PNG Highlands History: List of chapters

  • 01. Pioneers to the Highlands, 1950

    What was the dream for a new mission in the Southern Highlands in 1950? In Sydney in 1949 and 1950 the Methodist Overseas Missions Board started to discuss some new work. For a long time, they had been very worried about the terrible war that came to the Pacific between 1942 and 1945. The war,

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  • 02. Meeting for the First Time, 1950

    MENDI 1950 The people of the Southern Highlands were surprised when they first discovered that there were other kinds of humans in the world. They knew their own clans, and other clans who were their enemies, as well as news of distant communities who were trading partners. The first time they saw a small plane

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  • 03. Starting a New Mission, 1950

    Mendi, November 1950 As soon as Gordon Young heard that the MOM Board had approved their new mission, he was very keen to make a start.  The next time Assistant District Officer Alan Timperley went on a patrol to Mendi from Mount Hagen, Young went with him. In his first letter from Mendi, Young wrote:

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  • 04. Memories of Mrs Grace Young, 1951

    Mendi 1950-51 While Rev Gordon Young was busy establishing a new mission in Mendi, his wife Grace Young was also preparing to join him. At first, she had to wait while her husband went ahead. Gordon and Grace Young had been working in Namatanai Circuit on New Ireland with the Methodist Church since the end

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  • 05. Setepano Nabwakulea: a Teacher from Papuan Islands District, 1951

    Mendi 1951-1953 ‘We are thankful for the strong missionary instincts of the Younger Churches and for the gift of these young workers from the Solomons, Papua and New Guinea.’ Missionary Review 1953 Setepano Nabwakulea was one of the first men from Papuan Islands District to go to work with the new mission in Mendi. He

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  • 06. Medical Ministry Begins with Joyce Walker, 1952

    Mendi 1952 Sister Joyce Walker was an experienced nurse who had been working in New Britain. As soon as it was possible for Australian women to return to New Britain after the war years, Joyce Walker joined the first group of Methodist women to travel to Rabaul, arriving by ship in November 1946. Rabaul town

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  • 07. Elsie Wilson, Teacher in Mendi, 1952

    Mendi, 1952 Miss Elsie Wilson came to Mendi as a teacher to work in the new little mission school. She arrived with Rev Roland Barnes and his wife Miriam, and Sister Joyce Walker in October 1951. Elsie Wilson was an experienced teacher. She went to New Britain to teach in the Methodist Mission school at

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  • 08. Early Plans at Unjamap, 1952

    Mendi, 1952 In the first full year with the new staff in Mendi, the mission group had to stay in the area close to Unjamap because the government patrol officers thought that it was not safe yet to go further away. They were busy with new buildings for a small hospital. Rev Roland Barnes and

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  • 09. Letter from David Johnston, 1952

    Mendi, 1952 David Johnston and his wife Beryl arrived in Mendi late in 1951. The other missionaries in Mendi were people who had already been working in New Guinea for a number of years. David and Beryl Johnston came straight from New South Wales as a young married couple. David was an agriculturalist who worked

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  • 10. A New Beginning in Tari, 1953

    Tari, 1953 Why did a new Methodist mission start in Tari in 1953?  In some ways this is surprising. In 1953, the mission work in Mendi was still very new. The mission group had only been there for two years. They were a very small team, with two ministers, one agriculturalist, one teacher, one nurse

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