THE CENTER ON OAK HILL

As the group grew, Miss Kim decided to move from the Eugene Woman's Club and into the Pumphrey house on Oak Hill.

She decided to take the upstairs rooms, where she could have a bedroom and an office and would be insured a measure of privacy. The upstairs had been used for a bedroom and an art studio for me. It was dry walled but never finished or painted. While moving in, she proceeded to clean out the upstairs with typical Miss Kim efficiency. She opened the window above the front yard and threw everything out in a pile. Anything she thought important, which was not much, she carried down stairs.

The Pumphreys with their three kids lived in a house that was supposed to be a church center. That proved not entirely satisfactory. Kids are sometimes known to disrupted the tranquillity of the center, and a family living there would not allow room for any expansion as a center.

Patty and I were buying a small house next door, and it was vacant. The house was relatively new, but never completely finished and had water but no further plumbing. I worked on it periodically, building a septic tank system, and dry walling the ceilings. Before moving in, I needed to install a cast iron drain line to the bathroom. Miss Kim got me to accelerate my effort on the house. We moved our family into the small house and soon afterwards, George Norton moved into the center with Miss Kim. A Korean university student also moved in, a young man whose family were early church members in Korea.

Thus the first of many centers was born in the United States. This established a tradition of a communal type living which was unheard of at the time. It later became popular during the hippie and drug culture era in the following years.

George Norton and I both worked the night shift at the International Paper plywood plant at Vaughn, Oregon. We would talk about the Divine Principle every chance we had, and we witnessed to people in the plant. One person at the plant, a Methodist adult Sunday school teacher accepted the Divine Principle and began to teach straight Divine Principle in class. His class stayed on and discussed the Principle and missed church service. The minister didn't much like that and the Sunday school teacher was called on the carpet before the bishop. He did not however come to any of our meetings, meet Miss Kim or become a member.

After working our night shift at the plywood plant, George and I would arrive back at Oak Hill. Miss Kim was usually in the kitchen early in the morning. We would corner her and flood her with questions sometimes talking for hours. In later years when I found people who studied the Divine Principle and had no questions or curiosity about it, I just couldn't understand it. We wanted to know everything, the more we studied the more questions we had.

MEETINGS ON OAK HILL

We began to hold the study session and service on Oak Hill, they were held on Saturday afternoon. One time someone in Korea sent a tape of a church service that Father led in Korea. I think this was before there was such a thing as a cassette tape. They were singing a hymn, as I remember "Amazing Grace" and father was keeping time by pounding his fist on a table like a bass drum. His prayer was especially moving, it was in Korean and we could not understand a word, but we could feel the great emotion and power in his prayer, which brought us to tears. It was a moving experience his voice for the first time. Miss Kim translated the prayer for us.

JOINT MEETINGS WITH DAVID KIM'S GROUP

At the same time in Portland, Oregon, David Kim was finding members. It was difficult for him work openly because of his status as a student in the United States and also being under the scrutiny of the fundamentalist Christian college he was attending.

During early summer of 1960, we held monthly meetings on a Sunday. David Kim would come to Oak Hill with his members - including John Schmidli and Vernon Pearson who were later in the 1969 blessing of the 13 couples in the United States. We would have a service and a study session, this went on most of the day. Miss Kim did an excellent job of "bringing people to the conclusion" which meant bringing them to the understanding of Reverend Moon’s mission. She did this for the Portland members.

It was at one of these meetings that I first remember hearing the Holy Songs, which were not yet translated into English. David Kim and Miss Kim sang several songs together in Korean, Arerung and others. Then we would have a potluck dinner in the evening. There were some other people in Eugene who came to the meetings.

There were other people that Miss Kim worked with, there were some other people in Eugene that studied with us. In Albany there were some Pentecostal ladies she had witnessed to, she often spoke to small groups. These ladies could feel the high level of spirit surrounding the message and would speak in tongues and prophesy, but they never grasped the importance of the Divine Principle, and even remoter was their understanding of Reverend Moon. There wasn't the slightest curiosity about Reverend Moon. We even traveled to their homes in Albany to hold Sunday meetings and they came to Oak Hill several times. After awhile, Miss Kim recognized they showed no spiritual growth. They just plugged into the spiritual atmosphere, she quit wasting time and effort on them. We were shocked that she would quit working with them, but later understood why.

At these small meetings, the entire membership of the Unification Church in the Western world met in the living room on Oak Hill. It would be a number of years before a living room would be too small to hold our members.

Our monthly news letter dated December 13th, 1960 mentioned the following:

The Joint meeting for November was held at Eugene on Nov. 6, 1960. Four members from St. Helens, and six from Eugene shared a potluck dinner. After an informal discussion, the meeting was started at 5:30 P.M....

