Betty Howard thus found herself living on the fifth floor of a rundown tenement building in Brooklyn. The building had no elevator and only intermittent hot water and heat. But those were not the biggest problems; that “honor” belonged to the rats! The rats were enormous—large enough to turn over a trash can and rummage through its contents—and they roamed freely about the building. Betty made sure to make lots of noise when entering or leaving the apartment, giving the rats ample warning to get out of her way. Of course, she had no plan of attack if she were ever to corner one of the rats by accident. And as she climbed up and down the stairs each day, she tried to ignore the aromas of strange food cooking that floated out from other apartments.
Yes, the place was smelly and dark and rat-infested, and the Spanish lessons with the church pastor were not as frequent as Betty had hoped they would be, but she thanked God for bringing her to Brooklyn. It was a stepping-stone in a definite direction, and that was something she was very glad about. For the first time in a long time, Betty had clarity about her future. She had prayed earnestly about going to Africa and even to the South Pacific, but God had set her firmly on a path to South America. As she prayed for Him to show her where in South America, she felt the answer was Ecuador—with or without Jim Elliot.
Shortly afterward, Dorothy Jones, a young woman from Texas whom Betty had met at the Summer Institute of Linguistics in Oklahoma, came to live with her in the apartment in Brooklyn. Dorothy also felt called to mission service in Ecuador, and now the two women made preparations to go there together.
Letters continued to flow between Jim and Betty. Jim had finally sent the letter he had written to Dr. Tidmarsh in Ecuador, and now, independent of each other, the two of them were plotting their separate courses to get to the tiny South American country.
Like Dorothy Jones, Betty had been accepted for missionary service by the Plymouth Brethren mission agency Christian Missions in Many Lands, and the plan was for the two of them to travel to Quito, the capital of Ecuador, and study Spanish there together before being assigned to work with an indigenous group who needed the Bible translated into their own language.
Meanwhile, Jim and a fellow student from Wheaton College, Pete Fleming, were making final preparations for their departure for Ecuador. The letters back and forth between Jim and Dr. Tidmarsh had convinced Jim that he was on the right track. On February 2, 1952, Jim called Betty on the telephone to say goodbye. It was the first time the two of them had ever spoken long-distance. Because it was a very expensive call, they talked only briefly. Jim was excited about leaving, and he expected that they would meet up again in Quito if Betty and Dorothy went ahead with their plans.
As far as Betty Howard was concerned, there was no “if” about it. Betty was now certain of her calling and willing and ready to begin Bible translation work somewhere in Ecuador. It was merely a matter of where and when.
Chapter 9
Ecuador
Betty Howard almost had to pinch herself as she looked over the ship’s railing. The ship was sailing up the Guayas River toward Guayaquil, Ecuador. It had set sail from New York ten days before, heading south and then west across the Caribbean and on through the Panama Canal to the Pacific Ocean. It had then followed the west coast of South America and was now approaching its destination.
Guayaquil looked completely different from the huge, bustling city of New York. It had no tall skyscrapers. The city consisted of wooden buildings spread along the western bank of the Guayas River. But while Guayaquil, the largest city in Ecuador, looked completely different from New York, it too was a city of bustle and business. It was the main port for the country, and the Guayas River was studded with all manner of vessels, from ships to small dugout canoes loaded down with bunches of bananas. And on land, people seemed to be milling around everywhere. The city was also hot and humid and reminded Betty of the climate in Orlando, Florida.
“Can you believe it?” Dorothy said. “April 12, 1952, the day we finally begin our missionary work!” She grinned with excitement as their vessel approached the dock.
Once ashore, Betty and Dorothy were met by a Plymouth Brethren couple who helped them get their belongings through customs and then took them to their home. Betty hardly slept that night as she contemplated what lay ahead the next day—a flight over the spine of the spectacular Andes Mountains to Quito. She had never been in an airplane before and didn’t quite know what to expect, and she had read several travel accounts that touted the flight to Quito as spectacular.
Betty was not disappointed by the trip. Despite some apprehension as the plane took off from the airport in Guayaquil, she soon relaxed. Flying, she decided, was indeed the way to travel. As the airplane continued to climb and leave the Pacific coast of Ecuador behind, the Andes came into view. The mountain range was more massive than Betty could have imagined. From the air the mountains seemed to go on forever, as high, barren, rocky peaks, clad in blankets of ice and snow, reached toward the sky. Finally the plane began to circle and descend. Below her, Betty could see Quito, nestled at ninety-three hundred feet above sea level in a large valley surrounded by snowy mountain peaks. The accounts of flying into Quito that Betty had read were right—the vista spread below the airplane was spectacular.
The plane landed and taxied to a standstill on the tarmac at the Quito airport. As Betty and Dorothy deplaned, a group of missionaries met them. The group included Jim Elliot and Pete Fleming. Betty, of course, was delighted to see Jim, and after welcoming her to Quito, Jim explained that he and Pete were staying at the home of a local doctor while they learned and became fluent in Spanish. Betty and Dorothy would be staying in a house across the street from Jim and Pete.
