THE GUATEMALAN FOUNDATION
presents
THE COMPLETE
FINAL REPORT
for 50 YEARS OF TOTAL
DEDICATION--of many caring & faithful people
--The TWELVE STRONG & WHAT
THEY HELPED US ACCOMPLISH—
--32 MEMORABLE HISTORICAL
EFFORTS, EVENTS & ACCOMPLISHMENTS
in
THE JUNGLES & MOUNTAINS OF
THE MAYA
PREFACE to the
COMPLETE FINAL
REPORT
The GUATEMALAN FOUNDATION was quietly
retired, with no fanfare, after 50 years of service, on August 19, 2017—50 years after the Andersen Family crossed the
border into Guatemala to begin on our own what was called for 3 years the
Andersen Family Private Peace Corp
Report by "life-long volunteer Field Director," Cordell M.
Andersen,
IMPORTANT NOTE: Some of the beginning will be similar to
what you might have seen before, but believe me there is a lot of new, and
exiting reports with many photos you’ve never seen before including
emotional items of “the rest of the story!”
So, read-on……I always expressed gratitude and
felt overwhelmingly blessed for having been the servant of my Guatemalan
brothers and sisters for 50 YEARS—actually for 64 years since the beginning of my LDS
mission in Central America in 1956.
Above, I’m expressing gratitude kneeling at a Mayan altar from the “Religious
Center” of the Valparaiso—Ancient Fortified City, interestingly joined by my
guard dog, Goku—one day I hope to
learn if he really knew what he was doing.
My partner during some of those
years was Dr. Carl Jacob who told me of being greatly stimulated in his
interest in helping the “Lamanites,” Mormon terminology for Indigenous
Americans, on hearing LDS Apostle Melvin J. Ballard tell a
group of Spanish speaking missionaries,
"A
call to a Lamanite mission is a life-long call."
By the end of my mission in 1958,
I felt that even though I didn't learn about the statement until I was already
back in Guatemala living and working among the rural Mayans in remote
Guatemala. Daily I reflect gratefully on the Lord blessing me as He did, and
never cease to pray He will bless me to somehow be worthy of such an incredible
blessing and help me be deserving of my greatest beloved friends being the
thousands of brothers and sisters I was able to serve to the best of my ability
for more than half a century. The love was and is profound. Thanks.
The following
COMPLETE FINAL REPORT is:
A historical distilling of
50 years of twists, turns, and complexities-
--sometimes humorous, often
inspiring--
At times tragic and
controversial when perplexing decisions
& judgments were made based on "erroneous reports"
and
"widespread misunderstanding."
Yet, in the end, a fascinating
history of human conflict & triumph
I have struggled to make a summarized report that
accurately portrays the most important aspects of this 50+ year long
effort. The controversial history
is included for the first time with many details.
This is a sincere and
honest effort to tell what has been called "the rest of the
story," it’s need to
be told foreshadowed at the 10-year point by the BONNEVILLE
CORPORATION, that considered the astonishing story worth telling in their
first feature-length dramatic movie as explained in item #28. The next 40 years made it much more compelling
and historically meaningful. But it could only be understood and honestly
retold by rare individuals with "open minds and understanding
hearts" capable of comprehending fairly and telling the story
with integrity. I am the only one who really knows the history, and am believed
to be an honest man by key actors in the drama, like, Harold Brown, Enrique
Rittscher, and Oliverio Guerrero who trusted me so completely it was almost
scary—read on to see if they were right in their judgment.
THE
LORD’S COUNSEL TO TELL THE STORY
To guide me in gradually revealing all—I had a very profound dream, that two times was
interrupted by waking for various reasons, but each time as I went back to bed,
the dream continued without missing a beat, convincing me it was much more than
a simple dream==it really was A VISION IN A DREAM. A brief summary
of this unique spiritual experience was told in Part 1: THE MYSTERIOUS CAUSE
& THE PREPARATION TO ACT...., and
needs not be repeated, except for the conclusion, which was a message in bold
letters, clearly from the Lord, who said:
"SPEAK THE TRUTH FROM YOUR HEART!"
I accepted the guidance specifically for doing
this series of historical reports:
Part 1: The MYSTERIOUS CAUSE
and PREPARATION TO ACT and have the Courage to Make the Risky…Journey,
Part 2:
The RISKY, BREATHTAKING 1967 PIONEER JOURNEY TO THE JUNGLES
& MOUNTAINS OF THE MAYA. and,
Part 3: The COMPLETE FINAL REPORT
THE THEME OF THE
ADMITTEDLY IDEALISTIC
QUIXOTIC/AMMON-like
ADVENTURE
ALWAYS WAS:
"No man is a true believer unless he desires
for his brother that which he desires for himself"
See Jacob 2:13- 19,& D&C 38:25, --
expanded in item #28 and elsewhere
Let me just say that what follows is
a testament to the many who encouraged and gave
generous support—
like my children
& grandchildren seen below at the dedication of the
Ariel & Ines Andersen Chuluc School near Patzicia in 1987.
Likely not much of what
I describe here would have happened as it did without them, and
OTHER KEY EARTHLY
INDIVIDUALS—such as:
THE TWELVE STRONG & KEY SUPPORTING ACTORS
& CONTINUAL
HELP FROM THE LORD.
Especially were all of them critical for one who really was a "novice," or
as some began calling me a "RODEO CLOWN," –How that began is explained in
item #11. It
wasn’t meant as a compliment, but I loved it and continue to use it—we have to
learn to laugh at ourselves as often as possible, and some of us are open to that frequently!
Some called the attempt "CRAZY," or “QUIXOTIC.” On our arrival in
1967 the
LDS
Mission President, David Clark, was mystified, saying
"I wouldn't ever attempt what you
say you came here to do!"
Yet,
someone once said:
"IT'S ONLY CRAZY UNTIL IT IS
ACCOMPLISHED!"
and
"GREAT WORKS & GREAT
FOLLY MAY BE INDISTINGUISHABLE AT THE OUTSET."
So, "at the
outset," judgment should be put on hold, ignoring what
rumors and gossip you might have heard—no matter who it came from, and taking
time to go over the three historical reports with an open, unbiased mind,
and see if it ended up being a
"GREAT FOLLY," or a "GREAT
WORK"
in its
long term effect in the world.
*****************************************
The TWELVE STRONG...
plus supporting actors without
whom....who knows?
FIRST and foremost, my father, ARIEL A.
ANDERSEN & his wife—my mom.
Both of whom blessed my life in so many ways, and
actually got me started right on our second attempt to leave for Guatemala,
when dad humbly accepted my request for a Father's Blessing and
was faithful to his blessing, they together giving their all to help until
their passing years later in 1983 and 1986—14 of those years, an—AMMON-LIKE MISSION—dad organizing & managing as a non-paid
volunteer what today is THE GUATEMALAN FOUNDATION.
Others in the family likewise
were generous "supporting actors," like ALL
OF MY CHILDREN, and my older brother, Marlo, one of
the major contributors in the first years, who even persisted right up past
the Golden Anniversary,
with an extra donation.
I can't
mention everyone as the list is long, but other crucial "supporting
actors" were those in the first years, like: The very first contribution
from WESTON KILLPACK, and his Highland High School LDS Seminary, critical to helping us
get started. The organization of the Foundation by my father and friends
is mentioned in item
#7, which Foundation continued until the Golden
Anniversary on August 19, 2017 having:
Saved thousands and helped many tens of thousands
receive an education."
***************************
SECOND, my friend and brother since the first day of my LDS
mission in May 
1956 J. Frederick “TOBY” PINGREE, who
was a big-time helper from even before the Foundation was organized with a
$5,000 business loan—turned into a
contribution once the Foundation was organized. Then continuing over more
than 50 years right up to the end, and who in the '80s brought on
board others from his family, especially his brother, Dr. GEORGE
PINGREE, joined at the hip with
Toby, sharing this "Second" spot on the
critical list of THE STRONG;
******************
After my
parent's passing, others from the family took up the baton: Uncles, cousins,, and of special note—
THIRD,
my 2nd cousin JOSEPH JENSEN
He was
contacted about our work back before the new century when the Foundation
was
kind of desperate and I did a Family Promotion using my mom's
old address book from 1986. My cousin Nelda, on my father's side of the
family received that promotion and passed it on to her son, Joseph, that
led to him making contact and it evolved into him becoming the greatest
contributor in the Foundation's history, without whom the last 17-18
years would have been vastly different, likely only with just small, but still
important--Educational & Emergency Aid projects.
NOTE: He was gratefully another of those who made two other large
donations after we had completed our 50 years of serving the Mayan people in
August 2017. One of them recently in March 2018 after the special SCHOOL
SUPPLIES promotion. THANKS, JOE.
********************************
FOURTH, a
couple who I called "The Most Persistent," DOUG CAMPBELL
and his wife Rinez
The Campbells, since reading about us in the July 1971 ENSIGN
have contributed every month with sometimes large extra
donations--Breathtakingly for 46 years--even an extra donation after the GOLDEN
ANNIVERSARY in August!
NOTE: Now in 2018 we can say they've done it for 47 years, as they are among the 5 who have donated in March as a result
of the extra promotion among a few to help Federico and me with the 2018 SCHOOL
SUPPLIES PROJECT in which we provided 1,560 of the neediest with supplies to
get them started right. THANKS, DOUG & RINEZ.
**********************************
FIFTH, he
we call "The Most Incredible," HAL
POULSEN & wife, NEVA
At the time of the Great
Earthquake of 1976, they gave 6 months of their lives with us,
leaving their
vehicle, trailer and tools, then continued as contributors, and in the
end when Hal was able to retire, after beginning to receive Social
Security, worked one extra year as a part-time school bus driver,
and had all of his salary direct deposited into the Foundation's bank
account!
NOTE: We have to add a SPECIAL THANKS TO HAL & NEVA, as they also
donated again in March 2018 to help us with the SCHOOL SUPPLIES
PROJECT. Gratefully they are those who "DON'T GIVE
UP.....EASILY!"
****************************
Then, dear ex-missionary companion and life-long
friend,.......
SIXTH, C. JESS GROESBECK
Jess stuck with us since missionary days in 1957, when we called
ourselves"Nicaraguan Elders," seen to the right--who
inspired me as in my mind he was "the hardest working LDS
missionary of all time." He continued as a friend for
decades, with many years as Chairman the Board of the Foundation, including
when there evolved a lot of controversies.
*****************************
SEVENTH, LDS Apostle EZRA TAFT BENSON & later President of the LDS CHURCH
When an Apostle
he also had been Secretary of Agriculture in the Cabinet of President
Dwight
Eisenhower, who impressed me, prior to us going to Guatemala at a BYU
Devotional, when he said,
"If I were young again, I'd go south!"
Then once in
Guatemala in 1968 when I was working on one of my purposes of going to
Guatemala, which was, Get out on the front lines combating the threat of
communism that was coming close to turning Guatemala into another Cuba, which effort, among other things,
involved me showing a USIS documentary, "Revolution
Betrayed," about Cuba, and created fear in Mission leaders
that the Mormon chapel in Coban might be bombed, and I was ordered to
desist. I rather wrote consulting with two LDS General Authorities
in Utah, that resulted in two interesting replies:
One, from the
highest level—from First Presidency counselor, Marion G. Romney, who told
me to just read the Church's statement
about communism and then shut up! The other reply
was fascinating, from Apostle Ezra Taft Benson, congratulating me for my efforts and basically telling me,
POUR IT ON—which I
continued to do for the next 49 years!
Years later as
President of the Church he made comments about the importance of the Book of
Mormon which further endeared me gratefully
to him. He said……..
(President Benson,
CR, Oct. 1984, pp. 4-5)
My beloved
brethren and sisters, for some years now I have been deeply concerned that we
are not using the Book of Mormon as God intends. As I participated in
the Mexico City Temple dedication, I received the distinct impression that God
is not pleased with our neglect of the Book of Mormon. In the
eighty-fourth section of the Doctrine and Covenants, the Lord decreed that the
whole Church was under condemnation, even all the children of Zion, because of
the way they treated the Book of Mormon. "And they shall remain under this condemnation until they
repent," said the Lord,
"and remember the new covenant, even the Book of Mormon"
(D&C 84:57). “Zion cannot fully arise and put on her beautiful garments if
she is under this condemnation.” (See D&C 82:14).
I had come to understand this as a missionary in 1958 when inspired with
the Good
Life Method to get the Sacred Book of the Indigenous peoples
back in their hands to help them come out
of darkness into the light and blossom as I explain in item #4.
