Extra Memorial - The Word Carrier of Santee Normal Training School (Santee, Nebraska), 1927-05 - 1927-06

              XTRA MEMORIAL
WORD CARRIER
OF OAIN
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VOLUME   LVI
HELPING THE   RIGHT. EXPOSING THE WRONG
NUMBER 8
SANTEE, NEBRASKA.
May-) 11 tie,  IH27
FIFTY CENTS PER YEAR
The Death of Mrs. Alfred Longley Riggs
Mrs. Mary Buel Hatch-Riggs was born
May 20, 1939, at LeRoy, N. Y. her father
died in her childhood and her mother resided
for awhile in Rockford, Illinois to educate her
daughters, and then moved to Chicago. It
was there she was married on June 9, 1863 to
Alfred Longley Riggs, eldest son of Stephen
and Mary Riggs, pioneer missionaries among
the Sioux Indians then living in Minnesota.
They lived first at Lockport, 111. where
Alfred Riggs was ordained, and continued
with that church five years : then a year each
at Center, Wisconsin and Woodstock, Illinois.
But all this time they seemed to be only waiting for the Dakota work, attracted to the life
work of his father and mother.
In May, 1870 they accepted an appointment
from the American Board to take charge of
its work among the Sioux Indians who had,
June 1, 1863, after the Sioux Outbreak in
Minnesota, been removed to Nebraska.
Their work was to be educational among a
race which had only within a few years received its first converts to Christianity among
the Mankato and Davenport prisoners. Coming up the Missouri River by steamboat,
landmg at the Santee Agency they found
their Missiou buildings were a few log huts
with dirt roofs. Logs were cut from cotton-
wood, sawed into framing lumber and other
building materials, were freighted up the
river. The erection was begun of a family
dwelling, and of a school house which could
be used for church purposes. These young
missionaries had begun their life work which
was to bring forth great fruit and accomplish
most marvelous changes.
After fifty-seven years, this school started
for the education and uplifting of the Indians, is now the largest ProtestaLt Mission
School among the Dakota Indians, and is the
central station of the Dakota Mission of the
Congregational aud Presbyterian Churches,
with a yearly enrollment of nearly one hundred and fifty resident students and two hun-
derd in its correspondence department. Thousands have been under the school's influence,
educatiug them to appreciate Christian civilization. And it is the personality of missionaries that brings about such a change.
Dr. Alfred Riggs died on April 15, 1916.
Mrs. Mary Riggs died suddenly, February
27, at Wilder, Minnesota. Services were
held at the Mission Chapel ou March 4, and
she was laid at rest by the side of her husband in the cemetery on the hill.
Mrs. Kig{-S
generation at Sautee some of the inspiration which we received from your mother.
Goethe in his 'Faust' says: 'What you have
inherited from your fathers, acquire it to
possess it.' In other words, au inheritance is
not ours until we have made it our own by
work. But to do so, we need the inspiration
of those that have trodden the same path and
have reached the goal, 'a house not made
with hands, eternal in the heavens.' "
Dr. Charles Hall, Superintendent Emeritus,
of the Congregational Fort Berthold Reservation Mission writes: "Your mother was
so much to me during my first year and a
half in a new country, and iu later years in
the great experience of my life, that I feel
her passing on before me.
"We sympathize with you in your feeling
of a void made in life. There is, too, a feeling of triumph,—a goal has been reached, a
victory won. One who like our Savior, did
not 'break the bruised reed, nor quench the
smoking flax,' has conquered by geutle persuasion.    So may we."
c Tributes To Mrs. Riggs
Rev. Rudolf Hertz writes:   "While unable
to be with you in person Mrs. Hertz and I are | a^"^^r,"and "your remembrances of he
with you in spirit to   honor the memory of
Dr. G. W. Reed, from the Standing
Roek Mission field writes: "Mrs. Reed joins
me iu sending you our heartfelt sympathy in
your bereavement.     You have lost a splen-
yonr mother. Mrs. Hertz is glad to have
had an opportunity to visit with your mother last fall, and I am grateful for the few
but inspiring contacts I have had with her.
I shall never forget her giving out the
first Santee High School diplomas last spring,
nor the few. glimpses she passed on to me
of the early struggles of the Sautee School.