The hard bound copies of the Divine Principles will soon be available. Since this book is a limited edition the price of it will be higher than we had earlier anticipated. It has been decided that all books purchased must be paid for at the time of sale. The price of the new book will be four dollars.

Miss Young Oon Kim addressed the group. She spoke on the qualifications necessary for the Lord of the Second Advent...

Miss Kim explained the three judgments which we will all face...

We closed our meeting at 9 P.M. with half an hour of prayer.

Miss Kim announced that she was leaving this area and committed the Oregon groups to Mr. David Kim.

In the process of finishing the new book it was inevitable that we combine the Monthly news Letters of November and December into one...

November 19th (October 1st according to the Lunar Calendar) has been observed as the first Thanksgiving Day in the New Year of the New Age. This day was celebrated as the day of restoration of all things and also the harvest of people. March 1st and October 1st will be observed as the Day of the True Parents whereas October 1st, seven months from March 1st, will be observed as the Day of the restored Children. There was a ceremony and than offering on this day in Seoul...

PRINTING THE BOOK

Miss Kim was working on a new version of the Divine Principle. We decided that we would print a book and have it bound.

She asked me if I could help her in correcting grammatical errors and reworking difficult passages. I wasn't an English major or anything close, but had to write in college and was probably the most qualified to help her. I was getting a weeks vacation soon and promised her I would help her then. As vacation approached, I thought wouldn't it be nice to pack up my family and go to the Oregon coast for a few days. I could help her finish the corrections after returning from the coast.

That Sunday we made a trip to Albany to hold a meeting with the ladies there. During the trip my left leg became cramped or something and was very painful, I could hardly walk. It was even uncomfortable to sit. After returning to Oak Hill, I hobbled into the house, hardly able to walk and in great pain. I went to the bathroom and thought that maybe I should help Miss Kim with the corrections during my vacation, I had promised. I would go to the coast after helping her with the corrections. Immediately, the pain that I had been experiencing that day disappeared. It took the full vacation time to make the corrections, and I never have been able to vacation at the Oregon coast, well maybe some day.

After finishing the book, we made a trip to Portland and rented an IBM Executive typewriter. The typewriter had a Mylar ribbon and gave what today is known as letter quality copy. The copy could then be photographed to make plates for offset printing.

The typewriter was unique in that it used proportional spaces for the letters. An "i" took two units while a "W" took five units. To type a justified margin you first typed the page, drew a line down the right margin, counted the spaces between the last word and the line. You then marked where you wanted the spaces inserted in the line and retyped the page with a justified margin. I don't know if there was a simpler method, but this was the way Miss Kim did it. A very tedious job to say the least. All this is done in a flash by today’s computer word processors, this writing as an example.

We had the typewriter rented for only one month, that was the time-frame that she had for getting the copy ready for printing. She sat at the typewriter night and day for that month to finish the book. This meant typing at least 500 pages, typing the book twice to get the justified margins. If you made an error your only choice was to type the whole page over or type the correction on a sheet, cut it out and paste it over the error with rubber cement. This worked well for camera copy.

After renting the typewriter, we decided to buy one in Eugene. Miss Kim needed it and she was already planning another revision of the Divine Principle before the first on was bound. The IBM Executive typewriter cost over $800.00, and considering value of the 1960 dollar and that you could support a family on a little over $2.00 an hour, that was a considerable amount of money for us. I bought it on a monthly payment plan.

We had the book printed in Eugene, by a small printer. George Norton sold a piece of property to finance the book printing. The printer was only a printer and did not do binding. We needed to find a binder to do that. In those days work at many binderies was done by hand. Women were hired to gather books. This consists of putting the pages in sequence on tables and walking around picking them up until you have gathered a book, you then stacked it and started around again. We saved money by folding--with a rented folding machine--and gathering the book ourselves.

In order to bind a book the pages have to be to be folded and gathered in the what is known in the bindery trade as books consisting of 32 pages. Each book is then sewed up the back by a person with a special sewing machine. These are then assembled the back and cover are glued on and they are pressed in press for a period while the clue sets up.

At least that was the way it was done to a great extent at the time. Everything is done by machinery today, and the book is hardly touched by people in the process of binding.

When we moved to San Francisco, the pages of the book were taken along in the trailer, we then had to locate a binder to do the job of binding.

THE EXODUS

Eugene, Oregon, was a rather small community, the rumors were spread by the people working against us. People were calling the FBI. having us investigated claiming that we were probably a Communist group. Some people were afraid to be caught with the Divine Principle, and destroyed the books Miss Kim had loaned them. They were afraid of being connected to this handful of people with a religious message. We were somehow perceived as a threat.

Doris and Pauline's husbands became a great problem which probably started when they cut their husbands off sexually because of the fall of man. The husbands became angry and began to accuse Miss Kim of breaking up families. And to compound the problems, the more the girls witnessed the meaner the husbands got.

