17 October 2016 Family Heritage By

I accepted a position with Worthen Bank & Trust in Little Rock, Arkansas, and we moved to the bedroom community of Maumelle on February 15, 1985. Our home at 5 Hornrimme Place was a 2,230 SF four bedroom brick house, and cost $118,500, with a mortgage of $80,000. (we had sold our Lynette home for $ 63,000). We built our home at 31 Chatel Drive in 1996. The house would be 2,900 SF, two story five bedroom brick home, and cost $227,000, and a mortgage of $145,000. We sold this house in 2005 for $307,000, and Superior Bank paid for all the closing costs and relocation expenses to Birmingham.

We tried to create a world of security, grace, and beauty and for the girls so their personalities would be shaped by what is good. The time period that captured their fancy was the Edwardian era, circa 1910. Their dolls came from American Girl collection. “Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Avonlea” videos, and the Walt Disney films “Pollyanna”, and “Mary Poppins” portrayed the elegance of the period, and the strong family relationships and respect for authority that existed. Another movie that shaped their view of the world was “The Sound of Music”. I would guide us as a family to watch certain old movies from the ‘30s and ‘40s on the cable TV stations American Movie Classics, and A&E. These movies would have uplifting themes which I hoped would reinforce for the girls the values we were teaching them. The CBN Christian animated cartoons “SuperBook” and “Flying House” came on each morning at 6 a.m. I would begin recording each day, and after Kambry and Ashlyn finished breakfast they would go into the TV room and watch that day’s episodes. I did this to visually introduce them to Bible teachings. The greatest impact on the girls though was having their Mother home with them all day. This meant that they could arise when they woke up. They would eat a good breakfast and not be rushed. Nancy would take them to one of the many parks in our neighborhood in Maumelle to play with other children. In the summer, they would spend almost every afternoon at the swimming pool. I will always be grateful to Nancy for being such a wonderful full-time Mother, a much harder job than any other career.

In March 2003 we flew to Honolulu, and the first night there we celebrated Ashlyn’s 19^th birthday by having dinner at the Surf Room at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel, then the next day we took a 30 minute Hawaiian Airlines flight to Maui. We stayed 6 nights at the Ka’anipali Beach Resort, went snorkeling at Molokini, drove to the top of Haleakala to see the sunrise, then continued on the “Road to Hana” with Nancy and Ashlyn in the front seat of our Dodge Sebring convertible, and Kambry and I in the back seat whining until we stopped at the “Halfway to Hana House” at mile marker 17 to get fresh banana bread and Guava juice.

Nancy and I flew to Europe in July 2004 to celebrate our 30^th wedding anniversary. We met Ashlyn in London, where she was part of the 6 week “Baylor in Great Britain” program (as Kambry had done 2 years earlier). Nancy and I toured the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abby, Trafalgar Square, St. Paul’s Cathedral, the Tower of London, and we dressed up to attend a BBC Proms Concert at Royal Albert Hall. We used our Hilton Honor points to stay six nights free at the Hilton London Hyde Park on Bayswater. We made day trips via train from Paddington Station (“Mind the Gap”) to Hampton Court, Windsor Castle, and Bath. Then we took the Chunnel to France, checked into the Hotel Mayfair Paris just off the Concorde Plaza, walked up the Champs de Elysee to the Arch de Triumph, then to the Eiffel Tower, and that evening went on an evening cruise up the River Seine. The next day to the Louvre and Notre Dame, then a day trip to Versailles where Nancy got embarrassed when, as we were walking up to the palace, she absentmindedly took what she thought was my arm, but turned out to the be arm of a complete stranger! Late the next afternoon we boarded a sleeper train to Salzburg, Austria. We left Paris at 5:15pm from the Gare de l“Est, enjoyed the countryside until dark, and the porter woke us up at 4:44am to serve a continental breakfast in our compartment. In Salzburg we went on a “Sound of Music Tour”, attended a dinner/concert of Mozart music, and decided that this was the highlight of our trip.