"But to you, the great loss is not that of
a pioneer who helped to lay the very founda
tions of our mission and to form the characters of numberless boys and girls, and men
and women, to you she is above all "mothers".
It was a blessed privilege to have her with
you for so many years, aud now that she has
joined your father and others that preceded
her, I hope and pray that you and the other
children will feel with us that she is indeed
receiving the crown of life, the reward of
many faithful years..
"I hope  that at the mission council we can
set aside a time to pass on  to tbe present
will always be an inspiration. She has gone
to a sure reward for all her years of faithful
service. It is now too late to attend the funeral, but our hearts aud prayers will be
with you."
Rev. George W. White, Associate Secretary of the American Missionary Association
writes: "Everything else is overshadowed by
the sad news of the passing of your mother. Motherlove is one of the universal ties
that binds us all in bands of fellowship.
May I therefore be permitted to express to
you the sympathy of my innermost heart in
this hour of your trial. I cannot help but
feel that she must have died in the fullness
of joy that her children had given of her
spirit in the uplift of that portion of mankind with whom you have labored the best
years of your life aud iu whose behalf your
heart will ever be interested. Our parents
ask no greater reward than that we have
been of service to mankind."
Dr. T. L. Riggs, of Oahe, So, Dak., writes:
"A message from Olive last night tells of your
mother's call to life above; her body to be
taken to rest with your father's. Life here is
a wonderful thing. Life in the household
of the Father above will be far more—so
beyond our comprehension now—we shall
know Him."
Prof. Robert B. Riggs, youngest brother
of Dr. A. L. Riggs, in writing to Fred Riggs
says: "Your mother's many years, so full of
the joy of life and of usefulness, were a lesson
for all of us. I take it that it was her love
for, and sympathy with, all around her that
made her life full of interest and out going.
It gave her a full life a blessing to all. Too
many of us are wrapped up in a small self,
which grows smaller as time goes by. You
surely will be rich in blessed memories of
both mother and father."
Secretary F. L. Brownlee, of the American
Missionary Association, writes from the New
York office as follows: "I never had the opportunity to know your mother as others
have had, but it was a pleasure to me to meet
her at our conferences. She was so quiet, so
dignified, so gentle, open-minded and intensely interested in what we did at our conferences. I am glad that you have had such a
fine mother and sympathize with you keenly
in the loss of her."
Professor McMurtry, of Yankton College,
writes: "The news of your mother's death
carries my mind back to the days when your
father was such a wise and efficient counselor
and helper of the college; and in those efforts
I know he found encouragement and support
in her. So the smpathy of Mrs. McMurtry
and myself has gone out to you in your sorrow. For her at her age, we know of course,
that it was better than to linger too long."
From Rev. A. I. Tibbets, one of our native
pastors, a Santee graduate: "In 1885 I was
one of the very ignorant boys who went from
Montana to Santee to school, and began to
know Dr. and Mrs. A. L. Riggs. As I grew
up in that school Mrs. Riggs came to be to me
a picture of the "worthy woman" as described
in Proverbs 31: 10-31. The way Mrs. Riggs
kept her household and brought up her family inspired all of us who were iu the Santee
school to do likewise, and in the kaeping of
our homes aud the bringing up of our families, wherein we have succeeded is because of
what we lerned from Mrs. Riggs, for which
we owe her our everlasting gratitude.
"Dr. aud Mrs. A. L. Riggs did as Jesus
said, took His yoke upon them and in that
way they worked togatber to build at-Santee
a- school that was fitted to the needs of the
Indians, aud the Indian young people trained there went out to help their people, both
in the churches and in the service of the
Government. The Santee school has been like
a fruit tree and the fruit is the good men and
women that we now see in all the Indian
country. Thru the Bible Correspondence
Department, the Santee school has educated
many hundreds of Indian men and women
who have not been able to go to it. The progress of our Indian people is shown by our
Santee school last year becoming a full high
school, and we rejoiced that Mrs. A. L. Riggs
lived to give the certificates at the close of
school last year of the first class to graduate
from the full high school course. Dr. and
Mrs. A. L. Riggs gave up their lives working
for us that we might have better lives. Now
they have finished their work and gone to
their rest and we must see that their work is
continued in our lives, and in that of our
children."