From time to time, Nate was sent from Baer Field on special assignments. In early November 1944, he was sent for several weeks to the Willow Run plant of the Ford Motor Company near Detroit. The plant was producing a new type of airplane engine, and because of his mechanical ability, Nate was asked to investigate the engine and report to the engineers back at Baer Field. Nate found the assignment interesting, but something else happened on the trip that totally changed his life.
For some time, Nate had been listening to Dr. John Zoller’s radio broadcasts. Since he was so close to Detroit, it seemed like a good opportunity to visit Dr. Zoller’s church and hear him speak in person. And so on New Year’s Eve in 1944, Nate made his way to the Zoller Gospel Tabernacle in Detroit. He went into the church service with an ambition to be a pilot or an aircraft mechanic in the United States, but when he came out of the church in the early hours of New Year’s Day, 1945, he had decided to go to Bible school and then become a missionary in some foreign country.
He wrote about this transformation in a letter home: “Now, you’ve heard people tell about God speaking to them, haven’t you? I don’t know about the other fellow, but that night I saw things differently…BING…like that. Just as though a different Kodachrome slide had been tossed onto the screen between my ears.”
That night Nate realized how much time and effort he’d wasted going after his own dreams and plans, and he understood the deep joy that comes from surrendering every dream and plan and talent back to God. As this understanding grew in his mind during the church service, Nate decided to give up his dreams of flying commercially and enroll in a Bible college once the war was over. He wrote in his diary soon after the service: “The Lord has given me no desire to preach, but I’d like someday to be able to tell somebody who has never heard….”
After six weeks at the Ford plant, Nate returned to Baer Field. When he got back, he recognized his father’s handwriting on the envelope of a letter from home. He ripped it open. His father didn’t normally write, so Nate was eager to know what he had to say. Inside the envelope was a brief note from Mr. Saint and an article he’d cut from the Sunday School Times. The article, entitled “On Wings of the Wind,” was written by a navy pilot, Jim Truxton. The article described a new organization that Truxton and an ex-Air Force WASP pilot, Betty Greene, had just founded.
Nate read on. The organization was called Christian Airmen’s Missionary Fellowship, or CAMF for short. CAMF had been formed to serve missionaries who were working in remote areas of the world by flying in supplies for them, carrying the supplies to a doctor when the missionaries needed medical help, and ferrying them quickly from place to place. Although the new organization did not yet have an airplane, the article invited airmen who were interested in the new ministry to reply to their Los Angeles office.
Nate sat on his cot and read the article through several times. He didn’t know what to think. He had just given up the idea of flying and had dedicated himself to becoming a missionary. But now, while reading the article, Nate was starting to realize that God might be showing him a way to be a missionary and fly. He thought about it. He had both an aircraft mechanic’s license and a private pilot’s license, two qualifications CAMF was looking for. He decided to write a letter to Jim Truxton.
Nate started the letter by saying: “Last New Year’s Eve in a watch-night service I responded to the missionary challenge. [I] have been interested in missionary work for some time but the Lord owned only my finances. He now has my life.” Nate went on to list his educational background and qualifications, and then he folded the letter and slipped it into an envelope. As he dropped the letter into the mailbox at Baer Field, he had no idea it would lead to the greatest adventures of his life.
Chapter 4
An Unacceptable Risk
Nate received a fast reply from Christian Airmen’s Missionary Fellowship. Betty Greene wrote about CAMF’s plans to begin work in South America. CAMF’s first goal was to help Wycliffe Bible Translators set up some jungle stations in southern Mexico and then do the same in Peru. Betty Greene suggested that when the war was over, Nate join her in Peru and become the ministry’s mechanic. Nate thought and prayed long and hard about her offer.
Meanwhile, army life continued as usual. There were new challenges and new locations. For a while, Nate briefed crews going into combat overseas. He loved the job; it gave him regular hours and an office of his own. Best of all, though, he got Sundays off. And every Sunday, Nate would be in church, usually with a few fellow soldiers he’d brought along with him.
On June 19, 1945, after eighteen months stationed at Baer Field, Nate was transferred to an air base near Salinas, California. Shortly afterwards, he was transferred yet again, this time to Castle Field in Merced, California. Soon after Nate arrived in Merced, in August, the Japanese surrendered to the United States. World War II was over, the war effort began to wind down, and everyone stationed at the base had more time on their hands. Nate used the extra time to tell others about the gospel message. He invited friends to church with him and began holding a regular Bible study on the base. As a result of the Bible study and the example of his life, many men became committed Christians.
While stationed at Merced, Nate continued to think and pray about the offer from Betty Greene. In the end, though, he felt he should go to Bible college first and get some theological training. Reluctantly, he wrote to Betty Greene and turned down her offer—for now.
