yes, Addie is the same person as Adeline Amstutz. When I went to
college I preferred to be called Addie although it was hard for some
of the professors who knew my older siblings had a musical sister by
the name of Adeline. They soon learned. Some of my older cousins,
and definitely aunts and uncles, still call me Adeline and I sign my
checks as Adeline. I learned that in India. In fact, there it is
better to just use your first initials because according to their
laws, Addie Yoder is a person completely different from Adeline Yoder.
Not even related!
After 5 years at Goshen College (I took an extra year so I could take
some extra classes at the seminary located at the end of campus and
also to give an organ recital in addition to a piano recital). From
college I wanted to go directly to India to teach music at the
international school, Woodstock, north of Delhi. But my visa did not
come. I taught Jr Hi general music courses and HS choir in Wauseon,
Ohio for one year. The agreement with the school board was that I
would teach there until the visa came.
I went to India, via Germany(to visit a cousin studying in Bonn)
Switzerland (to visit Amstutz origins)and a 24 hr stay in Terehran
before landing-staying for 6 years. I was secretly engaged to Dave
Yoder, whom I met in Goshen before I left. He went to Oregon to do
his 2 years of alternate service by working at a Mennonite H.S. in
Salem. The mission board heard of an opening for a history teacher at
Woodstock, got him a visa, we were married in 1967 and our daughter
was born in 1970. We returned to the states in 1971. When the two
most important things in our life, getting married and having your
first child, happen in a country, a little bit of your heart stays
there. We were able to take Karmen back with us to visit the school
in 2004 when they celebrated their 150th anniversary. In fact, on
Karmen's 34th birthday, she was able to visit the hospital where she
was born. It was a shock for her to see the primitive it was, but she
loved the week we had in the Himalayan mountains. The views were
still spectactular. Her comment "And you guys got to see this every
day for all those years!". I was there a total of 6 years and Dave
for 4 and Karmen for 8 months!
We moved to Indianapolis in 1990 but have lived in Ohio, South
Carolina (where Dave got his Masters of Divinity at a Lutheran
Seminary and I got my Masters of Music in organ performance) and North
Carolina-Winston Salem for a year of internship and then in Reidsville
serving Holy Trinity Lutheran church for 8 years.
That's enough for now.
I want to thank Paul for being so patient with a computer illiterate
person! He finally got me signed on for dalton 59. Go pink and black.
Addie
