Letter from Everett

 Last month, while working on some research on where my mother lived in Kansas, I discovered this "Letter from Everett Chesney" in the Natoma Independent, Natoma, Kansas, Thursday, 23 May, 1918, Page 2.

Everett Mize Chesney, (b. 27 November 1895; d. 14 January 1987) is one of my mother's older brothers. He is the second son of Edward Kent and Alwilda "Wilda" Mize Chesney. At the time of this writing, Everett was 23 years of age. He enlisted in the Army March 8, 1918, and was assigned to the 38th Balloon Company at Fort John Wise, San Antonio, Texas. He was discharged May 11, 1919.

By a little research on this Balloon Company I learned that the United States Army Balloon Squadrons and companies were organized under the Aviation Section, U.S. Signal Corps and served overseas with the United States Army Air Service before and during World War I. I also found these images of the type of balloon that was used.

These balloons were used largely for reconnaissance, but they were not used for long because the Army quickly learned that the enemy could easily shoot them down with incendiary artillery which would cause the balloons to explode in the air.

 

Included in Everett's letter was another item that caught my attention. He recounts a Mother’s Day program he attended that evening where “the ladies of the Laural [sic] Heights church” gave each soldier a flower. I found this historical information on the website of the Laurel Heights United Methodist Church:

Laurel Heights Methodist Church

1917-18: World War I

Laurel Heights practically adopted the 2,300 soldiers at the Balloon School at Camp John Wise. Wednesdays the young people of the church provided entertainment at the camp, Thursdays were designated for sewing and mending, and Friday nights the church was thrown open to the soldiers who came in large numbers.

 

In 2012 I attended the funeral of my Dad’s ½ brother, William "Bill" Earl Wheeler, Jr., in this San Antonio, Texas church (not knowing any of its history). Uncle Bill's widow, Frances Ann, is now a member of this church. I had no idea of this connection until I discovered Everett’s “letter” and researched the church's history.

I sent Ann a copy of Everett's "Letter" and explained it's significance to me. She then shared it with the pastor of the church, Rev. Paul L. Escamilla. On Mother's Day, May 9, 2021, Rev. Escamilla preached a sermon using Everett's letter as the basis for his message "Abiding Love". I requested a copy of his sermon (below) and Ann sent me a recording of it (I've extracted a segment*).

* Video of Sermon Segment

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YvyYATiwSNnY8Vnq7ApK4UxoAG0YRbaJ/view?usp=sharing

John 15:9-17 "Abiding Love" Paul L. Escamilla

It was Sunday, May 12th, 1918, a hundred and three years ago. Just two miles north of our church, at Camp John Wise, on the evening of that Mother’s Day, there was something to write home about. Something that had to do with Laurel Heights.

Camp Wise, which was located at the corner of Basse and McCullough, was a training ground for maneuvering hot air balloons for military reconnaissance, a strategy often utilized in World War I, which at the time was still raging in Europe. The young soldiers in training at Camp Wise had the Sunday off, and there was a special Mother’s Day program planned for that evening, hosted by some local groups.

These soldiers, some of whom were mere teenagers, were far from home, far from family, far from their mothers; and surely feeling of this in a special way on Mother’s Day. Some of them were weeks away, possibly even days away from shipping off to a battleground across the Atlantic that by then had claimed close to 9 million lives. I suppose writing a letter to family back home is as good a tonic as any for homesickness and trepidation.

That’s what a young soldier named Everett Chesney chose to do that afternoon—write a letter back home. Everett was a relative by marriage of Ann Wheeler’s late husband Bill, and he was stationed at Camp Wise. Bill’s niece recently found that letter, and shared it with Ann, who shared it with me, who shares it now with you, because you’re in it.

We can imagine Everett situated on his bunk that afternoon, pen in hand, organizing his thoughts. After beginning his letter with camp news from the week before, he wrote, “They are going to have a Mother’s Day program here tonight,” describing one or two of the featured presentations he’d heard were going to be part of the event. At that point he set his unfinished letter aside. It was time for the program. The letter would have to wait. Later that evening, back in the barracks, he took up his letter again and continued where he’d left off: “The program is just over,” he wrote. “It was sure fine for a small place like this.” And then he mentioned one specific thing that had stood out for him. “The ladies of the Laurel Heights church gave each of us soldiers a flower.”