President Benson’s
statement, pronounced at the 17 year point of our history, so much in harmony
with our effort, further had him become very important during our many years
of effort, but sadly near the end of his
life he joined others in showing he was also human, which also teaches us the
lesson how careful all of us should be in judging others.
CONCERNING HIS STUMBLE: Since all of us humans are
“flawed,” as President of the
Church in 1988-89, he failed to recognize what might be called "a
big whopper" with
tragic consequences in the Santa
Cruz Verapaz/Valparaiso area as will be explained in The LDS Church History for
Alta Verapaz in item #12 & #28 of
this FINAL REPORT.
Apparently, he had no way of knowing that what was
reported to him was not true resulting in its profoundly disastrous human
consequences.
Some will object to me relating
such instances of mistakes and injustice in this FINAL REPORT, but the Lord told me to
“Speak the truth
from your heart”
The
Gospel teaches us that all need to have an honest chance to recognize our mistakes and
have
"a broken heart & contrite spirit,"
and be able to……
MAKE RESTITUTION WITH THOSE HURT & EARN FORGIVENESS!
Mistakes are not
failures if all of us, including Church leaders, can take advantage of knowing
about them to be able to repent, repair the damage done, and do better in the
future.
But, it is worth repeating that from early on President Benson was still a
giant motivator and supporter—especially in the anti-communist aspects of our work in
Guatemala, and his insistence on the importance of the Book of Mormon,
that was so much in harmony with our half
century effort that we will always be grateful for him and President
Kimball, explained next.
**************************
EIGHTH, SPENCER
W. KIMBALL, Apostle & later President of the LDS Church.
It has to
be mentioned in this PREFACE—that when criticism
was mounting from
people of our own religious community—with "a spirit of competition &
contention, rather than of cooperation, and gratitude," in
1971 he requested a private interview with me in Guatemala City when there for
a Stake Conference. I made the long trip from Valparaiso to the City, taking
with me our first four young men to be set apart as Local Missionaries,
including Daniel Choc, and Miguel Max—both among my most unforgettable Guatemalans.
Elder
Kimball congratulated me for what we were doing, gave suggestions how to
promote the Foundation, and encouraged us to persist saying, "Don't pay any attention to criticism as such had
also happened anciently to Ammon and his companions who were 'laughed to
scorn' by their own people."
I know he was referring to criticism from what could be called low
level "friendly fire," but perhaps he also
perceived it would come from some of his companions in Church leadership.
I was prepared for almost anything, except in the beginning--not for
that, but had to be a quick learner and
not be bullied unjustly—not even by “his companions,” and consequently was
able to survive the 50+ year effort, when in the beginning it was predicted we
would only last 6 months.
One year
later, in 1972, he was supportive of a unique effort by the Valparaiso LDS Group that
was in our 3rd year with no deaths at Valparaiso, where previously
an average of 8 infants died every year, and he helped win its authorization by the Church Financial
Department. It became a key part of stopping rampant death in
the area for 3 years and demonstrated a strategy that was revolutionary and
potentially applicable on a worldwide scale—as explained in item
#12—which item now
includes CRUCIAL EVENTS THAT CHANGED THE COURSE OF HISTORY. But Elder Kimball's encouragement was of key
importance in the 50+ years of history reported in this COMPLETE FINAL REPORT
that developed into…..
"Saving thousands and helping many tens of
thousands receive an education."
*********************
NINTH, Regional Representative, HAROLD BROWN for the LDS Church
He was a true
friend and came to us in "our moment of greatest
need" in 1973 and
again in 1986. He understood
completely some negative things that were happening, and not only repeated
the advice given by Kimball, but was the first to begin calling our
effort "Ammon-like," and insisted we couldn’t let opposition, even from the highest
level, stop us.
He encouraged us to persist and gave us encouraging news—about a World-Wide
humanitarian organization our efforts had inspired. See item #12.
He promised his support, and gave
it faithfully, while others—close friends and relatives who should have known
better, failed.
Later when my life became even more
controversial—some details of which
another leader advised me "Don’t tell anyone as no one will
understand,” Brown engaged with me in a long and frank
conversation that included “the rest of
the story,” and not only was he the
rare exception—understanding, but promised and actually gave his continual
support—including volunteering to be a Trustee for the Foundation and persisted
until age-related conditions ended his effective life. But, for many
years he was a lifesaver whose support and encouragement helped make possible
achieving our GOLDEN
ANNIVERSARY serving the needy in Guatemala! See details
in items #12, #14, 15, 16, 18 & #28. NOTE:
In the last item I will relate my
conversation with him that had him understanding and giving his support when
many failed.
***************************
TENTH, ENRIQUE RITTSCHER, also a one-time LDS Regional
Representative.
He was the first
key Guatemalan of crucial influence and help, and one of the great
men of
my earthly experience who was a genuinely honest man and a true friend—who helped and encouraged us in many ways.
He understood clearly why in the eyes of some I became controversial—he explaining,
"Cordell is a
pioneer helping the Mayan peoples, and an outsider free from the control of
the establishment and thereby a threat to some insecure leaders and
bureaucrats who felt they had to oppose Cordell no matter how right,
inspired and effective his methods were!"
Brother Rittscher
persisted as a sincere friend, eventually volunteering to co-sign for credit
purchases for crucial expansion, and becoming my partner in almost introducing
Kentucky Fried Chicken into Guatemala.
On his first visit
to Valparaiso, he surprised us entering our crude office where I was busy
training a couple of Vocational Students in accounting, and record-keeping,
when he saw Miguel Max on the floor under a table with a slide projector
viewing in that semi-darkness the Foundation slide show, “The Testimony of Miguel Max.”
Enrique smiled broadly at the scene, and said, “I don’t know who that is under the table on the floor, but I foresee
that he will one day be a leader in the Church!” NOTE: A few years later Miguel became
my Counselor in the First District Presidency of the Verapaces, and described
last as one of the TWELVE STRONG! He would have become much more than that, but
as mentioned when I describe him, he was among many of the best whose faith was
damaged by unrighteous leadership.
Enrique was very sensitive to the
needs of those less fortunate, and I can add that when he perceived injustice in any form he would
boldly speak up and refuse to be silenced. This eventually made him controversial
too—when he was the REGIONAL
REPRESENTATIVE for the General Authorities, and he lobbied for more concern
and effective help for the needy. He considered the attitudes of his superiors “hard-hearted” that evolved into what shocked some in the LDS religious
community when he wrote a letter to the Church President requesting his name be
removed from the membership records. It
wasn’t a shock for me as he had confided to me some details of what he was
experiencing with superiors in Church leadership.
Some in our religious community
are bothered by the controversy Enrique and I created by being honest and
following the dictates of the Spirit, and automatically conclude something was
wrong with him, and me, dishonestly refusing to consider other sources for the
controversies. Brother Rittscher and I both fit into what I
believe was said by Aristotle, something like,
"If you don't want to be
criticized, say nothing, do nothing, and be nothing."
Both of us rather focused on DOING, BEING HONEST—REFUSING TO BE SILENCED, and doing our
best TO BE what
we were supposed to be in defending what we believed deeply the Lord felt
was right, true, and just.
**********************
ELEVENTH, FEDERICO VELIZ
PACAY
A dedicated and devout Catholic who became early on my partner
in helping his
people—persisting for 42
years. He is….
“THE VOLUNTEER OF ALL VOLUNTEERS”
….explained
with much more detail in item #19 that describes the new
approach of Foundation work from 1979 on when we did as LDS leaders wanted and
had our work free of the LDS image with my two representatives both being
devout Catholics which opened up all rural areas of Guatemala to our work,
and multiplied many times our influence in what we began calling “a preparatory work,” but worthy of mention right here the
following about Federico after the Foundation was retired.
SPECIAL
NOTE: After the Foundation was retired at the end of
2017, he persisted on his own responding to the pleas of 5 of the neediest
rural schools in his area, took all of the Emergency Fund of $1,103 the
Foundation had given him in parting, plus he borrowed $414 from a sister,
and provided 1,560 students with supplies to begin the 2018
School Year. Since his monthly retirement pay is only $468, he did ask me
if he couldn't get some help--to at least be able to pay off the loan, so
I took the balance of $700 in my Emergency Fund, provided by the Foundation as
its final expenditure, and sent it to him to "help a little," making his personal
donation for the project, $817.
Afterward, the FIVE mentioned above gratefully
responded to a special promotion to help us with $1,295 of the $1,517 spent on
the supplies. The generosity of the FIVE has now made possible building
back up most of Federico's Emergency Fund, as well as mine. So in the
final accounting, we also donated about $100 each. Federico is profoundly
grateful for this help, as am I--since my retirement income is only a
little more than Federico's. But,
it is clear that Federico's personal dedication to his people is
breathtaking!
*****************************
TWELFTH to complete my list of real heroes, one who represents the
Mayans, MIGUEL MAX
He was one of my first vocational students,
but who didn't last long as I needed
help quick, and so he
also became my first Supervisor in charge of a
growing herd of cattle, and my
leading companion pursuing cattle rustlers in the mountains. Then was the one who came dashing in from
patrol duty interrupting our evening Family
Hour announcing "the guerrillas are here," as
well as my companion in fighting off invaders and helping put a
bunch in jail.
He also
was the first Maya/Poqomchi to be called as a local
missionary for the LDS Church, first from Valparaiso to become
the Manager of Valparaiso, then elected President of
the Valparaiso Cooperative in an effort to help the Indians become
owners, and then my Counselor in the new Alta/Baja Verapaz LDS
District Presidency. Tragically in 1989 when “the big Whopper”
was believed by Church leaders and they took unrighteous action, Miguel’s
faith was also shaken—not in the Gospel, rather in the Leaders, as happened to many, but I know the Lord
understands the total sincerity of his honest reaction and his place in the
eternities is assured.
He also was
key in the CHULAC ADVENTURE, and my companion
in THE GREAT MACHAQUILA RIVER ADVENTURE in dugout, motorized canoes—another adventure not even told yet, but
mentioned in the Note at the end of item #16. Miguel is seen above with me when meeting him in 2016 after years
of separation. No other words but to say, I'm
grateful for him, love him and have him in my heart and prayers always.
***************************
SPECIAL STATEMENT FROM A SUPPORTING ACTOR STEVE
COVEY
I feel
moved to add here a person I consider an important "supporting actor" whose statement
was unexpected
and extremely motivating, who in 1977, when one of the Vice-Presidents of
BYU, attended a special fireside up Hobblecreek Canyon at the home of
Phil Christensen—one of the founders of the Foundation, and at the end said:
"I
came here expecting to find an Albert Schweitzer, but found someone who just
didn't talk theory, principles, and dreams—like the rest of us do, but more like a modern
Brigham Young, who actually is doing what he says he believes."
*********************
OTHER KEY SUPPORTING ACTORS/ACTRESSES
My special daughter MAHANA—who works full-time to support
herself and son,
Ryan, and she also goes to school full-time to become a
Registered Nurse. Nonetheless, after
making a large donation in August 2017, she also donated again to help her
people, becoming the FOURTH
DONOR of the five for
2018. THANKS, MAHANA, you are one of the great "supporting actresses."
BEST
FOR LAST—AN INCREDIBLE SUPPORTING ACTOR
WITHOUT WHOM THIS REPORT WOULD NOT EXIST & MUCH MORE
My
wonderful son, JESSE—when
we moved back to the U.S. in 2002, was a
junior in high School, but already becoming an expert with computers and the
internet. He was shocked to learn
that the Foundation didn’t even have a website, so he created one and
forced the rest of us to fill in the blanks, opening up
the modern era of the
Foundation. Of course he became my
professor in computer science, and with unbelievable patience has helped me
do the impossible over the years with the computer. He
then clewed us in that the name of the Foundation for Indian Development, on a Google
search took one to India, so we changed the name to the GUATEMALAN FOUNDATION. He has been my life saver, and I love him a
ton and am grateful for him letting me park my Cabin-A alongside of his home in
American Fork.
Best give credit also to
the FIFTH DONOR from the special promotion.
It was long-time donor, ALBERT BERNARD, Maria's older
brother. Thanks, Albert.
Others were key "supporting actors" in
crucial ways, like my old fishing buddy, BOB ALLEN & WIFE, LUCETTE, helping
right up to the end.
There are
so many more, for whom I'm most grateful as all helped in a great cause.
My cause became your cause too, and you deserve almost all the
credit;
*******************
Last, let me mention a key "supporting actor,"
MIGUEL ANGEL ORTIZ
He was crucial in
the first years, my friend & brother, who came to me in my time of need as
an 18-year-old, actually was my first vocational student—at least my first graduate as in one year he learned from me how to work with
poultry, cattle, hogs, how to drive, do accounting and business
management, and at 19 became the
Manager during a critical year of development, then returned later
to help make a success out of the Victorias Dairy.....
