeting of the conference committee had been called for that morning in Los Angeles at their new office on the second floor of 257 South Hill Street (Ibid., June 22, 1905). A heavy cloud of perplexity hung over the assembly. Some felt the circumstances justified the misgivings they had entertained from the start. Others, Elder Burden recounted, "remembered the clear words that had come through the Testimonies, and refused to concede there should be failure" (The Story of Our Health Message, 358). As they reached out for deliverance, someone suggested that the morning mail had not yet come and perhaps relief would come from that source.
Elder Burden tells the heartwarming story:
Soon after this the postman was heard coming up the stairs. He opened the door and delivered the mail. Among the letters was one bearing the postmark Atlantic City, New Jersey.
The letter was opened, and it was found to contain a draft for $5,000, just the amount needed for the payment.
Needless to say, the feelings of those who had been critical were quickly changed. Eyes filled with tears, and one who had been especially critical was the first to break the silence. With trembling voice, he said, "It seems that the Lord is in this matter." "Surely He is," was the reply, "and He will carry it through to victory." The influence that filled the room that day hushed the spirit of criticism. It was as solemn as the judgment day (Ibid.).
Among those to whom Ellen White had written appealing for funds was a woman in Atlantic City, and Elder Burden points out:
The Lord put it into her heart to respond and to mail the letter just at the time when our faith had been tested almost to the limit, that it might be revived and strengthened (Ibid., 359).
Two More Payments
Elder Burden had no reason to expect that it would be any easier to meet the remaining payments on the $40,000 contract that he had signed; the next payment was due within a month. The president and officers of the Southern California Conference were still holding back on their interest, support, and money.
It was hoped that the soon-coming Southern California Conference camp meeting would provide an opportunity to lift the level of support. Ellen White would be present and would have a message.
The camp meeting was scheduled for August 11 to 21 in Los Angeles, where evangelist W. W. Simpson's tent meetings were about to close. The big tent would be moved to Boyle Heights--an area that would become well known to Seventh-day Adventists a decade later, for the White Memorial Hospital was to be established there. The tent would be pitched on Mott Street, between First and Second (Pacific Union Recorder, July 27, 1905).
The annual conference constituency meeting would be held in connection with the camp meeting, which made it a particularly crucial session. Writing of the experience a month later, W. C. White declared:
We all saw that very much was at stake, and that much depended on how the sanitarium work was presented to our people at this meeting. We knew that there was sufficient means among our people in southern California to carry forward all the institutional work in that conference, but if they chose to keep it in the banks, to invest it in real estate, or to tie it up in farms, if they feared to trust it in our institutional work, then we should have great difficulty in securing funds.
Ellen White spoke six times in the large tent, at times to a packed tent of 2,000. And while some speakers found it difficult to make themselves heard by so large a crowd, the Lord gave her "strength to speak so that all could hear" (Letter 241a, 1905)."The Lord greatly sustained me in my work at the camp meeting," she wrote later (Letter 251, 1905).
At the close of the three-hour meeting when the Loma Linda project was presented, the people began to testify to their confidence in the work, and to tell of the money they had in the bank, which they would lend to the enterprise. Others promised to sell property and to invest the proceeds in sanitarium enterprises. By one o'clock the blackboard showed the responses:
Gifts subscribed on June 20 $ 1,100
Gifts subscribed today $ 1,100
Money offered at moderate interest $14,000
Property consecrated to be sold and the
proceeds invested in sanitarium work $16,350
(28 WCW, p. 449).
The tide was turned in overwhelming favor of the sanitarium enterprises. Loma Linda would have full support.
This led the astonished conference president to comment in his report in the Pacific Union Recorder:
This liberality on the part of a willing membership, few of whom are well off in this world's goods, ought to stimulate confidence in our own conference and perhaps inspire other conferences to raise funds to liquidate all indebtedness (September 14, 1905).
The August payment of $5,000 was made on time, and a few days later the December 31 payment also was made. In fact, instead of taking three years to pay the second $20,000 of purchase price, as agreed to in the contract, it was taken care of within six months.
Reported J. A. Burden, who was closely involved in the enterprise:
The counsel of the Spirit of Prophecy had been confirmed. As we moved forward in faith, the Lord opened the way before us, and the money came from unexpected sources (The Story of Our Health Message, 361).
A detailed account of God's continued providence in connection with Loma Linda cannot be included here. Fuller accounts are to be found in such works as The Story of Our Health Message; The Vision Bold, Legacy; Origin and History of Seventh-day Adventists, volume 3; and the Seventh-day Adventist Encyclopedia.
Dedication Of Loma Linda Sanitarium
By the first of October Elder and Mrs. Burden were residing at Loma Linda, and within days patients were coming. But pressed hard to meet the needs of an opening institution, the staff found it necessary to postpone the dedication.
This dedication was something Ellen White could not miss. Invited to give the dedicatory address, she made the trip south to meet the appointment and to attend, a week later, the dedication of the Paradise Valley Sanitarium. She, with her son W. C. White, Sara McEnterfer, her niece May Walling, and Clarence Crisler, reached Loma Linda on Friday afternoon, April 13.
She was glad to arrive a few hours before the Sabbath began. She sometimes found it necessary to travel on the Sabbath and sometimes arrived at her destination after the Sabbath had begun, but she said, "It is very painful to me to be arriving on the Sabbath" (Manuscript 123, 1906).
By the time the sun was setting over the orange groves, casting light on the snowcapped peaks beyond, Ellen White was comfortably settled in the "nine-room cottage," one of several on the eastern end of the sanitarium grounds. She found the surroundings beautiful--the air filled with the fragrance of orange blossoms, the lawns green and flower gardens colorful, and the glow on Mount San Gorgonio a rich pink from the last light of the sun.
Sabbath morning in the sanitarium parlor she gave a sermon on Second Peter. Sunday morning she looked over the property as guests came in from all over southern California for the dedication that afternoon. About 500 gathered in the chairs set up on the lawn under the pepper trees. Among the guests were "several physicians and other leading men from the surrounding cities." The speakers' platform was an improvised structure about three feet (one meter) off the ground and covered overhead and in back by a striped canvas.
Ellen White made her way to the platform for her talk and took a seat beside Elder Haskell (Manuscript 123, 1906). When her turn came to speak, she stood just to the left of the small table in the center of the platform. Part of the time she placed her right hand on the table, while she gestured with her left.
In her talk she reviewed the providences of God in the purchase of Loma Linda, emphasized the values of its then rural location in the treatment of the sick, and delineated the purposes of establishing sanitariums (The Review and Herald, June 21, 1906).