General Conference Bulletin, vol. 5
Central Union Conference
E. T. RUSSELL
REPORT BY THE PRESIDENT, E. T. RUSSELL
I take pleasure in presenting to this Conference a summary of the resources, extent of territory, and the work that has been accomplished in the Central Union Conference from Jan. 1, 1901, to Jan. 1, 1903. GCB April 2, 1903, page 46.10
This conference was organized at Topeka, Kansas, April 18, 1902. It comprises five organized conferences, viz., Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, Missouri, and Colorado; also, included in its boundaries are Wyoming and New Mexico. It has 656,240 square miles of territory, with a population of 8,639,854; total church membership about 13,200; organized churches, 343 (Eight churches were organized in 1902.); unorganized companies, 62; isolated Sabbath-keepers, 757; church buildings, 180; ordained ministers, 72; licentiates, 47; licensed missionaries or Bible-workers, 90; total laborers on conference pay-roll, 196; church edifices erected in 1902, 13; number of Sabbath-schools, 484; number of church-schools, 53; membership of church-school, 808; number of schoolhouses built, eight; number of treatment-rooms, eight; number of vegetarian restaurants, seven; number of sanitariums, four; number of health-food factories, five; average number of canvassers in 1901, 48; retail value of books sold in 1901, $34,381.45; average number of canvassers in 1902, 48; retail value of books sold in 1902, $48,654.27; total tithe receipts in 1902, $104,572.71; amount of tithe appropriated to fields outside of Union Conference, $14,373.53; annual offerings to foreign missions, $5,577.45; weekly offerings to foreign missions, $7,605.58; miscellaneous offerings to foreign missions, $7,021.67; total Sabbath-school offerings, $4,357.22; Sabbath-school offerings to foreign missions, $4,255.19. GCB April 2, 1903, page 46.11
UNION COLLEGE
Union College has an enrollment of about 424 students, and a good influence has seemed to permeate the school, so they have had but very little trouble this year in the matter of discipline. The students have also been active in missionary work. They have organized missionary societies, and have been engaged in mailing tracts and papers and in house-to-house work in the city of Lincoln. They have also raised $100 with which to educate a student in one of the South American schools. GCB April 2, 1903, page 46.12
The college bakery has had an increased patronage over former years, and has increased its facilities by the addition of a new oven. There has been added to the printing department a small cylinder press, and at present the college is doing the press and composition work for the “Central Advance.” They are also doing the press work for the three foreign papers, as they have been removed to College View since the burning of the Review and Herald Publishing House. These papers are now comfortably located in connection with the college, and since the fire they have received as donations with which to purchase new material, such as type, etc., as follows: German paper, $1,040; Danish-Norwegian, $650; Swedish, $300. GCB April 2, 1903, page 46.13
SUMMER SCHOOL
During the coming summer a training-school for teachers will be conducted at Union College, that teachers may be better instructed in the methods of church-school work. No tuition will be charged, and only the nominal sum of $2.25 per week required to cover room rent and board. The educational secretary of the Central Union Conference and the state school superintendents will act as instructors. GCB April 2, 1903, page 46.14
COLLEGE INDEBTEDNESS
The original debt of Union College before the sale of “Christ’s Object Lessons” was $79,000. There has been paid on the principal, up to Feb. 24, 1903, $48,940.70. Present indebtedness, $31,825.90. The $25,000 taken over by the Central Union Conference Association from the General Conference Association is not included in this amount. GCB April 2, 1903, page 46.15
There were four state and ten local camp-meetings held during the summer of 1903. At these camp-meetings there were many conversions. GCB April 2, 1903, page 47.1
SANITARIUMS
Our three largest sanitariums, viz., Boulder, the Nebraska, and the Iowa Sanitariums, have had a good patronage. This is true of Boulder during the summer season, and it is true of the Nebraska and Iowa Sanitariums during both the summer and winter months, as they have this winter had their rooms well filled with patients. GCB April 2, 1903, page 47.2
A new health-food bakery has been erected at Des Moines, Iowa, in connection with the Iowa Sanitarium, and one at College View, in connection with the Nebraska Sanitarium. GCB April 2, 1903, page 47.3
A state school has been established at Stuart, Iowa, with an enrollment of sixty, and several conversions have been reported as the result of the work there. GCB April 2, 1903, page 47.4
The Central Union Conference has been supporting three or four German laborers in St. Louis, Missouri, and, as a result, quite a number have embraced the truth. We are also supporting, at the present time, a laborer in Mexico, and we have agreed to support the editors of the three foreign papers for one year, believing that in so doing we will be doing commendable missionary work, as heretofore the papers have not been considered self-supporting, and these papers have a wide mission field into which they enter. GCB April 2, 1903, page 47.5
All of the conferences comprising this Union are in good condition financially, and most of them have been contributing quite liberally of workers and means to the support of the foreign work. Twelve laborers are being supported by tithes from different states in the Central Union, in other lands, and, at their late conference, Colorado voted to support three more of its workers, in addition to those it is already supporting, in foreign countries. GCB April 2, 1903, page 47.6
As a conference, we feel to express our gratitude to God for His prospering care over us, realizing that, “Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it.” As the wheels of time roll swiftly on, signs in the social, religious, and physical world agree with the prophetic utterances, clearly indicating that we are near the borders of eternity. Oh, that we may labor earnestly as we have but a short time in which to accomplish the work that God expects of this people! GCB April 2, 1903, page 47.7
“Oh, wake Thy slumbering people;Send forth the solemn cry;
Let all the saints repeat it—
The Saviour draweth nigh.”
GCB April 2, 1903, page 47.8