Miguel is seen to
the right with his wife, Miriam, and son, Oliverio, reported on in 2016 in
Foundation reports.
He was the first Guatemalan to become the Valparaiso
Branch President—only to sadly be damaged in his faith due to
terribly mistaken and tragic leadership decisions—said Leaders more than
deserving of having the symbolic “millstone
hung on their necks!” He is still my beloved brother, one of
the many SUCCESS STORIES, now owning his own cattle ranch north of
Coban-- WOW.........I JUST SAW THE PHOTO/ESSAY AGAIN (LINKED TO
BELOW ) & I HIGHLY RECOMMEND YOU TAKING THE TOUR TO SEE THE AREA,
WHAT ITS GEOGRAPHY and CULTURE ARE LIKE & THE SUCCESS OF THE VOCATIONAL
PROGRAM AT THE VALPARAISO CID, which helped produce Miguel Angel. Click
on: VISIT MIGUEL ANGEL'S RANCH.
************************
A MILLION THANKS TO ALL WHO HELPED MAKE POSSIBLE ALL THE FOLLOWING
LIST and MORE, & WHO DESERVE MOST OF THE CREDIT.
INTRODUCTION
The original list with 23 items, without
photographs has been added to many times--now with 32 items that
have been organized better and put in better chronological order with more than 400 photographs, along
with many tweaks and major additions—and now what could be called
"The rest of the Story."
SO, IF YOU READ AN EARLY VERSION—THIS COMPLETE FINAL
REPORT IS QUITE DIFFERENT
& TO UNDERSTAND THE HISTORY – IT IS CRITICAL TO READ
CAREFULLY AGAIN WHAT FOLLOWS
A part of the new items deal
with successful efforts to support
ourselves—as we
were volunteers with no living allowance of any kind from the
Foundation much less from the LDS Church, for doing religiously motivated
leadership and altruistic activities. Without these key business ventures,
the effort would have only lasted the predicted "six months," rather than 50 years. Our
business profits made possible us Andersen’s being non-paid volunteer Field Directors
for 50 years! Rather than as
gossiped about as “a scam to get
rich,”—the opposite was the truth as our business ventures, time after time
provided the money necessary for critical
Foundation projects by selling old cows for slaughter, selling pine trees, and
even selling parcels of land.
The simple life I now live is a
testament to us having given the cause
our all, as shown in item #28—what you will see is a modern-day equivalent of the simple life I saw
myself living while giving everything to SAVE PEOPLE, all coming from an
NDE—Near Death Experience I had when 16 years old which started this 68 year
history.
The other new items are in the
category of “the rest of the story”
and deal with my family and personal life
as well as the religious history—I finally decided it couldn’t be separated
from the rest of the history, even though at one point the Foundation
leadership felt like it was unnecessary
and that we should only stick to reporting Foundation projects and success
stories—that was fine for the Foundation, but now—being alone, I realize it is crucial to tell the whole story—so, this
COMPLETE FINAL REPORT is a comprehensive history of, like they say, “the whole enchilada!”
The first
two business ventures described are also what the "experts," called
our first "failures," which
has me still smiling. It was coming from those who presented us with our
greatest challenge over the 50 years, which was:
"A spirit of competition
& contention rather than
one of cooperation, and
gratitude."
I'm not complaining—as
actually opposition &
criticism—after we got over the initial disappointment, became tremendously motivating.
I'm rather adding a couple of interesting points without which the
history is not complete. I'll
let you be the judge of the importance of said items.
Admittedly
we were novices—as you've heard me even joke about being called a "Rodeo Clown," or “a
crazy don Quijote,” as I was not a farmer, much less a cattle or
dairyman, nor had a Ph.D. in anything.
Additionally, in 1966 I had made
a presentation in an Ex-Missionary
Reunion in Salt Lake City proposing
something needed to be done to solve the "life & death problems" of those
we all claimed to love, but then told by two ex-missionaries who would
become Church leaders,
"You
don’t have the necessary capital.....nor qualified with
sufficient education."
So I have admitted openly
it was an "impossible
dream....against all odds," and so, as I worked
relentlessly along with my family, I began having fun characterizing
myself as a crazy Don
Quijote de la Mancha, and later really liked the "rodeo clown" label,
as well as proudly, but humbly accepting being called “a modern Ammon,” as I was trying to
follow the example of my real hero of
ancient America, "laughed
to scorn" by those of his own religious community.
But, it’s well
to note that I wasn’t so naive as to imagine that me and family alone would be
able to save all the needy Mayans, or as Mormons call them, "LAMANITES." In
my historical writings I state that my original purpose was to go to work on a small scale as a family,
do as much as we could, learn from the experience, then do more, and more—and:
"Hopefully be a catalyst for action on a big scale by
qualified individuals and well-funded institutions."
We were to experiment with the
strategy I felt was revealed divinely to me as an LDS missionary in Coban in
1958, known as THE PHILOSOPHY
& PRINCIPLES OF THE GOOD LIFE, which began as an effective way to achieve
what I believed was our primary purpose among the Indians—get back
into their hands in an understandable way their original Sacred Book and
let it lead them where it may, rather than just push for impressive baptism
statistics. But having in their hands
their book and understanding it—was just the beginning. It had to evolve into them actually
solving their problems—by applying The Principles, coming out of darkness into
the light, and literally blossoming!
THE PHILOSOPHY would supply them with the
motivation, THE PRINCIPLES would be what they had to understand
and be able to apply in their lives.
We would help as many as we could and by our example lead
the way, learn the necessary methods, and teaching techniques, hoping to awaken
others with a movement—that would likely have us forgotten and never
given any credit—yet evolve into large
scale, significant efforts, and then we would just fade away quietly, but with
a grateful smile watching what we knew our efforts helped stimulate and
hope and pray it could be done effectively. See item #12
NOTE: Here at the outset we have to mention this was not
happening in Indian branches, like Patzicia, where the members were still
living in primitive, unsanitary conditions with their homes and home sites
literally being “incubators for disease and death.” Below we see the home of President Pablo Choc
of the Patzicia Branch —this is how we as a Church helped the most
outstanding LDS family to live in the famous Patzicia area!
The members from Patzicia still suffered the
majority of the elements of “the curse” or “darkness” outlined in
2 Nephi 1, and among them there were infant deaths.
Our covenant as a Church, and brothers and sisters,
was to:
“Think of your brethren like unto yourselves,
and be [friendly] with all and [generous] with your substance, that they may be
rich like unto you.”
BOOK
OF MORMON, Jacob 2:16
They
still didn’t understand what their Sacred Book was about, their sermons all
being from the BIBLE, giving them the appearance of being “evangelicos,” rather
than “awakened Latter Day Saint Lamanite converts.”
At one
point I did a study there discovering that one important chapter from the BOOK
OF MORMON had 22 keywords they did not understand, sometimes even
giving an opposite interpretation—for example
the word “apostasy” they
interpreted as something positive associated with “apostoles!” —even though I was dealing with men who
all claimed to know how to read and write, including the Branch President.
In a
Mutual meeting the week before the GREAT
EARTHQUAKE I helped the 160 in attendance for the first time understand 2
Nephi 1 and the elements of the curse.
They were shocked to realize and admit that in most ways they—supposedly
as converted Lamanites, were still under
“the curse.”
In launching myself and family
into said cause, it was good and critical for me to recognize our
deficiencies and weaknesses, just as I had done as a very small-statured
child and youth--bullied by almost everyone, yet determined to do something
about it—so strengthened myself to not take any guff from anyone. NOTE: For
those interested enough in understanding to have read my Checkered autobiography, Part
1—0 to 22 years, you learned that in “strengthening myself” I came to
believe that I would kill someone if I hit them with a doubled-up fist, so made
my first covenant with the Lord to never hit anyone that way, rather get them
in a stranglehold—literally, but later
symbolically.
You'll notice by reading on that
this, as respectfully as possible, included biting my lip—in the moment at
times, or during the interview with some important Leaders who perplexingly
became part of the "friendly
fire" with whom I soon learned wouldn't accept the opinion
or inspiration of this lowly servant—I just wasn’t a called and chosen member of the establishment—no matter how successful my methods were.
So, I
waited for the interview to end, or for the visiting leader to leave, and then persisted in following the inspiration
received within the jurisdiction of my responsibility and demonstrated with
success that my guidance had come from the Lord.
But from 1966 on I believe those
of my religious, community failed to understand the power of being spiritually
born of God and transformed with a quite well understood divine mission
and calling, with absolute confidence—with, metaphorically:
“The back capable of being strengthened to
carry whatever load was required."
So, in the learning process
we struggled, stumbled at times and had our failures—but not the ones being gossiped about.
But, with everything we learned—recognizing our weaknesses, and with the
help of the Lord plowed forward doing
our best—as our survival, and that of
many Indians depended on us being quick learners. So I
lit the candles (or Coleman lantern) at night and studied to keep
one page ahead of my vocational students, and employees, then literally, put on
my boots and worked with them, often taking the lead with disgusting and even
dangerous tasks....then they would follow.
Actually working and dirtying my
hands had me breaking the Ladino tradition, and that of well-heeled, and finely dressed gringos, and earned
the scorn of many—except for a
few honest people in my business dealings who came to trust me totally, and because of it, the way continually
opened up for even more amazing developments. So, I will add new sections
relating in some detail the acquisition of the Poultry Farm & business,
the Valparaiso
Plantation and especially the cattle
and Dairy business, plus at
the end the Farm of
the Holy Man.
NOTE: You might question why it
is important to mix personal/family business with altruism, but not
only did all of that support us making possible 50 years of managing altruism
as volunteers, but you’ll notice here
and there, it was the business profits that made possible Foundation projects,
when donations were lacking—like when I had promised the people in Patzicia by
a specific date the Foundation would pay for purchasing the property for the
school construction—but the funds didn’t appear from the Foundation, but the
property was paid for by me selling 5 old cows for slaughter. Time after time that pattern
shot down completely the eventual accusation that all “was a scam using the
Foundation and the Church for me to build a business empire and get rich,” but
the opposition didn’t care about facts.
************************
Now on to
the meat of this FINAL REPORT:
THE 32 MEMORABLE EFFORTS,
EVENTS
& ACCOMPLISHMENTS
We'll begin with the item being
gossiped about as our
“FIRST FAILURE."
1. FOR 6 MONTHS, IN THE
BEGINNING, RAN A TRAVELING MOVIE--CINE CHAPINLANDIA—IN THE MOST ISOLATED PART OF THE COUNTRY,
INCLUDING:
Chicaman, San Miguel Uspantan, Cunen, Sacapulas, Aguacatan and Nebaj, showing
educational and good
quality commercial movies to 50,000 people, with my camper, also being A MOBIL
MEDICAL CLINIC & LIBRARY as there were no effective medical
services in most of an area of 200,000 people, and not one library until 1983
when we cooperated with AYUDA to construct and inaugurate one in Cunen.
This experience
began adding to my Army training as a Medical Specialist and preparing me to
perform for many years thousands of medical treatments every year. This literally was a PRIVATE
PEACE CORP of great success. To the right, you see me in
Chicaman unloading the frame for our 9' x 12' movie screen and
getting ready our theater--which was an old abandoned Catholic Church.
Below is Cine Chapinlandia—in Sacapulas, with a view of the spectators
in the outdoor patio of the Catholic Convent which was our theater and
where we spent the night with the priests and nuns.
A most memorable experience was
had with a surprisingly young and beautiful "Mother
Superior," who one
night surprised me in my camper reading the BIBLE. That stimulated a great conversation.
It might have ended up with a great convert if they hadn’t of transferred her
back to Chichicastenango—maybe to keep her away from me!
NOTE: The
Traveling Movie—Cine Chapinlandia, finally had to end as the initial .10 and .15 cents
charge was too much for most of the poor villages, so we reduced it to .05 and
.10, concerned more for getting a large audience and serving the people, than
profit. However, the need of supplying every town with
benches--made during the off-week, and the rough roads that always required
pickup repairs, and also in between it all, a quick trip to Guatemala
City (and back then it was an 8-10 hour journey,--one way, fording
quite a few streams, etc.) to get from the USIS, Canadian, Japanese, &
Israeli Embassies more educational movies, and another commercial one—all of
which caused economically a loss.
