Even before the 1900’s, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod was sending missionaries to foreign lands. One of the first areas to be reached by our missionaries was India. One missionary to India has a tie to Perry County. His name was George August Naumann. He was sent to India in 1902. The picture below shows his arrival in India being greeted by Rev. and Mrs. George Kellerbauer and Rev. Theodore Naether. The Naumanns are in the middle with Rev. Naumann holding a child and an umbrella.
The Naumanns would have seven more children while serving in India. Two of those children, John Naumann and Martha Naumann, have connections to me and to Perry County. George and many of his family returned to America on a furlough in 1912, but because of World War I, they were not permitted to return to India. Here are two pages of Baltimore passenger lists including members of this family coming back to the USA.
Martha Naumann was born in 1910 in India. Martha Naumann married Walther Richter in 1936 in Spring, Texas. Walter was one of the people I wrote about yesterday…The 3R’s…Richter, Remembrance, Reunion. Walter and Martha met while serving at the Lutheran Mohican Boarding School in Gresham, Wisconsin. Here are some photos of Martha and Walter.
John Naumann was also a missionary to India. He apparently returned to America in 1953.
One of John’s children was Helen Naumann. Helen was teaching in North Morristown, Minnesota when she married Clarence Spitzack. Helen is a dear friend of mine who came to teach art history at the school in North Morristown where I served as teacher and principal. I had the opportunity to visit Helen last week and once again heard some of her stories about her time in India. They are wonderful stories. Rev. John Naumann is buried in the cemetery in North Morristown.
Mission work has always been an important part of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. It has also been very important to people in East Perry County to support the work of our Synod’s missions. This Sunday, we have one of our regular Mission Sundays at Concordia Lutheran Church in Frohna. The interest in mission work continues.
Reblogged this on and commented:
I’m having computer issues today, so the best I can do is share an old post. I noticed that today is the date of the first missionary being sent to India by the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, so I thought I’d share this post that discussed a Perry County connection to that early missionary effort.