About this time, Nate was also thinking about Marjorie Farris, a friend of a friend. Marj, as she liked to be called, was training to be a nurse in Los Angeles. She was about five-foot-two with short, wavy brown hair and sparkling blue eyes. Nate had met her only a few times, but there was something about her faith and the way she cared for those around her that attracted him. Marj lived in a flurry of activity, always visiting friends, volunteering her spare time to sit with ill patients, and leading Sunday school at a local church. Despite all her activity, there was a peace about Marj. She was never in a hurry and somehow always had enough time to make everyone she met feel special. Nate would have liked to spend more time with her, but Merced was three hundred miles from Los Angeles, and he expected to be sent home soon to Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, for good.
Men were being discharged from the army and shipped home every week from Castle Field. Nate waited impatiently for his discharge papers to arrive. After nearly three years in the army, he was tired of the routine of military life and the lack of privacy that came with it. As he waited, he came up with the idea of using his remaining leave time to go camping at Yosemite National Park. There he could get away from everything and be alone with nature. Nate had no idea just how alone he would end up being.
Nate set out for Yosemite with two army buddies. It was mid-December, and when they arrived, the park was nearly empty. The following morning, as the three men looked out the tent door, they knew why the park was deserted. It was not normal camping weather. Thick, damp fog had closed in all around them, blanketing them in gray silence. It was hardly the start to the trip they’d imagined, but Nate was eager to do something. He wanted to hike the trail up to Glacier Point. The trail was several miles long, and neither of his two friends was eager to hike it with him. So Nate, determined to do something different on this vacation, decided he’d hike the trail alone.
An hour later, wearing his army issue coveralls with two sweaters pulled over them and carrying a pocketful of peanuts to snack on, he headed up the mountain trail. He waved a cheerful farewell to his buddies and rounded the bend that officially marked the start of the well-used path. Hundreds of people used the trail in the summer, so he thought it wouldn’t be too difficult to climb, even in the damp fog. And it would be good to get away from everyone and be able to make his own decisions for once.
Just beyond the trail head, Nate stopped to talk to a park ranger. He told the ranger where he was headed, and the ranger pointed out that it was not the best weather for climbing the mountain. Nate insisted he would be fine. The ranger told him if he got to the top, he would be welcome at the lodge at the end of the trail. Douglas Whiteside, a photographer, was spending the winter there and would love someone to chat with over hot coffee.
Nate could hardy wait to get moving. There was someone to talk to about photography at the end of the trail. He munched a few peanuts as he started up the mountain. There were no forks in the path, and every turn was well marked, so the trail was easy to follow. He whistled as he walked along, happy that there was probably not another person between him and Douglas Whiteside. He hoped, though, that he’d soon climb above the low clouds and drizzle and feel the warmth of the sun on his face. But instead of getting above the low clouds, he entered more and more fog the higher he went. Still, he didn’t think too much about it; he was on a well-defined trail, and he could always turn back if conditions got too bad. Besides, a single telephone wire was strung above the trail, and he felt sure it led right to the lodge where Douglas Whiteside was staying.
It wasn’t long before the misty drizzle turned to a steady rain. But Nate still didn’t worry. He had on two sweaters and a woolen undershirt that kept out the rain. After he had been walking for a while, his muscles began to ache a little, so he walked backwards for a few minutes at a time to stretch them out. Upward he went, one army boot after the other.
As he got higher up the trail, the rain turned to light snow, and before long the light snow gave way to heavy snow. Now Nate was beginning to worry. He had no idea how far it was to the lodge at the top, but the telephone wire was still running along overhead. As Nate walked on, he began making emergency plans in his mind. If he got too exhausted to go any farther, he could break the wire. When the rangers came up to fix the problem, they would find him. Trouble was, if Nate had been thinking more clearly, he would have realized that the wire often broke in winter under the strain of snow and ice or because of landslides. As a result, the rangers usually waited until spring before they would fix the broken wire.
Nate trudged on. It was too late to go back, and he felt sure the lodge couldn’t be far away now. The snow was already six inches deep, and it took all his effort to keep one foot moving in front of the other. After a while he had to use his hands to help lift his legs with each step. He was shivering so hard now it was difficult to reach into his pocket for the peanuts, and after putting the peanuts in his mouth, it took all his effort to chew and swallow them. He had to stop every few minutes and rest. He would scoop up a handful of snow and stuff it into his mouth. As his body heat melted it, cold water trickled down the back of his throat. He looked around at the swirling whiteness that surrounded him and smiled to himself. One thing’s for sure, he thought, I’ll never die of thirst up here.
He continued to walk, keeping his head down, concentrating on the trail. He could still make out the outline of the trail beneath the snow. He also kept a close lookout for signs of life.
His feet were now damp and cold, and he was having a difficult time feeling his toes. It was also becoming difficult to concentrate on the path in front of him. He was just about to flop down onto the snow from exhaustion when he noticed something. He could hardly believe what he was seeing. He rubbed his eyes and looked again. He wasn’t seeing things; there really were footprints in the middle of the trail, and fresh footprints at that! They could only be Douglas Whiteside’s footprints. The lodge had to be close by. Footprint by footprint, Nate placed his feet where Whiteside’s feet must have trod no more than five minutes before. If it had been any longer than that, the snow would have covered the footprints over.