But,
it was so enlightening for so many people and provided me with invaluable
experience in so many ways—that I became
convinced that if I was ever like, say—a
mission president, or supervising the Peace Corp, I would have teams of
missionaries, or volunteers, doing precisely that in isolated areas with the
goal of bringing enlightenment to every town in my area, all in harmony with
my "agricultural approach
to helping a needy people"(see item #15) -- cultivating friends all over
the country, helping people in whatever way they needed and were ready
for, and preparing entire areas for even greater things.
But,
our initial capital of $4,273 was disappearing—but the traveling movie $500 loss over 6
months was covered by the first donation from Salt Lake City's Highland
High School LDS Seminary, directed by my old friend, Weston Killpack.
But, to support the family, I needed quickly to find a piece of land, have a
vegetable/fruit garden, and get a business started that would support us.
OF
GREAT IMPORTANCE: The spirit of Cine
Chapinlandia lived on for all our years in Guatemala, showing many movies,
in many places, to instruct, and entertain.
Eventually we produced our own educational videos to awaken, inspire and
enhance the lives of all as explained in item #25
describing the showing of the movie, THE TEN COMMANDMENTS to 10,000
people all around the country. This was
done in schools, chapels of many churches, hospitals, jails, groups of
Alcoholics Anonymous, and even in EL
PAVON—the Federal Penitentiary. In
the beginning, this included movies educating the public about the menace of
communism—which was one of my purposes, as mentioned in the Preface referring
to Ezra Taft Benson as one of THE TWELVE STRONG.
2. THE 1st COMMERCIAL
POULTRY FARM IN NORTHERN GUATEMALA –Granja La Cabana located on the outskirts of San
Juan Chamelco, 30 minutes south of Coban.
Gossiped about as our "2nd FAILURE."
Note: Somewhere in
the History Summaries I talk about and quote a friend who
visited us and
told us about all the "failure" gossip. See item #12.
My search for some land for a
garden and an agro-business to support us abruptly ended on December
5th when just such an opportunity presented itself by a "Captain
Penny" from Florida who had just bought a 50 acre
farm in San Juan Chamelco, 30 minutes south of Coban.
It had a few laying hens ready to
produce, but then due to an emergency Captain Penny had to sell the farm
quickly and return to the U.S.
His hobby was orchids that he
determined its worldwide capital to be Alta Verapaz and had purchased a
property in his Shangri-la.
We took over, and quickly learned
about poultry, doubling the production, only to
learn no one in Coban
wanted our white eggs—famous then for
very pale yolks. I made an emergency trip to the city and with poultry
suppliers, I had already come to know, found a solution—mixing an additive to the feed and producing dark
orange yolks and tasty eggs. After breaking our eggs open in front of
potential customers, contracts were made for all our eggs.
A bonus from the family business
in Provo, Utah, Andersen Sampler's & Consulting Service, due
to work I had done prior to leaving for Guatemala, made possible more than
doubling again the production with 1,000 chicks, and creating what was called
the
First
Poultry Farm in
Northern Guatemala,
By the time our 1,000 chicks had
grown and come into production it was the beginning of the rainy season when
all the Indians planted their corn and corralled their chickens to keep them
from eating the new plants. This caused
many to get sick, and without foraging their production dropped leaving us as
the only provider of eggs in the area, with people every afternoon lining up in
front of our store for me to come with
the eggs, and in 30 minutes we were sold out every day.
Our STORE was in the front of our rental home in
Coban, 30 minutes north of the Farm. In the picture: Julie, then Rich in my arms, in
Maria’s arms, Joey, our first Guatemalan baby born on January 2, 1968, then
David and Cristina.
Note: As a "Rodeo
Clown" and also a sort of nutty Don Quijote kind of guy,
I was soon known--humorously to me as—the
"POULTRY
EXPERT"
in a vast area of Guatemala.
My
only previous experience was….here comes a confession, when
moving to Utah in 1952, with my new teenage buddies from the
Oakhills II Ward, we stole a chicken one dark night, took it to my girl
friend's house (Janet Beck) where she cooked it for us--it was awful! NOTE: By the
way, after becoming a convert I repented of having done that!
By February we had the good
fortune of acquiring the VALPARAISO PLANTATION and so for the
next 6 months I would travel back and forth—The Farm 30 minutes south of Coban
on one dirt road, and the Plantation one hour west on the rough road that was
the “Highway” to Guatemala City, and
I became too divided.
Everything we were doing at the farm we could do at
Valparaiso even more efficiently—and we were already preparing to do it having
built during those months chicken coops at Valparaiso, so in September 1968 I
sold the poultry farm for the same amount spent on it, with the profit
being:
OUT OF THE SUPPOSED “failed farm” WE
GOT THE FOLLOWING:
You can decide…..Was this a failure?
1.) Effectively supporting us for 10 months;
2.) Giving us an incredible education in all aspects of
agriculture in Guatemala, for example planting our first wonderful vegetable
garden in Guatemala….at the farm in deep black soil.
For example, each red potato
plant produced an average of 7 lbs. of potatoes, averaging 1 lb. for each potato,
etc.
3.) Becoming acquainted intimately with the people of Coban and the quirks of marketing in rural Guatemala;
as well as
4.) Knowing the important suppliers in Guatemala City;
5.) Financing our beginning at Valparaiso including importantly the POULTRY
PROJECT, with the building of unique chicken coops and transitioning into the
broiler business.
6.) Plus, I became A CATTLEMAN—with 9 cows and a Jersey bull that had come with
the farm, which herd we drove overland following mountain trails to Valparaiso,
and, as we had treated them and got 100% of them all with calf, soon we had 19
head—all part of the profit from the Farm.
Then, less than a year later,
with a loan from my long-time friend and brother, Toby Pingree, the herd grew
to 69 and soon to 100, and then, as a cattleman, I
failed as a "Rodeo Clown," not being able to save
several employees put in the hospital by our mean Jersey bull--which we
soon sold for slaughter, replacing him—with Toby's help, with a much better, and gentler
Brown Swiss bull pictured further along.
NOTE FOR LDS PEOPLE: Out of the supposed "failure" with
the poultry farm, was also harvested, so to speak, a dedicated
alcoholic, Manuel Ajanel--seen to the right cleaning eggs, and with his wife
Julia, continued with us to Valparaiso where he was
nearly killed in a tragic propane gas explosion, badly burned and disfigured.
Years
later, Manuel, after a time as LDS District President, became the Patriarch
of the Coban LDS Stake as seen above.
Wow, with
all kinds of guidance and blessings from the Lord, what an
incredible "failure!" But, forgive me, you can make that judgment for
yourself.
But, about the Farm being our "2nd
FAILURE." I hope you’ve noticed all the previous 6 points that
had us laughing our heads off all the
way to the BANK!
All of the above examples set the stage for more supposed “failures”
of he who soon would be labeled a RODEO
CLOWN with many trips smiling all
the way to the bank.
********************
3. THE MIRACULOUS ACQUISITION OF
THE VALPARAISO PLANTATION
We had spent every penny of the
$4,273 we had saved to make the move to Guatemala, along with a similar amount
given me as a bonus for extra work done in Andersen Samplers prior to leaving Provo, Utah—in the acquisition of the poultry farm and
doubling and quadrupling egg production. Then in late December 1967 or
early January 1968 I was visited by a couple of Garcia sisters from Santa Cruz.
They, along with their mother,
were the owners of the Valparaiso Plantation located in
Santa Cruz
Verapaz—mid-way to Tactic on the Guatemala City highway, and the road that then
went through Valparaiso and on to San Cristobal Verapaz—and today where the
road takes off to the Chixcoy Hydroelectric Project/dam. They wanted to sell me their 600 acre property.
They had been asking $85,000, but by the time they got to me had come down to
$35,000.
I visited the plantation and had
visions of how I could develop it—along the lines of a dream I had as a missionary in
1958 seeing myself establishing a rural community that was creating a blossoming
among the people.
The only production was from
sugar cane fields and a crude sugar refinery.......
.........the crusher was moved by a 16-foot diameter water wheel, the
juice condensed down then put into molds and after cooling the crude sugar
called “panela” packed for sale, but I envisioned the plantation's great
potential, with its 39 resident Indian families with 240 Poqomchi
Indians who were recognized as the most backward in the country--just what I
wanted to test my ideas.
I offered them $20,000 and they came down to $30,000. I persisted with
$20,000 and they lowered the price to $25,000. I didn't budge and they finally
accepted $20,000, when I reminded them it
wouldn't be a cash purchase, rather
$5,000 down, 2 years running with no payment, then $200/month until paid off—all
with no interest on the unpaid
balance. They accepted! It seemed as though they were obsessed with us
becoming the owners for whatever reasons.
The purchase would be made on February 2, 1968. My father was
prospering in the Sampler business
selling the two year supply of samplers I feverishly produced working an
average of 19 hours/day six days a week for four months before leaving for
Guatemala, and Dad promised to send me another bonus of $6,000.
In the meantime, I was struggling for our permanent residency application
to be accepted as there were complications to be dealt with, one being I had to
show I had more than $10,000 in a Guatemalan Bank—and we only had in the account $1,000 from sales
from eggs, a big chunk of which was spent to cover expenses each month.
So the purchase of Valparaiso had to produce a title clear of any mortgage,
which would be taken care of in a separate document, implicating double lawyer
fees. So we held off paying January expenses, accumulating sales from eggs,
and waited for the bonus to arrive. After it arrived, before
making
the purchase, I got a letter from the Bank showing I had $7,000+ in my
account, and with a copy of Valparaiso’s deed showing a value of $20,000, plus
that of the Farm La Cabaña, worth
$5,000, I would sort of show I owned properties worth $25,000, plus $7,000 cash
in the bank, and I guessed Migration couldn’t turn us down—which is how it
worked out, after proving that Maria really was my legal wife and mother of the
children, rather than as they suspected—a
polygamous wife picked up along the way in Mexico.
The day of the purchase, February 2, 1968, the sisters dropped by and said I’d have to
pay interest on the balance, that I
quickly figured would cost me at least $6,000 more for the property so I told
them the deal was off. They left with
their heads hung low. But, I knew they
would be back, and they were an hour later, saying if I could pay $6,000 down they wouldn’t charge interest on
the balance, That would take my entire bonus,
with the $1,000 left in the bank for January farm expenses used to pay the
double lawyer fees. I accepted.
For the first time in my life I
was in debt, and I don’t recall how on earth I ever was able to pay January’s farm
expenses, but it was for the most just of causes, and we went to work.
From February to September I was racing back and forth between the
poultry farm which supported us, 30 minutes south of Coban on a dirt road near
San Juan Chamelco—and then to Valparaiso 60 minutes southwest in Santa Cruz
Verapaz on a different rough road, with
Coban in the middle with our simple egg store. The struggle was on
with a literal infinity of problems and things to learn—FAST!
Below is seen an aerial photograph of the central
portion of the Valparaiso Plantation a few years after
acquiring it—by which time we had
created a lake, cleared and mowed an area to the west and above the Central
House—we came to call “the colony,” which
revealed a hillside covered with mounds
of an ancient city.
Soon we discovered trenches from
the outer perimeter down into the plantation where there were other trenches
the last one all-around one of the sugar cane fields where eventually we
created our legal-sized soccer field. We couldn’t dig a trench, an outhouse
hole, or cultivate for a garden without always finding artifacts.
About 11
years later it was determined that Valparaiso had been an
Ancient
Fortified City
As described in chapter
53 of Alma in the BOOK OF MORMON which states in verses
3-5:
“Moroni caused that they should commence laboring in
digging a ditch round about the land, or
city….and he caused that they should build a breastwork of timbers upon the
inner bank of the ditch; and they cast
up dirt out of the ditch against the breastwork
of timbers; and thus they had
encircled the city….with a strong wall of timbers and earth, to an exceeding
height…and became an exceeding stronghold….”
Some LDS archaeologists
came to believe that it was anciently the
City of
Helam others the City of
Manti
INHIBITING
CORRECT UNDERSTANDING
NOTE: Terrible
errors in Spanish translation of the Book of Mormon—the word
“ditch” is translated as “fosa” which
in most of the Spanish speaking world means, “hole” leading to them not understanding the significance of Alma
53 & others. It should be
“zanja,” that was the entire perimeter of the Valparaiso Plantation.
OTHER MISTRANSLATIONS: The word “wilderness” is used prominently in
the Book of Mormon. The
English word has us thinking like “High
Uintas Wilderness” a high, mountainous unpopulated area, or in
Guatemala a remote jungle or volcanic region sparsely populated. But in Spanish
“wilderness” is translated as “desierto” which in the Spanish
speaking world means a dry, arid desert--like Arizona, and in Guatemala
could be like the Rancho area which is dry and full of cactus, but would not
be thought of describing the perpetually green mountains of Alta Verapaz, or the jungles of the Peten.