There you are; you’re in Everett’s letter. A church barely nine years old, bringing some Mother’s Day kindness to young soldiers far from home. A small thing it was; a flower. To paraphrase Mother Teresa, Not all of us can do great things; but we can all do small things with great love.

At Camp Wise that Mother’s Day, while the training balloons were tethered to the ground, a small thing was done with great love, and for just the briefest time it must have seemed that God was in heaven and all was right with the world. Sometimes love is that simple.

And sometimes not. Sometimes our best intentions to love result in misunderstandings. Broken hearts. Wounded pride. Hurt feelings. Sometimes our efforts to love meet barriers—erected by ourselves or by others. “Along party lines” is a phrase I wish we could banish from both our vocabulary. The Jesuit priest Thomas J. Clarke spoke prophetically about our country years ago when he wrote “Community wounds even as it blesses.” Love is not always as simple as a flower given to a soldier on Mother’s Day.

When our two oldest children were toddlers they had their dust-ups now and then over one thing or another. Which is why at the grocery store I always used two grocery carts—Sarah in one, David in the other. Spaces in their togetherness. Once I was in the produce section getting some vegetables, and somehow I had turned the carts so that the two kids were face to face. When I glanced up, Sarah had reached over and was hugging David. Like any parent, I wanted to capitalize on good behavior. I said, “Sarah, do you love your brother?” She pulled away and said, “Not yet.”

Christians, do you love your neighbor? Not yet. Your enemy? Not yet. The stranger? Not yet. Your political opponents. Not yet. That church member or family member who hurt your feelings a few days ago, or a few years ago, or a few decades ago? Not yet. Then when? We don’t have forever.
For the gospel writer John to have chosen to include this teaching about love so prominently in his gospel, the first-century church he’s writing this for must have been challenged in this same way. Which means John’s congregation could have been any congregation. After all, church is always at least two things: a training ground where we’re going to make mistakes and a school for practicing forgiveness when we do.

At the front of the classroom in the Jesus school of forgiveness is Jesus, whose main teaching technique is to repeat fundamentals. In chapters 13 through 16, what we call Jesus’ farewell discourse, a single phrase appears word for word five different times: Love one another.

Usually it follows these words: “As I have loved you.” You remember last week we said the DNA double helix for followers of Jesus is summarized in 1 John 4:19: “We love because God first loved us.” Up and down the grateful stairs. It’s in Jesus’ message here as well.
Besides repeating fundamentals, Jesus also likes to employ object lessons. As best we can tell, the classroom where Jesus is teaching his disciples to love one another is the Upper Room where they’ve just had their last supper together. And you’ll remember John describing how during supper Jesus gets up, finds a basin and a towel, and begins to wash his disciples’ feet.

If they’re still in that room, then during this whole lecture about loving one another there’s a basin of water sitting in the corner, a rumpled towel beside it. We might say it abides there.

That’s a word we hear Jesus speak often in John. Over two dozen times actually. Abide. Situate yourself. Make it a part of you. In Spanish: Permanecer. Let it take on an inner permanence. Abide in my love, Jesus says. Which in this context must mean always keep the basin in the room to remind you of my self-giving love for you.

Mary Lou Kownochi once claimed that there isn’t a person you couldn’t love once you learned their story. What I believe is also true—and this might be the way Jesus would put it—is that there isn’t a person you couldn’t love once you learned your own story; that is, that there is surely a basin and towel in your past, the emblem of someone’s kindness and compassion toward you.

Who needs a flower from you today? A soldier. A stranger. A relative. Someone about whom you have said for far too long, “Not yet.” I say a flower. It could be something else. A kind word. A listening ear. A renewed effort to understand that opposing view. Practicing forgiveness.

Having been drawn from the basin, caressed and clean, where is the Holy Spirit leading your feet to go?

Just look at what happens with a love like that, how it abides across generations. Take Everett Chesney’s flower, the gift of those kind visitors from Laurel Heights Church who found their mission that day. I don’t mean the flower itself abides. That blossom probably lasted a few days before it drooped in the little tin cup by Everett’s bunk. I mean the gesture, the kindness. It’s been a hundred years, and we’re still repeating the story, and the practice.