We returned to Maui in September 2007, this time with Brian, using Delta Airlines frequent flyer miles for all five tickets. The first night in Honolulu we used our points to stay free and the Hilton Hawaiian Village. The next morning I got up at 5:30am to go for a walk before everyone arose. I was strolling on Waikiki Beach, when in the early dawn I saw someone coming out of the water. I thought to myself, “who would be swimming this early in the morning?” I was astonished to see it was Brian, so I asked him what he was doing, and he replied with a grin “I may never make it back to Hawaii, so I wanted to say that I had gone swimming on Waikiki”. After touring Pearl Harbor and lunch at the Surf Room at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel, we flew to Maui and we stayed at our timeshare at the Sands of Kahana.

in Spanish, I could share the gospel with the people we were privileged to be Jesus’ hands and feet. March 2004 Honduras Construction trip

June 2004 Honduras Medical trip

May 2007 Honduras Medical trip

April 2008 El Salvador clean-water drilling trip

June 2009 Nicaragua clean-water drilling trip

I flew from Birmingham to Houston on Continental Express 2-1 plane, and stayed Friday evening at the Hilton Garden Inn on JFK Blvd. just outside the George Bush International Airport using my Hilton Honor points. Since I didn’t know anyone on the team, I just looked for people with LWI shirts.

Met the team at Terminal E of the airport – Don Parker (30) Team Leader, Jonathan Magnus, Lois Henry (3), Greg Eddlebrook (3) and Doug White (they were both professional engineers with Shell), Celia Tirador, Eli Ramirez, Joe Torres, Matias Perez. We sat on the plane for one hour because of mechanical problems, then had to change planes and gates. Arrived in the San Salvador Airport after a flight of 2 hours 40 minutes on a Continental 3-3 plane, and a time change. We loaded our luggage on top of a Toyota van, and it rained on us, so we thought our bags would be soaked, but they weren’t. It took 2 hours to drive on CA-8 to our location, Oasis Beach Lodge at Salanitas, a series of bungalows rented out for $100/person/week. On the horizon we could see freighters steaming in and out of the port of Acajulta. I roomed with Jonathan, Doug and Greg. That evening Don gave us the Rules of Engagement, and asked us to tell 2 things no one would guess about us. We also talked about how to witness, and an effective opener is to ask “what are your dreams” Several of the men are from Sugar Creek Baptist Church, in Sugarland, Texas, which is where LWI founder Harry Westmoreland attended. Trip cost $1800.

I got up at 6:00 am to have devotions, at breakfast I learned about ultra high temperature (UHT) milk, then we drove to a small, local church service Tabernaculo Biblico Buatista – Amigos de Israel (a branch of the main church in San Salvador that has over 5000 attend each week. The pastor is on TV and radio). This county church had a tin roof, dirt floor, and the women had uniforms of a white blouse (with the church logo) and blue skirts) and entire service was in Spanish. When we got back to Salanitas, it was low tide and we could walk out to the rock outcropping 100 yards from shore where a 10 ft. white statue of Jesus had been erected. At the high tides of 6am and 6pm the waves crash against the stone retaining wall so loudly at first I thought it was thunder. That afternoon we went out to the drill site to set up. It is located at an aldea called Culote, in the Acajulta Districto, Sansonate Departamento. To have a well drilled, the community must commit to providing a 20x20 piece of land deeded to the village, sand, gravel, mud pits, arrange for two local huts to serve as a staging area to store the LWI equipment, and an armed guard each evening. Several meetings are conducted with the community leaders to ensure their commitment to these requirements.

I would get up at 6:00 am to have personal devotions looking out at the ocean. It was very special seeing the waves crash against the white statue of the Savior, as if Jesus is walking on the water. After personal devotions we had group devotions at 7:00 am sitting under a thatch-roofed hut, then after breakfast drove to the well site. We used one of the two pneumatic drills (LW -100) the ministry owns in El Salvador. Each drill bit costs $7,000, and two have been stuck, therefore lost, in the previous 3 years of drilling. Each well costs $2,000 to drill, so the team meets half the expense, and LWI fund-raising the other half. You always know how deep you are because you add 5 ft. sections of pipe. Typically you hit water at the first water table at 30 ft., continue through gravel (sanitary seal) till you hit the second table. A compressor forces air down the drill pipe, out three orifices of the bit, forcing water, mud or gravel to blow out the 6” bore hole. Local farmers brought the sand on a wagon pulled by oxen, and the men had machetes. The children are either barefoot or wear sandals, the houses have dirt floors with dogs and chickens wandering in and out, and the existing wells are hand dug to 30 ft., and are polluted. We hit the 2^nd water table at 4:00 pm. We went back to our lodging, showered, had supper, and you rinse the washed dishes in water with Clorox, because there is no hot water to kill the germs. Sometimes I would get so hungry, I would get a tablespoon of peanut butter. Don Parker is a great team leader, he stays out of the way of the drilling operation, and intervenes only if there is a problem. He made a point of spending time with each person to share his passion for Central America.