“Wilderness” in Spanish would have to be like, “ region remota con poco poblacion” but
not “desierto.” This mistake makes
correct understanding in Guatemala impossible, as would be the case in Southern
Mexico, Ecuador, Peru, etc.
The 2nd aerial photo seen below is from
a different angle that shows the central part of the valley on the left where
years later we would have our soccer field, and then the Dairy and the homes
built nearby for those who managed it and then on the upper right the beginning
of the area where we would by 1980-81 establish the VALPARAISO COMMUNITY.
Later, as the Central House was
reconstructed The
MUSEUM of the HOLY MAN was
established as seen in item
#30
FOREMOST IN MY MIND was to
find a place where we could experiment with and develop the GOOD
LIFE METHOD of
helping needy Indians, all
based on the Philosophy & Principles of the Good Life—all in harmony
with the dream I had as a missionary seeing myself come into this area to a
rural community which I had helped develop where Indians, regardless of their
religion were living and working together achieving THE GOOD LIFE.
Walking around Valparaiso the
first time I envisioned that this was the place, and wrote my dad telling him
what I would do here. He immediately
replied, “BUY IT!”
I replied quickly, “WITH
WHAT?”
That had led to receiving an additional bonus
from Andersen
Samplers, and becoming owners of Valparaiso—but with a big debt. It happened to be a place where the Indians were recognized among the
most backward, with serious problems of alcoholism, laziness, and dishonesty—a people who were the biggest challenge—so that…
……if it worked there, honest people would recognize the miraculous potential of the strategy
almost anywhere—I assumed.
ONE VERY CRUCIAL MOTIVATOR & GUIDE FOR MY LIFE
For NEW YEARS—2019 saw again this great movie—but seen first in 1956 that
began to multiply my desire to dedicate my life to the Indigenous people in
Central America.
I saw the movie for the first time as an LDS missionary in
Heredia, Costa Rica, when
recently made a senior companion 6 months into my
mission in late 1956. The Mission rule was that we could go to a
movie once a month--if we could find one that would inspire us in our
missionary calling.
This
movie was the perfect motivator to do exactly that. It was the story
of John Clum who had wanted to be a Christian minister but didn't quite
qualify and so volunteered to be a government agent on the Apache Reservation
in Arizona. He went to work, against all odds, changing the treatment of
Indians to one of respect and love as though brothers—in fact, he became blood brothers with a key
Indian. All kinds of wonderful things were done, including providing
education, giving them work with fair pay, and in other ways treated them
justly, even organizing their own police force and along with them capturing
the rebel Geronimo, and more.
NOTE:
Little did I know that what I had seen would become a metaphor for
my future life among the Mayan peoples of Guatemala—but for reasons I didn't then understand I was
deeply impressed.
I left the
theater mesmerized but didn't really begin to understand until early 1958 when I was
transferred to isolated Coban, Guatemala known among the missionaries as
"the
Siberia of Central America."
For the first time, I found
myself in the land of the Q’eqchi’ and Pokomchi Indians,
and rather was instantly convinced that it was Shangri-La. Witnessing firsthand the
suffering of the Indians, and noting them being treated unfairly helped me put
into sharp perspective the movie that took on powerful meaning.
During a short stay of only 3 months, I had revealed to me
the Good Life approach to
helping Indians, and I left there having had spiritual experiences that had me
know I had to prepare to return and dedicate my life among those people, and
later before my mission ended, added Patzicia to my future, along with
other areas among the Mayas.
The
powerful impact of the movie remained with me and influenced me forcefully 9
years later as I began my lifelong work as a permanent resident in the Coban
area of Guatemala, and today as I review my years of dedication among the
Mayans, recognize that many of the things I did to help them were patterned
after what I observed in the historical movie.
BUT SURVIVAL WAS FIRST SO WE WENT TO WORK
I quickly learned the sugar cane and panela
business to employ my 39 “colonos,”
or resident workers, in two teams—two
weeks each,. Soon I learned the profits were small and not enough to pay
fairly my workers, and additionally, by helping speed up the harvest with
transporting of the sugar cane, rather than it all done as before on the backs
of the Indians, the “year-long harvest”
that supposedly “never ended,” was over in 3 months—so we had to scramble to
provide work for our 39 colonos, as explained in the sections describing the
cattle and dairy businesses. So, we had
to do more at Valparaiso, but continued to be supported mostly by our egg
production from the Farm until September when we sold the farm.
POULTRY ADDED to SUGAR CANE/PANELA
During
that period I noticed boxes of laying
breed chicks coming into the area on buses—people following our lead. Within 6 months the market would be flooded
with eggs, so I just kept the egg production from the Farm going until our
newest chickens finished their laying cycle when we would sell the Farm, and
already had built new chicken coops at Valparaiso, but not for laying hens,
rather broiler chickens, so that by the time the market was flooded with eggs,
we had switched our main emphasis to raising broiler chickens, which
project employed for many years, young men, as well as women, who did the
dressing and preparing for sale at what time we established our new store in Coban up near the center of
town on the same block as the market, seen further along.
Our chicken coops were unique with wire
floors with sloping cement floors underneath to be able to scrape out the
droppings for fly control and having them be fertilizer factories using the droppings to fertilize our sugar cane
fields to double the production, and soon for new pastures for our cattle with
improved African grasses.
Also with a few turkeys were sometimes mixed in with the broilers.
We continued egg
production on a small scale, but the broiler business employed many more
people.
Quickly we had to
turn a portion of the Central House into a dressing facility, equipped with an
electric drum plucker, and with our own design of plastic bags for the dressed
chickens as seen below.
Our new store in
Coban for a long time was the only place the residents could purchase eating
chickens—or broilers, raised in the area.
A few years later, with the Dairy
development, it was much more a popular place every morning at 6:00 AM for
milk products that we’ll discuss in item #11.
THEN CATTLE, HOGS, VEGETABLES,
CARPENTRY, FENCING, A LAKE & FISH CULTURE, ETC.
You must be
thinking…….we needed employees that had knowledge and experience, who could
accept employment in all these things.
There were NONE! So, I did have to import a couple, but I first offered
to the colonos training them for fulltime employment. NONE accepted. They just wanted to put in their two weeks
doing menial tasks that required no education, and then be free for two weeks
to cultivate sections of plantation land planting corn, beans, sugar cane for
their bootleg liquor production and heavy drinking.
All of a sudden their
teenage boys wanted their section of land too and be able to continue
the traditional way of life. I didn’t
legally have to do that, and so offered them the opportunity of being
VOCATIONAL STUDENTS in the program I
began calling:
“LEARNING WITH A SHOVEL…
….or chain saw,
or poultry, hogs, cattle, carpentry, and eventually a garden cultivator, a
tractor, fish culture, etc.!”
As VOCATIONAL STUDENTS they would go to school half a day, learning to read
and write, and have classes with me learning how to work as my helpers……..me
learning quickly about all the things we were doing, then bouncing back and
forth between the projects teaching and guiding them in working 4 hours a day
in the assigned projects on a rotation basis for one month in each of the categories
we were dealing with so that in a year they would know how to WORK, and qualify
for fulltime employment.
They were
paid half wages along with giving each useful items they needed, like: A
machete, hoe, rubber boots, a pocket knife, pants, shirt, etc. For those
qualified I added the office & business accounting/management, and all received classes in THE PHILOSOPHY & PRINCIPLES OF THE
GOOD LIFE which I’ll explain in a moment.
They all quite naturally accepted
the teachings from the POPUL VUH,
the Mayan’s
present day Sacred Book, about their “ancient
sacred book that had been lost, but now found,” and after work, volunteer
classes soon started for all—teenage vocational students, and colonos,
in their Modern Sacred Book, which I began calling the first Seminary
Class in Guatemala!
In addition on weekends, I was introducing all to the modern
world showing a Sunday evening
movie (for many their 1st). And, hiking the slippery
trails visiting homes to find and treat the sick, but frustrated because most
of them would hide their sick and dying babies from me. In spite of
incredible efforts, they didn't trust me as their centuries of experience with
what they called "ladinos" (tricky, shrewd
European types) had always exploited them in one way or
another. That would soon change dramatically.
THE
CENTRAL HOUSE FAMILY—“THE MOB”
An important part of what
developed was at the old "haunted" Central House I
moved into, along with a few key helpers. First it was just me during the
week, with the family in a rental home in Coban—as I had promised Maria she
wouldn’t have to live “in the sticks or
boondocks” in Guatemala. But we
would all spend Sunday’s there and the kids would visit homes with me to treat
the sick, and in the evenings show a movie or two.
Soon the kids all ganged up on
their mother and they all moved to the plantation—first camping out in the feed warehouse we used as a theater,
while I worked on fixing up the haunted Central House……I cleaned, disinfected,
gunned down and trapped the critters, and the ghosts went away, and we fixed up and painted a couple of rooms in
the northern end of the giant home.
We then went to work gradually to
transform the entire house into livable conditions for what all of a sudden was
the need of accepting into our home orphans
and needy children abandoned by an alcoholic mother, or father, then abused mothers and their children, and
soon vocational students from other areas
as well as volunteer helpers from BYU,
and Guatemala City, and often the acutely
sick that needed intensive care.
So the Central House all of a sudden was filling up with what was called
the
"CENTRAL HOUSE FAMILY,"
…..but by negative visitors, who
couldn’t understand what we were doing,
calling us,
"The Mob."
Above
we see the first portrait of the Central House Family.
Worth repeating, mentioned in the
RISKY….JOURNEY history,
is what Maria and I were accused of.
I quote:
“You don’t love your children as you live with a bunch of Indians who
could infect them with incurable, tropical diseases!” Gospel explanations about us trying our best to live Christ-like lives, “loving
and helping the needy” fell on deaf ears!
Gratefully there were a few who looked at it differently and
began helping.
THE FASCINATING SOURCE OF THAT CRITICISM & IT'S
REVERSAL
Surprisingly the accusation we "didn't love our children" mentioned
above was leveled against us by Bob Arnold and his wife when they first arrived
in Guatemala assigned to establish the LDS
Seminary System in Central America. That judgmental attitude towards us was
a big part of the war of criticism
against us in the early 70's, but with Harold Brown’s (mentioned in a moment) help, at least with the Arnolds, was
reversed by 1974-76 when Arnold was the Mission President and by 1976 said, "Valparaiso is the only place in the
country where positive things are happening!" and much
more—described in the RELIGIOUS HISTORY in this FINAL REPORT, items #12, and #15, #16, #29 and others.
This,
along with the miracle of Elvira—which will be item #5, had the Indians all over the area begin to
trust us for the first time, yet strangely motivating gringos, living in
Guatemala City and in the U.S., to increase their criticism of our efforts as mentioned above.
As you
can see above, soon vocational students
and volunteers made necessary enlarging the dining room and eating in at least
two shifts.
At times
sick and dying, needing intensive care, swelled the Family to 50 and at times,
more.
******************************
THE NEED OF LOTS OF POTABLE WATER
& ELECTRICITY
--OUR PIONEER SPIRIT TO THE
RESCUE—
NEEDED GOOD WATER—LOTS OF IT
In the beginning when I
lived in the Central House, along with Alfredo Rodas who became the Manager,
since he spoke Pokomchi—the dialect of the area, and Manuel and Julia from the
Farm, we had a growing need for water.
Soon the need was much greater
with my whole family and then the growing Central House Family, plus
eventually Vocational students from
other areas, as well as volunteers from Guatemala City and BYU and the sick
being treated.
I checked out the old
system which was a rusted pipe they had inserted inside a rock aqueduct about
4” x 4” that anciently, at the beginning of the plantation in 1875, had been used. I followed it up to the
spring, and we cleaned it and covered it, We replaced the rusted pipe with
plastic hose that increased a little the flow, but not enough. For bathing and for the chicken coups we
installed a second system taking water out of the water system that turned our
sugar crusher water wheel—water from the creek and not drinkable. We needed desperately a safe potable water
system for us and for the homes we envisioned building in what we called the “colony” where the aerial photos had
shown all the mounds.
A friend visiting from
Lehi claimed to be able to water-witch and find underground water
sources, so with forked branches from a peach tree, we tested him to see if he
could find underground water pipes he didn’t know about. He found every one of them.
So, all of a sudden
there was a parade going back and forth above the Central House. First our
friend with his forked water wand, then me behind, and behind me Wayne Potts, a
volunteer from BYU—each of us with our water
wand hoping we also would have the
gift—but we didn’t.