One Sunday morning Doris, Pauline and Patty had been witnessing in a church and Patty dropped Pauline off at her house. Both husbands were waiting at the Pauline's home. They had a big confrontation the husbands were angry made the ultimatum, either go with Miss Kim and loose your children or stay with us. The girls made their decision at that moment. They made the decision to leave. No woman in her right mind would leave her home and children but they felt at that moment God needed them and relied on their strong faith and connection with him. They decided then and there what road they must take. A very difficult one. Their husbands probably thought that they wouldn't go through with it, that they would go off and be back later.

Pauline had her bible in her hand and that was all she had, she didn't even take her purse. Later she told Patty where the purse was and Patty sneaked into the house and got it. They had walked over the hill past the Pumphrey house and down the other side to Doris's house. Doris grabbed her car keys and a check book, and with the clothes on their backs and Pauline's Bible they left in Doris's car, a green Jeep station wagon. They cashed a fifty dollar check on Doris's bank account.

Later Pauline's husband took all her clothes and personal items out in the yard and burned them.

That night they called the Pumphrey house, and wanted to speak to Miss Kim. Patty had to go next door and bring Miss Kim to the phone. Miss Kim told them to please think about this, we will talk about it. They were adamant and would not tell Miss Kim even where they were, they wanted to spare her.

They made the decision to go to California, and just as they got to the Oregon-California border the Jeep broke down and they abandoned it. They flagged down a truck and the truck driver took them into Redding, California.

They went to the bus station in Redding, and purchased a ticket to Fresno, which is all the money they had. Doris heard a voice that told her that a place was prepared for them. In Fresno they bought a newspaper and looked in the want adds for a place to stay. They called about one of the adds, and the woman told them they must be the two girls that God had told her to prepare for. The lady was a very devoted Seven Day Adventist.

Doris had worked one time as a waitress and soon found a job for her and Pauline. In the meantime Doris's father and their husbands hired a detective to find them. When the husbands found them they went out the back door and went to the bus depot and fled to San Francisco, again with nothing but the clothes on their backs.

They were led step by step by spirit world. They called Miss Kim from San Francisco.

Miss Kim felt that because Doris and Pauline's faith was so strong, that they would sacrifice their families, they were the ones to work with in building the foundation in America. This level of devotion and not academic records or secular achievements is the strength and character of the early members.

It was at this point that Miss Kim decided the work should be carried on in San Francisco with Doris and Pauline had gone. The thought was, the larger city would be a better place to work and the work would probably be subject to less persecution.

Because of the fall having been caused by Eve, the task of the reversing the fall, the restoration of fallen man, had to be carried on by Eve. In the early church, many of the founding members were women and much of the work of witnessing was done by women. Reverend Moon stressed having women witness, and go out as missionaries. When Miss Kim began her mission in the United States, she needed to find 3 women who would give up everything and follow as a foundation for the work here in the United States.

In the fall of 1960 Miss Kim went to San Francisco with George Norton. They took a car and a trailer and their few belongings with them. In the trailer were boxes of pages of the Divine Principle book that we had printed in Eugene. They were yet to be gathered and bound.

Before we left Oregon, I put our property up for sale. It was difficult decision to make, I loved living in the country on a hill overlooking a valley. I had just signed the agreement with the real estate company to sell the property and was worried if quitting my job, dropping any chance of finishing my degree and moving to San Francisco was the right thing to do?

I went in and laid down, it was the afternoon and I needed to sleep before going to work that night. I had a vision of the restored world. I could see a landscape running for miles where architecturally everything was in harmony with their surroundings. The buildings were beautiful as they harmonized with the country side. It was a moving experience, and it assured me the move was right.

Patty and I took the two oldest boys, Richard and Stephen Parks, on a long trip to Idaho to live with their father, who lived in a small town in Idaho. Our son Lloyd, who was a little over a year old at the time, came with us to San Francisco. All three boys are now blessed. Richard later became one of the first state leaders. Steve worked in the church. Lloyd was on CARP for sometime.

This was when a made another great sacrifice for the cause, I shaved off my beard and mustache. Patty had never seen me without a beard before. I guess it was only a small sacrifice for the cause. At the time, San Francisco was populated with bearded beatniks and I didn't think a beard would be fitting. Gee, I was handsome in a beard, although everyone else held a different opinion.

We sold one house, packed up everything in a trailer and went to San Francisco. Miss Kim had rented a large flat, 7 rooms, at 410 Cole Street in the Haight Ashbury district of San Francisco. At that time a working class neighborhood, in pretty decent shape. Later the neighborhood became famous as the Hippie and drug capitol of the country. It was also somewhere on Cole St. that the notorious Manson Family lived in 1967.

Eileen Welch soon moved to Portland, Oregon, where she worked with David Kim and later went out to pioneer in Salt Lake City and Chicago. Eileen was the first member to join in the United States. She was later blessed with the late Hank Lemmers.