Life in Quito fell into an easy pattern for Betty. As young missionary trainees, Betty and Dorothy, along with Jim and Pete, studied Spanish together each morning and then had their midday meal. Sometimes in the afternoon, Dr. Wilfred Tidmarsh, the senior Plymouth Brethren missionary in Ecuador, gave lectures on relevant topics related to living and working in the country. On their first day together, Dr. Tidmarsh told Betty a little about his background. He explained that he had a PhD in geology and had been a university professor in England. In his spare time he loved to read about strange and remote places, and he was especially drawn to Ecuador. He wondered why the place was among the most backward countries on earth and why the gospel had not taken a stronger hold there.
Eventually, Dr. Tidmarsh told Betty, he came to believe that God was calling him and his wife, Gwen, to work in Ecuador. They had sold their belongings, and he had enrolled in a one-year emergency medical course. When he had completed the course, he was accepted as a missionary in Ecuador to the Quichua Indians. For the past thirteen years the Tidmarshes had been living and working among the Quichua. Like Betty, Dr. Tidmarsh had a flare for languages and had compiled the most complete Quichua dictionary available. But the work had taken its toll. Dr. Tidmarsh was gaunt and pale from bouts of malaria, yet he exuded a cheerfulness that Betty prayed she could match when her time finally came to go and work among one of Ecuador’s indigenous Indian groups.
Every day was a wonderful new adventure for Betty, and the time was made all the more magical by having Jim at her side. Betty and Jim often planned adventures together. They liked to take the bus sixteen miles north to La Mitad del Mundo, where the equator ran right through the middle of town. They would stroll through the Mercado de Santa Clara, stopping to smell the huge bunches of freshly cut flowers for sale at the market and admire the Indian weaving and baskets. One day Betty and Jim and a group of other trainee missionaries climbed Mount Pichincha. And on Ecuador’s Labor Day holiday, Jim took Betty to a bullfight. It was the first bullfight either of them had been to, and Betty did not know quite what to expect.
The bullring was packed to capacity with excited people who stood and cheered when the matador entered the ring. The matador was dressed in an elaborately decorated suit, with long white stockings to just below his knees and shiny black shoes. He acknowledged the cheers of the crowd and then took his place in the center of the ring. Moments later a large black bull raced into the ring and headed straight for the matador, who held out his cape. At the last moment the matador stepped sideways and turned as the charging bull raced by him only inches away.
Back and forth the bull and the matador went, and Jim told Betty that the matador’s movements were almost like ballet. Betty had to agree. There was a certain graceful, dancelike fluidness to the way the matador moved to avoid being gored by the bull. But as the bull began to tire, the illusion of ballet quickly came to an end as Betty watched the matador thrust a sword through the majestic animal. Betty turned away as the crowd stood to their feet cheering and clapping. Although bullfighting was not something Betty cared to see again, she had to admit that it had been an interesting cross-cultural experience.
Jim and Pete were two months ahead of Betty and Dorothy in their Spanish language studies. By late spring Dr. Tidmarsh was preparing the two young men for the next stage of their mission—moving into a jungle station in the Oriente, as the eastern Amazon Basin of Ecuador was called. As planned, the place they were going to was Shandia, the mission station Dr. Tidmarsh had established and manned for five years before reluctantly relinquishing the post because of his wife’s ill health and moving to Quito.
Jim explained to Betty that Shandia was located in the jungle alongside the Atun Yaku River. While living there, Dr. Tidmarsh had built a large hut on piles. The hut had a thatched roof, and Dr. Tidmarsh thought they would have to do a lot of repair work to make it habitable again. The house had been empty since he and his wife left Shandia, and everything deteriorated quickly in the jungle.
Betty could see how excited Jim was to be moving into the jungle after six months in Quito. Jim was eager to learn the Quichua language and start his evangelistic work.
During this time, Jim told Betty about another group of Indians who lived in the jungle of the Oriente not too far from Shandia. These Indians were called the Aucas and were a Stone Age tribe that spoke their own language and kept themselves isolated from other tribes and outsiders. They had a reputation for being the most violent tribe in the Oriente. People said that they would kill a man or woman with their spears for no apparent reason. Jim told Betty this was probably true. The Aucas had speared to death a number of men working in the jungle for the Shell Oil Company. Jim told Betty that although he could not explain it, he felt strangely drawn to the challenge of one day sharing the gospel with this unreached tribe of Indians. Because of this, he had made it a point to gather information on them, though there was not much to be had. Few people who met the Aucas lived to tell about it.
Before long it was time for Jim and Pete to begin their new venture in Shandia. Betty noticed that Jim put off saying goodbye as long as he could. But the reality that the two of them were going their separate ways set in. When they finally said their farewells, Jim apologized because although he professed his love for Betty, he did not feel God leading him to marry. He said that there was simply too much work for a single man to do in Ecuador. Of course, Betty was disappointed at his explanation, yet she had to admit she was still struggling with whether she also should be married or remain a single missionary. Because there was a lot of work for a single woman missionary to do in Ecuador, she turned her focus to her future in the country.