We eventually followed
an underground vein of water up high on the property line and drilled a hole
hoping to find artesian water. You see
below Wayne playing around with his water-wand
where the hole was being drilled.
In the second picture we see David
Andersen adding his weight to the drilling rig.
IMPORTANT
NOTE:
As Julie had become my “right hand female man” in educational and medical
activities,
Dave
become my “right hand man” in the work—which he enjoyed much more than book
learning. At 8 years old he took charge of 400 laying hens in cages—with his
younger brothers—Rich, Joey & Danny and the Indian boys at the
Central House as his work crew, and was getting 120% egg production which none
of the poultry experts in Guatemala could believe. I had to find out how, and
worked with him checking everything and discovered he was giving like a
quadruple dose of a supplement—thus forcing them to lay their 6 month
allotment of eggs in less time, and eventually they got tired of being pushed
too much and stopped!
Later, Dave and
his team took charge of the “Rabbit Project,” with up to 400 rabbits. You also
see him above doing the accounting for his “120% Laying Hen Project” and
working in the carpentry shop building the bunk beds that later collapsed with
a chunky President Glade falling on Dr. Mason described in item
#12-3, and I had to include Dave as a fisherman,with a large Israeli
carp, along with his brothers Danny and
Rich, with an 8 lb. large mouth black bass that had in it’s stomach a Tilapia
that weighed 1 ½ lbs.
*************
Back
to water-witching, in letters home I
was afraid to mention to my scientist father the water-wand or water-witching effort, but eventually
did and he replied saying he was a believer having seen it work repeatedly in
Australia when he was a missionary, and believed there had to be some
scientific basis for it. But, eventually
that effort failed as artesian water wasn’t found, but it’s a fun aspect of our history to
remember any way….and for the “friendly
fire” they can have fun saying it was another of our FAILURES! NOTE:
By the way in the learning process we had lots of them, which had us
learning and then pushed us to many more
SUCCESSES and trips to the bank!
MY
VOCATIONAL STUDENTS TO THE RESCUE
I
sent them into the mountains above the plantation looking for a good water
source and
they found one about 1 mile above the plantation, and talked the
Indian owner into selling a small section of his land where the spring
was. The purchase included authorization
to install a water line crossing his property, and in turn we provided him with
a water line and faucet just outside his thatch home—Nesario Caal becoming actually the first Indian in the entire area
to have potable water!
We isolated the spring,
cleaned it up, including the area above to prevent contamination coming down
into it, and let that whole area grow up as watershed. We then sealed it and captured all the water
in a 3” vinyl water line down to the hill overlooking the colony area and built
a water cistern on what was an ancient mound of the City of Helam, 9’ deep with
the dimensions you can see in the following pictures.
NOTE: Sorry, archaeologists, for destroying a
mound, but the important artifacts all went into the MUSEUM OF THE HOLY MAN
built years later.
Inside is one of my favorite
Vocational Students, “MECANISMO,”
who was from the Peten. I don’t remember
how he ever learned about the CID, nor do I know whatever happened to him.
But he was a star
student and a wonderful person, who in 1975 when our precious Pepita was run over, he held her in his
arms in the back of our microbus as I raced for Coban and the hospital.
NOTE: If anyone reading this happens to know what
happened to Mecanismo, and/or where he is today, so I can contact him, I would
deeply appreciate it.
We can say that this could have been our first
SWIMMING POOL, and before covering it I wanted to make at least ONE DIVE, but
didn’t want to contaminate it in any way.
So we now had abundant water that didn’t need to be treated, and we
began running water lines all over the plantation, as shown below.
FIRST, to the Central House and area, but with
closed connections ready along the way for homes that by 1976 would be
constructed in the colony area for the Welfare
Missionary couples, and then others.
At the Central House having abundant water, with tons of pressure,
eventually made possible things only dreamed of before:
Gradually in our “pioneer life” we were learning how to
do all kinds of things that the modern world takes for granted.
We learned about septic tanks, built one in the area east
a crossed the ravine below the
garden area, and all of a sudden had a FLUSH TOILET! But, even before that we built a shower room with a propane gas water heater—we
were really getting soft taking hot showers! That stool you see I still have today in A.F.
One of our first projects was to
take a swampy area with drainage ditches where our cattle would sink in and get
stuck—so, since we couldn’t beat the swamp we filled it up with water, building
a dam and drainage system and created our lake.
Eventually we built our
swimming area and throughout all my years at Valparaiso I tried to keep up
my record of always bathing daily in our
lake, even once starting an ESKIMO
CLUB that to be a member one had to make a dive daily into the lake even when the temperature dropped to
freezing—4 times in 35 years! I eventually installed electric lights in
our “balneario” so when I had to bath at night I’d flip the switch and take my
dip in the dark of night—ALL LIT UP.
Once when bathing at night, waist
deep in the water, I was ambushed by two guys with guns, but I was ready for
them with my pistol underneath my towel! Another of many adventures!
But with the new
potable water system, great water pressure and hot water it finally even
made possible having an
automatic washing machine, seen on the right in a picture being used by
Soila Chiquin, later one of “The
Mob” who had escaped the oppression
of the family who raised her—who had
acquired her from a father who didn’t want her—the family accepting her to be like
a slave for them,
Until about 8 years old
Soila wouldn’t speak a word, then
escaped from the family who I had kicked out of Valparaiso when the colono, Esteban Jul, had
first been caught stealing panela and
put in jail, then when drunk attacked
with a machete my manager, Miguel Angel,
which I couldn’t forgive and removed them,
they to Najquitob to live!
From there at 8 years
old Soila escaped and made it all the way down the mountain and asked to live with us. She finally began speaking for the first time
in her life and grew up in the Central House eventually marrying Hector
Poou and having her own family.
Well, with all
these modern developments, the friendly
fire had new ammunition to accuse me of building
a business empire and getting rich.
I would soon give them more ammunition.
To the right are seen
two of the eventual 6 homes in the colony, First, one of the homes
built for the Welfare Service Couples in 1976, but
rather first lived in by us Andersen’s as Maria needed more relief from the
pressure of the Mob. Later it became the home of Carlos Valdez who
had joined us as a 12 year old, and finished his last 12 years as Manager of Valparaiso.
Next comes the “earthquake proof home” built by Hal
Poulsen who came, with his
wife, Neva, and daughter, Jeanie, to help for 6
months after the Great Earthquake item #14.
Interestingly
40 years later in 2016 when I made what I thought then was my last trip
to Guatemala and Valparaiso, Hal's home is the only one left in the "Colony area" in good shape. I'll insert a picture below.
Thanks Hal & Neva for your "long lasting contribution!"
The first vastly improved "rancho" in the "colony"
area, along with it's nice outhouse/firewood storage unit, and
wonderful interior--first lived in by dona Carmelina & kids,
immediately had potable water. I'll insert below a shot of the
intertior.
This was an improved "rancho" that qualified as a "healthy& mentally stimulating home."
Then one of the five dairy colony homes
built in 1972 that originally had water from our new system, but eventually
from the 2nd potable water system built especially for the Victorias Dairy in 1972. Item #11.
The
picture blow shows that
each home--in total contrast to the Indian's hut or "rancho," had
windows, a cement floor, potable water with a pila, and a shower as well as a woodburning stove with
chimney, and we’ll see next electricity. The Indians were getting “rich” too!
Above we see one of the dairy homes that was turned into a “stimulating environement” by Miguel and
Carmela Ajpop.
Then in 1981 when we
created the Valparaiso Community, item
#22, independent of the
plantation, where all owned their own
property and homes, We ran a water line, first with a Public Pila where they could get their water as seen to the right.
Then to a few homes,
but the water and pressure wasn’t enough for all the homes—our system was being spread too thin, so we helped
them create their own potable water system from a spring 2 miles back up in the
mountains to the south.
*********
FOR A “REAL BUSINESS
EMPIRE” & “TO BE RICH”
WE NEEDED ELECTRICITY
It started interestingly
in the KAIBAB NATIONAL FOREST north of the Grand Canyon where in 1966 I was
trapping wildlife to photograph for the Audubon Society. My trapping/photographic
work was early and late so during the
day I drilled millions of air jets for Andersen Samplers using what became
our first electricity in Guatemala—a 500 watt Honda Portable Generator, which
I used in 1966 to get night photos of the Tree
of Life Monument, then it went with us to Guatemala in 1967, and in 1968 was our first electricity at the
Farm, and then at the Central House in Valparaiso
Next came the 2,000
watt portable generator used for Cine
Chapinlandia—the traveling movie. It
was one of the ones we got into Guatemala duty free because it was used, “having started it to see if it
worked.It also was used at Valparaiso, and many
times was carried on the backs of Indians to villages to show movies, such as
on long hikes following the mountain trails to Pambach. It weighed 150 lbs. To carry it a single Indian would take it
using a tump-line as seen, with a paper feed bag to protect their backs. They would take turns. They were incredible!
At Pambach we see when we first met
Federico Veliz—in the green jacket, who was the teacher in the isolated Pambach
community that asked
for our help to build their school—we were stopped from
using the road by the land owner, and had to follow the mountain trails and
both Federico and me suffered DEATH THREATS for our work. Miguel Max is talking to the group in the
picture explaining the first movie ever seen by these Indians.
That generator was used in the beginning at
Valparaiso when we had to operate the drum poultry plucker, and of course for movies.
Then, with the help of my brother, Marlo,
we eventually acquired a one cylinder, slow revolution diesel motor and
constructed a facility with the belt turning an axle that had other belts
turning an electric generator, and also a hammer mill used to make our own
feed. With this we had good electricity for work projects, and for a couple of
hours each evening in the Central House.
We were getting real rich—all
part of the SCAM!!!
ELECTRICITY HELP FROM THE NAVAHO RESERVATION
In June of 1971 the owner of a Trading Post
on the Navaho Reservation in Arizona donated a huge used diesel generator to
the Foundation. The Explorers from the
Oakhills II Ward in Provo, Utah volunteered to deliver it as their summer Super
Activity led by Richard Brimhall, who 10 years later would be Executive
Director of the Foundation. I heard they
were coming but wondered how on earth they would ever get through Mexico and
into Guatemala.
Accompanying them was a BYU student, Julio Salazar,
who was a Guatemalan and apparently a smooth talker who was planning on being
Guatemala’s President. He somehow talked
their way through Mexico and into Guatemala.
So one day in June they pulled into the plantation with several
vehicles, and the 2,600 lb. generator completely filling the back of one of the
pickups—the unloaded generator seen to the right with Maria observing after the difficult job of unloading it.
On the right another shot with some
of the Explorers checking it out after we finally got it onto it's new foundation..
One of the Explorers was the son of Paul Felt who had been in charge of
the BYU Lamanite Development Program,
and who had just received his call as President of the Southwest Indian Mission for the LDS Church. Paul wrote a letter to his son sending it
to Valparaiso, and saying to his son:
“Observe carefully
what they are doing, as we’ll have to do those same kind of things on our mission, if we are to be successful.”
Richard Brimhall brought me a printed copy of President Ernest L. Wilkenson’s
May 28th, 1971 Commencement Address at BYU in which
he described our efforts as an example of what BYU graduates should go out into
the world and do.
As it turned out, the generator wouldn’t start, and we had to have it
rebuilt before it would run, and for a while it did provide us with lots of
electricity,
Soon thereafter line electricity came into the Alta Verapaz area of
Guatemala, which was an incredible blessing.
Thereafter we only needed generators for emergencies, or when we would
go to remote villages to show movies.
4. THE EVOLUTION OF OUR EDUCATIONAL EFFORTS
& THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE PHILOSOPHY & PRINCIPLES OF THE GOOD LIFE.
It is a big story that could fill
a large book, but depicted in the following photos—beginning with the Sunday
evening movies, then classes with my Vocational students, 
then Julie’s effort when 10 years old, teaching 6 little Indian children, including THE FIRST LITTLE GIRL IN HISTORY to begin getting an educvation at Valparaiso.
Her effort was followed by organizing an official school that
eventually had 110 students, with all six grades as well as adult literacy
classes.
In 1980 our school was the first
plantation school in history to participate in the yearly Departmental Fair in Coban, led
by our 1980 Championship soccer
team, The Lamanite Youth, see item #21, then our float, next the children, followed at the tail end by the adult women’s literacy class.
We won
the President’s award as
FIRST
PLACE for the BEST PARTICIPATION.
Twenty-six years
were spent at Valparaiso--and if it hadn't have been for some complications and
unrighteousness, we'd likely still be
there—as it became the heart and soul of our work in
Guatemala, supporting us for 26 years, and becoming The
Center for Indian Development, as seen in item #8, from which
projects would reach out all over the country, all based on the…..