Each morning I would walk about 50 yards to a hut with 3 sinks and 3 showers. Then when dressed I would walk around the circle drive for exercise, like I did in Tegucigalpa. If the first day is drilling the well, the second day is developing the well. After perforating the bottom section of pipe to serve as a screen/filter system, we lowered 10 ft. sections of 4” PVC pipe into the hole, and then let it gush for about 2 hours. Then we inserted chlorine to clean out all the impurities we had introduced during the drilling process. There was a lot of time available during this phase to witness to the villagers. I talked a lot with Pablo who owned a corn field nearby, and Carlos who was a soldier in the 1980-1991 civil war. As poor as the local farmers were, the teenagers had really nice uniforms to play soccer. They talked about the national teams and stars that they root for. We had cheese sandwiches for lunch each day, so I was very hungry at night. When we got back to the Oasis, I helped Delores, the full-time cook, snap green beans as we talked in Spanish. Each evening about midnight I would half wake up and think there was a violent thunderstorm, only to realize that it was only the waves of high tide breaking against the retaining wall. El Salvador has granted LWI a NGO “non-government organization” status; therefore it doesn’t have to pay any taxes. The average daily wage is $5.45 which explains why so many Salvadoran men leave their families to work in the United States, but unfortunately, after two years of sending money back home, they marry again, and abandon their Salvadoran wife and children.

Today we inserted the sucker rods into each section of galvanized pipe, and lowered the pumping mechanism into the hole. Then we connected the well head which is made in India (LWI purchases about 100 at a time and stores them in-country). We had lunch at Carlos Morales Morales’ home, he set out tables in his yard, plastic table cloths, and we had soup with vegetables from his garden, roast chicken (that he had killed that morning) and tortillas. It was such a poignant scene to have such a relaxing meal with fellow co-workers hosted by truly grateful people. That afternoon, Celia and Katy Shields, the permanent missionary in El Salvador, gave health and hygiene lessons to the children and mothers. There is book of LWI lesson plans to introduce the concept of germs (using sprinkles to demonstrate how germs are spread) pictures of everyday life to discuss good and poor hygiene, and what to do – wash hands, boil water, build latrines and wash food. A 3 legged stool represents diet – the red leg is protein (beans, rice, fish) to help us grow, the white leg is carbohydrates (corn, tortillas, potato sans sugar) to give us energy, and the green leg is vegetables and fruits to keep us from getting sick.

We had an outdoor church service at the soccer field to pray and distribute Bibles, and a dedication ceremony for the children to start pumping the water. We emphasized that this water was to be used only for washing hand, washing food and human drinking (not for washing clothes or giving to animals). After supper we all talked about the most memorable events of the past week. Joe mentioned the discussion that I led with him, Matias, Eli, Doug, Greg and Don on Tuesday evening in which I asked the older men to give advice on how to be a good husband.

We left the Oasis to drive to Apaneca, a quaint little pueblo about 4000 ft. attitude where it was a lot cooler than in the lowlands. We had a flat tire, so Esduardo and Stanley took the van to buy a replacement while the rest of the team went to El Jardin de Celeste, a “finca cafetelera” where I had a slice of banana pie and two cups of the best coffee I’ve ever had (since the coffee beans were raised on the nearby fields all around us). We later stopped at Pollo Campero, the main chicken fast food franchise in Central America. We then drove on CA-1 into San Salvador to stay at the Hotel Miramonte. We all took turns around the computer at the registration desk checking e-mail and the market since we had been on a technology fast all week. We went out to a pupuseria that evening for supper, then back to bed. But I told people that I needed a chocolate fix.

We had to leave the hotel at 3:30 am to make it to the airport in time for our 6:30 am flight. Several people bought me Snickers bars for the flight as a gag. Because I had a long layover in Houston, I sat and had a cup of coffee with Ray Williams who was coming back from a trip to Guatemala, I flew to Little Rock because Nancy was doing Ashley Taylor’s wedding.