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Chapter 3: Angel of the East
child, and everybody from the busboys to Mrs. Van were interested.” Mary Helen not only survived, but also became a longtime friend and shared her memories and photographs in preparation for Presbyterian’s centennial celebrations. Emory Nielsen came in the thirties, afflicted with tuberculosis. Carolyn Nielsen Sedberry thinks her mother stayed with her father at the San, which is likely because Mrs. Van believed families should stay close whenever possible. Carolyn was born in the brand new hospital in 1934. “Mrs. Van cared for me as an infant, and sent me a birthday card every single year until she died.” That thoughtfulness meant a great deal to Carolyn. A California seminary friend called in 1939. “We have a Japanese Christian student,” he informed her, “who has broken down.” Mrs. Van raised money for Emma Fukuda’s care. The lass was miserable, as her church music studies had earned her a coveted place at the Westminster Choir School in New Jersey. When her doctor declined to send her to such a damp place, she was heartbroken, so Mrs. Van arranged music and art classes at the Univeristy of New Mexico. After Pearl Harbor, Emma needed to go home to work with the Japanese people. She and Mrs. Van took the Santa Fe Chief to New York. Fukuda faced no problems in Albuquerque, a city of many cultures, but hostility and suspicion were quite evident as the ladies traveled. Emma embarked on the Gripsholm, a Swedish ship. She married a dermatologist and the pair worked first at a leper colony in Thailand and later in India. Emma wrote a book, Ai, Love, dedicated to “Mother Van.” Many more patients and employees would echo Emma’s thoughts in the forty years that would follow.
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Opposite: Nurse Melois Beam, Mary Helen Allburt, Minister’s Cottage Courtesy: Mary Helen Allburt
1930
Below: Emma Fukuda
Presbyterian Healthcare Services Photoarchive
1940
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