***************
The Philosophy & Principles of the Good Life
This "Method" crucial in all of our work for the Foundation's 50
year history is outline simply below
THE
PHILOSOPHY: The present Indians are descendants of a progressive and
great people, some called "The Greeks of the New World,"
but who fell into a period of darkness, yet have a prophetic
destiny in the last days of, "coming out
of darkness into the light & blossoming." But to do so
they have to come to understand and apply……
THE PRINCIPLES: Which are
simply:
1.
CLEANLINESS,
2. PROPER
NUTRITION,
3. LIVING IN
HEALTHY HOMES,
4. UNITED
FAMILIES,
5. EDUCATION FOR
ALL,
6. INDUSTRY, BUT
LEARN TO WORK MORE PRODUCTIVELY, & last,
7. SHARE WITH
OTHERS the GOOD LIFE being achieved.
FOR LDS CHURCH ORIENTED MISSIONARY WORK
and those Indians receptive religiously, the philosophy
included what their sacred book, THE POPUL VUH, states as
having anciently had the original
Sacred Book that was lost, but for complete
application of the Method, they needed
it (the BOOK OF MORMON) to be restored to guide them, which
included
1.
BELIEVE IN & FOLLOW THE GOD OF THIS LAND WHO IS JESUS
CHRIST,
2.
TAKE SERIOUSLY HIS TEACHINGS & LIVE THEM, and
3.
UNITE WITH OTHERS WHO HAVE THE SAME DREAMS OF PROGRESS FOR THE FUTURE.
EXAMPLES OF IT’S
APPLICATION?
AT VALPARAISO & THE POLOCHIC WHEN I WAS
DISTRICT PRESIDENT
Following
are some displays that explain the philosophy and principles
"The Greeks of the New World,"
But who fell into a period of Great Darkness
Yet have a prophetic
destiny in the last days of, "coming out
of darkness into the light & blossoming."But to do so
they have to come to understand and apply……
THE PRINCIPLES of THE GOOD LIFE:
It was this method that opened
Valparaiso and the Polochic area to some of the most successful
missionary success in the history of the LDS Church among the Lamanites. The missionaries said they had never seen,
nor used such a successful method.
You will even notice one
who initially was against the effort, but in the end see it bring him
success—but which the missionaries couldn’t report to the Mission/Church
leaders. See item #15, pages 111-112.
****************
5. A BIBLE-LIKE MIRACLE
OPENS THE WAY TO GAIN THE CONFIDENCE OF THE INDIANS…to begin having really
significant success.
In the first nearly year and a
half of being owners of the 600 acre VALPARAISO PLANTATION, with 239 resident Poqomchi speaking
Indians living in 39 families, I was killing myself with intense activity
trying to help what seemed like a people who were perfectly happy with
half of their children dying, as well as adults dying of tuberculosis and other
terrible diseases--which was all normal for them. It would still be another year before the Foundation existed. It was
still the struggle of the Andersen Family Private Peace Corp.
Accepting
the teenage boys as VOCATIONAL STUDENTS, and teaching them how to work and be
able to qualify for better paid full-time employment, plus teaching them the Philosophy
& Principles of the Good Life began changing the attitudes of the
adults and Indian leaders.
Julie
beginning to teach 6 little barefoot Indian children, even including one little
girl—the first female to received any kind of education, all of which soon had us officially beginning our own private
School, with Zoel Gomez as teacher. All of this helped in gradually changing attitudes towards
us.
Then
driving away the ghosts from the Central House—us courageously moving
in, then accepting needy orphan children, and abused mothers and their
children—all as part
of our family with no descrimination, as we see in the picture, David sharing a cushion with one of the Indian boys.
On
the left we see another great picture showing how we accepted the
people as our family--the picture of the three little boys, the LDS Magazine ENSIGN, labeled it, "Three little Indian Boys,"
but that was a mistake--the three boys, arm in arm as brothers, were
from the left, my son Richard, then in the middle, barefoot Rueben,
brother of Carlos and Moncho, then Dave Andersen.
Many such examples of my family began melting the hearts of even the
most stubborn Maya/Poqomchi at Valparaiso. Then a big step forward
occurred as I adopted the family
of Victor Suc with his grandma returning him to us dieing as seen in the well used photo of him with our son Joey.VICTOR,
in the picture with Joey, both 2 ½ years old, Joey weighing 39 lbs., Victor at
13 lbs. with a blob of round worms on the upper right corner we got out of
him—and him growing up and sort of being the SPIRIT OF VALPARAISO…….
All making up “THE MOB,” or The Central
House Family. At the end of item #6 I will insert the complete story
of this child with whom we are using his birth name here to respect his
privacy.
While
we were surprisingly criticized for all of this by “friendly fire,” what we were doing even had the
die-hard Indians softening. One more undeniable
miraculous event got us over the summit of resistance which I’ll now
describe as best I can.
THE BIBLE-LIKE MIRACLE
In July
1969 I acquired several gallons of internal parasite medicine and invited all
to come one Sunday afternoon.
160 came—about half of the residents, and we were busy
giving the medication when Chavela arrived with her two little girls, Marta and
Macaria—who somehow we came to call
Elvira. Elvira was a baby in Chavela's arms and we gave her a tiny dose,
but all of a sudden she reacted violently, vomiting. We got her
normalized, so we thought.
After the
treatment, we invited those interested to see a movie—the first religious movie shown which was "Man's
Search For Happiness," with about 60 who filed into the warehouse
to see it. Alfredo Rodas, my manager, translated it into Poqomchi and it
seemed like the message was understood and well received.
After the movie, I rewound the film and then noticed a group of women
surrounding Chavela who had Elvira on her lap but completely covered with her
shawl. All were crying as Elvira had died.
I quickly kneeled before Chavela, uncovered Elvira and sought for a sign of
life. Her tiny body was cold, with no pulse, or signs of breathing.
I picked her up and stood telling all we were going to pray. Generally,
my prayers are simple and short, but this time in the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ it went on and on as though it was a Patriarchal blessing, promising her
life, and good things for her future. Then I finished, opened my eyes to look
at Elvira who was softly snoring and there was warmth in her body.
There was a hushed silence of reverence among all. Chavela, without
saying a word, gathered her baby in her arms and they drifted off into the
night. Not a word was said as all exited the warehouse and headed to their
homes. I was so weak I couldn't walk to the Central House without
help. Apparently, strength was drained from my body and transferred to
Elvira giving her life.
Elvira's miraculous life was featured later in a book, THE MAYA LEGACY, by Stanford Robison
The next day the news spread like wildfire all over the Valley, and to the
neighboring villages:
"In Valparaiso, there is a new Medicine Man
with strange powers. Something is happening that should be
trusted!"
That was
a new beginning. The Indians stopped hiding their sick babies and
children from me, even asking for treatments, like above is
seen the well-used photo of Julie helping me try and save Alfonso and Lic's
mother. From those beginning years we went on to perform thousands of
medical treatments every year of every type imaginable, and we started keeping
track of those we felt had been saved from sure death, but when we got to 160
we stopped counting.
NOW, BACK
TO VALPARAISO IN THE EARLY YEARS: Soon
classes started teaching them how to avoid sickness and death, and we discovered
effective methods of teaching CLEANLINESS & NUTRITION, explained
next—along with an additional handful of
events, and initiatives…..
…..of
most importance organizing the Indian vocational students to save their own
people by a weekly visit to every home and then advise me of
those needing treatment before they became lost causes, and…..
DEATH STOPPED FOR A PERIOD OF 3 YEARS!
NOTE: This was basically a
program of ministering—commanded
by the Lord thru Joseph Smith in 1830
to "watch over the Church," but in our case "watch over all our
brothers & sisters—none of whom were
LDS," with a weekly visit to every home--initially by our
youthful Vocational Students—most of
whom became spiritual converts, and who then took doubly seriously
the charge to "watch
over" the families assigned, and then report situations of
need so that adequate measures could be taken to save lives. In the LDS Church
for years, it was called "Home
Teaching," or "Home
Visiting," which apparently the Leaders didn’t take seriously
enough, and was never managed properly—except
for a few cases, like at Valparaiso—where
we took seriously what we felt the Lord
had commanded over 180 years ago. See: Doctrines & Covenants 20:42, 51-53
EPILOGUE: Interestingly in recent
years the LDS Church has claimed a "new
revelation" concerning the same activity, but calling it
"ministering," which is what it always was from the initial
revelation, but apparently not taken seriously. However we did, and it
was a cornerstone of the effort
that produced 3 years with no death at Valparaiso and I can mention that prior
to moving to Guatemala when I was first Elder’s Quorum President in the Spanish
American Branch in Provo, and then as President of the Branch, we also took the
initial revelation seriously, and it worked miracles also in Provo, Utah from
1964-1966.
At the
time recently of what was called “a new revelation,” it had some General
Authorities giddy “over the “new flood of revelation,” as though there
had been a modern absence of revelation for many years and they seemed to hunger
and thirst for something they could call “revelation!” The original revelation was more than
enough for us—as we took it seriously.
On the
next page, more than 50 years later we are seen back visiting the Valparaiso
Community.
Here we
are 48 years after the Miracle of Elvira having lunch in Elvira's home in the
Valparaiso Community--she is seen to the right. If I recall correctly she
had a son at that time on an LDS mission. In the picture to the left is me,
my partner & traveling companion, archaeologist, Garth Norman, then
Federico Veliz, and my daughter, Aura.
***************************
6. CREATION OF UNIQUE
METHODS TO TEACH THE CRITICAL AREAS of CLEANLINESS & PROPER NUTRITION, both Principles
of the Good Life.
The
critical need of CLEANLINESS…….
……a lack of which, like—not
one outhouse among the 39 original
families at Valparaiso—contributing to
homes and home sites being "incubators
of disease and death," with 40% of the
children born to the 39 families dead already for an average of 8 children
dying a year. We found more sick and dying in every home.
NOTE:
The "haunted" Central House did have a 6 holler –all together like a "community-friendly
outhouse" with the stuff dropping down into an
underground canal from the sugar refinery that washed it into
the creek that went behind the house, and meandered its way all
through the valley--where some families got their water, and then into the
Cahobon River continuing on to Coban and eventually to the Polochic Valley--So,
for years VALPARAISO DID SHARE WITH
THOUSANDS! The first thing I did was to close it down--that
perplexed many as it was known as quite a unique system--except for all those
downstream! We dug a hole below the Central House for the
first outhouse in the valley. The "2nd" I dug myself for Victor
and his family when I tried to care for them on their own home-site--story told
later.
But, teaching the Indians they needed an outhouse on each home site didn't
make sense to them, as that would put an end to the lush, green corn and other
plantings around their homes abundantly fertilized by human waste!
As I started to treat the sick, I
became frustrated as they would often relapse--with no end in sight—THEIR ENVIRONMENT & HABITS HAD TO CHANGE.
I began the attempt to teach preventive medicine beginning
with the invisible world of microbes that brought laughter
from the Indians. They
needed to learn that sickness came from the
invisible microbial contamination from their own waste--microbes they
refused to believe in because they couldn't see them. We had to show them the invisible
monsters, so began using Petri dishes to grow microbes from dirty hands, contaminated water, dust, a cough,
a captured fly walking on the nutrient agar, etc. Then show them the colonies
that grew that had a foul odor, then
let them see them using a microscope--conclusion
being that said "invisible
monsters" created nasty odors, rot, sickness, and death. The outcome was nothing short of miraculous.
The Petri
dishes showing colonies of microbes are along the front of the table.
Obviously,
my father, a bacteriologist, helped us design this method
and
sent/or brought to us the equipment we needed, including the first microscope
seen to the right, which dad had found being discarded when working on
his PhD, at Iowa State—US ANDERSEN’S ARE SCAVENGERS!
INTERESTING NOTE: Eventually we were
gifted 10 microscopes, like the one seen above on the left, by a BYU professor
who had been a Trustee for the Foundation, but who had to quit when I became
too controversial, see Item #28, but he
acquired some obsolete microscopes, but couldn’t let on he was giving
them to us, so just left them in the dark of night on the doorstep of our
rental home in Provo at the time when I had to bring the family back to Provo
due to the Guerrilla War, and I was traveling back and forth every two months
to keep the family going, run the U.S. Foundation, as dad had passed on, but
also manage the projects in Guatemala, as well as keep the business going that
supported us. We were able to provide
microscopes for our projects with Federico Veliz in Santa Cruz, for Humberto
and our projects in Patzicia and Patzun, and shared with other non-profit
organizations.
****************
We began a program
of constructing floors & box/seats for any who would dig their own
hole. Soon after showing them the "invisible world of microbes" I was advised
of the first hole dug—by Felipe Laj, which tiny news for me WAS
GIGANTIC!
By the end of 1970 100% of the 39 families had
outhouses, and death stopped for the next 3 years.
Eight
years later, Felipe Laj,
one of the original "colonos," seen to the right with his
wife, son, Esteban & a granddaughter, was named by me as Supervisor
of the Victorious Dairy—that, had him shocked, he reminding me he
didn't even hardly know how to read and write. But he had my
trust and I assured him I would teach him all he had to know—all he had to do was:
Continue
to be special and do as taught, which he faithfully did in that key position
until the END.
Teaching
NUTRITION
And that "we
are what we eat," we did nutrition experiments with broiler chicks, using 4 pairs,
each fed different diets:
One, WHITE GROUND CORN—that nutritionists say "is not capable
of sustaining and supporting human life" (representing the
typical Indian diet);
Two, YELLOW GROUND CORN (that is high in Vitamin
A);
Three, COMMERCIAL BROILER FEED—representing a BALANCED
DIET;
Four, A PAIR TAKEN HOME BY A
FAMILY and turned loose with their poultry.
RESULTS:
WHITE CORN CHICKENS, small, little weight gain—4
oz, sickly, anemic in appearance—sometimes
dead, and an economic loss.
YELLOW CORN CHICKENS, twice the weight gain—8 oz. of white corn chickens, small still but
healthy in appearance, an economic small profit.
BALANCED DIET, huge—4 lbs. 8 oz. of weight gain, healthy, huge
profit.
HOME CHICKENS, weight loss or dead.
It was then easy to
translate the results to the need of humans eating a balanced diet.
We then taught them inexpensive
ways of doing that which, along with greater cleanliness,
contributed to: NO DEATHS FOR 3 YEARS. Death only began happening again due to bureaucratic interference in our
group working together to solve the life and death problems, see item #12
These
methods were used in many schools, repeated every year or so, reaching
thousands of people and influencing many to apply these principles in their
family lives, the end result being saving literally thousands.
*****************************
THE CORN
IMPROVEMENT PROJECT SHOWING INDIANS HOW TO TAKE THEIR NATIVE VARIETIES &
INCREASE THE QUALITY AND YIELDS.
To help with the critical need of better
nutrition we quickly learned we weren’t going to be able to get the Indians to
not eat corn, especially white corn—described by nutritionists as “a food incapable of supporting and
sustaining human life.” We tried
improved varieties of corn with improved nutrition, but they were too tasty and
eaten quickly by worms, bugs, and raccoons. Those varieties were also hybrids requiring the
continual purchase of seed corn from suppliers. That would never work with the
Indians.
I
therefore decided it would help tremendously to improve one of their native
varieties of corn….VASTLY IMPROVING THE VITAMIN-A CONTENT, plus INCREASING YIELDS. So, the “rodeo clown” with no agricultural education, much less a PhD
in anything, went to work for 6 ½ years:
HAVING
TONS OF FUN plus, EXPERIENCING MIRACULOUS SUCCESS.
I chose their native summer corn called VERANERO, that had a
yellowish/red color, indicating to me at least some Vitamin A.
NOTE: The Indian’s white, and black (or very dark purple) corn
HAS NO VITAMIN-A, much less protein.
Over 6 ½ years we increased
yields from 50 to 650 lbs. per 1/9th acre, with three crops yearly—rather than
one, while more than doubling its nutritive quality—ALL OF A SUDDEN WITH TONS
OF VITAMIN-A, all with no use of
chemicals, rather only natural organic fertilizers & methods available to
the Indians.
The Indians in
said 1/9th of an acre had an average of only one plant with two
ears. We began with seed from that plant, crossed it with seed from a
superior rare ear that had the right coloration—tending towards GOLDEN-YELLOW,
and patiently developed seed that produced uniformly plants with multiple ears—as
seen above on the left, even with an
increasing percentage with 3 and even 4 ears of good size and quality.
Then worked on improving even more the color and vitamin content from the
normal red, to a rich golden yellow as
seen above on the right side, which we proved, with poultry experiments, was a vast improvement in vitamin A content.
Then we worked on reducing the normal 4 months to maturity as I noticed a few
plans would mature in 3 ½ months so choose from those plants the ones with
multiple ears per plant, and the right coloration. Eventually we achieved a high percentage of
plants that would mature in 3-1/2 months rather than the typical 4 months,
making possible 3 harvests per year, of a corn with high Vitamin A content, and
a 1,300% increase in yields—all with no use of chemicals of
any kind.
NOT BAD FOR A "RODEO CLOWN!"
IMPORTANT NOTE: As we learned, the varieties of
native corn were very sensitive even to slight geographical changes, so we mainly
tried to teach the Indians how to choose their seed corn to continually
improve the quality and quantity of their harvests.
THE STORY OF VICTOR SUC
An Example of Medical,
Nutritional & TOTAL DEVELOPMENT HELP
By 1969 we were learning that we
couldn’t leave lying around anything, like happened once with a pair of pliers,
and again with a hammer, and they both disappeared. We soon learned that for the Indians such
things left carelessly here and there—even though all knew who they belonged
to, for our Pokomchi Indians, they assumed that the owner didn’t want it and so
would pick it up and take it home.
One afternoon a gallon of
gasoline for one of our generators disappeared.
It was concerning because the Indians used kerosene to light their
fires, burn in their lamps, etc. and not being familiar with the explosive
nature of gasoline we feared that someone would use it to get a cooking fire
going and there would be a serious accident. I mobilized our employees and
vocational students to visit and search every
home and find that gallon before it was too late.
I joined the search following the
trail up the mountain from the spring, and found a home site I hadn’t seen
before, and there found the gallon. It
was where lived a widowed grandma, Isabela Max, with two teenage daughters,
Marta and Elvira, a teenage boy, Alfonso, a younger son, Alberto, and a younger daughter, Margarita, and a
bunch of young grandchildren—
The youngest, Victor
Suc, sucking at his
grandma’s
dry breast as a pacifier. At that time he was about 18 months old, never able
to walk yet.
I discovered a horrible
situation. They produced from the maguey
plant string, like binder-twine, making it into nets for sale, but their main income was selling to Indian men the bootleg sugar-cane liquor, “boj,” that
for .50 cents one could drink all they wanted and spend the night with the
oldest daughter, Marta, seen in red upper right.
At night to sleep they would all
pile up on a sleeping platform covered by a straw mat with one blanket half-way
covering them.
I immediately adopted the family
and began treating Victor for terrible skin infections, and sending them food
every day, but soon noticed that for the eggs I would send, there were never
any shells in the garbage dump.
Grandma would send her daughters
to Tactic every day to sell what I was giving them, so I began sending the eggs
broken open in a plastic bag so they would have to eat them, and I began eating with them several times a
week.
I got tooth brushes for all,
taught them how 
to brush, and dug myself an outhouse hole—the 2nd
outhouse at Valparaiso, the
first for a family.
But soon found it impossible to take care of them way up the mountain,
so moved them into a tile roofed building down near the road and moved them
there. Below to the right you see that
building.
The house is seen in front of the
lake—NOTE: The lake filled up with water
weeds the first time we filled it up. We then emptied it got rid of the weeds
then filled again. For a time Carlos and his family had lived
there until they had to flee from the father who I employed briefly but he
had
a drinking problem and abused his family and I had to let him go. Carlos and
family remained with us many years. The house later was used as our first
school, then destroyed in the Great Earthquake of 1976.
Victor’s family lived in that
house briefly, but four had already joined us:
I was employing Elvira, along with Cecilia and
Feliza. Alfonso joined us and the vocational student group. Alberto
joined Alfonso, Lic and Agustin living with us and were students in our school,
along with Margarita who also joined
us, joining
Carmelina, Rosalia, and
eventually Soila.
I soon gave up on Grandma Isabela, Marta
and the little ones and insisted
they come and live at the Central House, the grandma and older children seen in
the first “Mob” photo. Victor is not seen in the “Mob” picture as he
was very sick and being treated.
As it worked out the easy going order
and discipline of the Central House Family was just too complicated for Grandma
Isabela, and so one day she disappeared with Victor and all the little
children, along with Alberto, Alfonso and Elvira.
Six months later she returned just to leave with us Victor who was gravely
sick, thus the well known picture of him at 2 ½ years old at 13 lbs. and our
Joe the same age at 39 lbs. He resisted
everything, wouldn’t even drink anything, until I took the risk of forcing on
him an infant’s dose of worm medication and got out of him the blob of round
worms seen to the upper right.
Then it
became impossible to fill him up with good food! Soon he was walking for the
first time in his life.
As it worked out, we learned that
all those children that left with their grandma eventually died—four dead, except for the two older
daughters, Elvira and Marta.
Victor
grew up with us at the Central House as part of “The Mob.” He had a very
difficult time learning, but on
his 3rd attempt got through 1st
Grade when 10½ years old and seemed to come alive, always being the first in
classes to attempt to answer questions.
Margarita,
his aunt, also survived and grew up with our MOB: Rosalia, Margarita, Carmelina and Soila.
At that
time he went to the U.S. adopted by a family from Heber, Utah. He eventually
returned to Guatemala as an LDS missionary, actually becoming the first from
Valparaiso to become a full-time missionary for the LDS Church.
*********************
SIXTH, C. JESS GROESBECK
the modern era of the
Foundation. Of course he became my
professor in computer science, and with unbelievable patience has helped me
do the impossible over the years with the computer. 
A most memorable experience was
had with a surprisingly young and beautiful "Mother
Superior," who one
night surprised me in my camper reading the BIBLE. That stimulated a great conversation.
It might have ended up with a great convert if they hadn’t of transferred her
back to Chichicastenango—maybe to keep her away from me!
The day of the purchase, February 2, 1968, the sisters dropped by and said I’d have to
pay interest on the balance, that I
quickly figured would cost me at least $6,000 more for the property so I told
them the deal was off. They left with
their heads hung low. But, I knew they
would be back, and they were an hour later, saying if I could pay $6,000 down they wouldn’t charge interest on
the balance, That would take my entire bonus,
with the $1,000 left in the bank for January farm expenses used to pay the
double lawyer fees. I accepted.
Above
we see the first portrait of the Central House Family.
As you
can see above, soon vocational students
and volunteers made necessary enlarging the dining room and eating in at least
two shifts.
Inside is one of my favorite
Vocational Students, “MECANISMO,”
who was from the Peten. I don’t remember
how he ever learned about the CID, nor do I know whatever happened to him.
Next came the 2,000
watt portable generator used for Cine
Chapinlandia—the traveling movie. It
was one of the ones we got into Guatemala duty free because it was used, “having started it to see if it
worked.
It is a big story that could fill
a large book, but depicted in the following photos—beginning with the Sunday
evening movies, then classes with my Vocational students, 
Then
driving away the ghosts from the Central House—us courageously moving
in, then accepting needy orphan children, and abused mothers and their
children—all as part
of our family with no descrimination, as we see in the picture, David sharing a cushion with one of the Indian boys. 
On
the left we see another great picture showing how we accepted the
people as our family--the picture of the three little boys, the LDS Magazine ENSIGN, labeled it, "Three little Indian Boys,"
but that was a mistake--the three boys, arm in arm as brothers, were
from the left, my son Richard, then in the middle, barefoot Rueben,
brother of Carlos and Moncho, then Dave Andersen. 
The Indians in
said 1/9th of an acre had an average of only one plant with two
ears. We began with seed from that plant, crossed it with seed from a
superior rare ear that had the right coloration—tending towards GOLDEN-YELLOW,
and patiently developed seed that produced uniformly plants with multiple ears—as
seen above on the left, even with an
increasing percentage with 3 and even 4 ears of good size and quality.
Then worked on improving even more the color and vitamin content from the
normal red, to a rich golden yellow as
seen above on the right side, which we proved, with poultry experiments, was a vast improvement in vitamin A content.
Then we worked on reducing the normal 4 months to maturity as I noticed a few
plans would mature in 3 ½ months so choose from those plants the ones with
multiple ears per plant, and the right coloration. Eventually we achieved a high percentage of
plants that would mature in 3-1/2 months rather than the typical 4 months,
making possible 3 harvests per year, of a corn with high Vitamin A content, and
a 1,300% increase in yields—all with no use of chemicals of
any kind.
to brush, and dug myself an outhouse hole—the 2nd
outhouse at Valparaiso, the 
