“I may turn out to be of use somewhere in this old world with you helping me. Won’t we try hard,
Elta, dearest, to be of some use to society?”
As Orie was about to graduate from Goshen’s School of Business, he
received an important phone call from Noah Ebersole Byers, president
of Goshen College. Byers, scholarly and sophisticated, had served as
president of Elkhart Institute from 1898 to 1903, and then of its successor,
Goshen College, since 1903. Now he was recruiting a teaching
principal for Goshen’s School of Business, the program of study that Orie
was just completing. Would Orie be willing to fill that role beginning in
September?
As soon as the spring term ended, Orie enrolled in the MacCormac
Business College on East Madison Street in downtown Chicago to take
advanced courses, in order to better prepare for his teaching role. He had
only the summer to do so.
Having begun his studies at Goshen in 1910, Orie already felt at home
on campus. His first association, however, dated from 1903, when his
father took ten-year-old Orie to a wheat field on the south side of Goshen.
It seemed to be a field like any other, until Orie learned that it was to
become the campus that would replace Elkhart Institute.3 Now he was on
that campus in a dual role. As a student, Orie was taking classes toward
a bachelor of arts degree in English; in his faculty post, he was replacing
his former teacher, Frank S. Ebersole, who had resigned after five years
of service.
Elta Wolf
In the spring of 1913, Orie began courting Susan Elta Wolf. The relationship
started with a double date. Orie and a friend had asked two women
for an evening out, but they had not decided how they would pair up. As
the two men waited for their dates to descend the stairs from their thirdfloor
rooms in Kulp Hall, Orie solved the problem by claiming as his date
the one who came down last. Though his plans were rarely so haphazard,
his choice was in character; he did not need to be the main man, nor did
his date need to be the foremost woman. The second woman down the steps that spring night was Elta Wolf, the woman he would marry in 1915.10 She was also the major factor in determining
his “life work,” as he often put it.
A Busy Summer
One catches a glimpse of Orie’s full schedule when later in June he found
himself at home on Cloverdale Farm with a case of the mumps. It required
a great deal of effort to find substitutes to teach his business courses, his
Bible class, and his Sunday school class; to chair the devotional committee;
to lead the Young People’s Bible Meeting; and to fill in as “master” of
the men’s dorm. His brother Ernest agreed to attend faculty meetings in
Orie’s place and do his janitorial work in the dorm. After this litany, Orie
said he had had no clue that “running a school” required so much effort!
There was no one who could do Orie’s twenty-hour student load, of
course. That he had to do himself.
Indecision
Orie felt pulled in both directions. He had begun his postsecondary education
under the Byers administration, and Byers had hired him to teach.
The professors and administrators were his friends and mentors. Yet Orie
was also the son of D. D. Miller, a member of the MBE and of the executive
committee of the Indiana-Michigan Conference, both calling the college
to greater accountability to the church. While Orie became a lifelong
advocate for Goshen College, his greater loyalty was to the church. The
college, as all institutions, was to be a servant of the church.
An Akron Christmas
Orie spent the 1913 Christmas holidays with Elta in Akron. It was his
second visit, having met her parents earlier in the fall. During this festive
week, Orie proposed to Elta and they agreed to marry in September
1915, some twenty months down the road. Elta’s father, A. N. Wolf, and
his partners offered Orie a place in Miller Hess, so his vocational plans
seemed to be settled. They needed his skills and experience as a bookkeeper,
and A. N. wanted an apprentice who would eventually take his place
as wholesale shoe salesman. The Wolfs also planned to buy and remodel a
house across Main Street for Elta and Orie.
Summer 1914
By June 1914, summer school was in full swing. Orie was taking German
and algebra and teaching his usual business courses. He reported to Elta
the beginning of a construction project: teams of horses and graders were
excavating for a new science hall, the school’s third building, which would
not be finished until 1916. As in the previous year, Orie was responsible
for all student religious activities. He asked Elta to pray for wisdom to
make the right decision about his vocation and their future.
Perplexing Choices
Once again Orie worried about his future vocation. What had been
so gloriously clear last Christmas had quickly become murky. By mid-
September, his resolve returned. Innumerable conversations, particularly
with his father, led Orie back to his original commitment to Akron and
the shoe company.34 Elta and the Wolfs were, of course, relieved. Elta was
sympathetic to Orie’s sadness about moving so far away from his parents
and promised to build a close relationship with them by writing frequent
letters and visiting when possible.
Sights Set on Akron Again
In March, A. N. Wolf graciously reaffirmed his desire to have Orie work
for the company. The public nature of their family plan had compounded
Wolf’s distress. The entire Akron community knew he had purchased a
house on Main Street for Orie and Elta. At that very moment, carpenters
and plumbers were at work remodeling the house. A. N. assured Orie he
would not hold Orie’s vacillation against him. Wolf acknowledged Orie’s
desire to serve God and the church and assured him that God could use
Orie in Lancaster just as well as any other place. In fact, the Ephrata
church needed his gifts. “I am very sure if the Lord does not want you to
be in the shoe business or to live in Lanc[aster] Co[unty], he will find you
here and put you in the right place.”
From Indiana Farm to Pennsylvania City
In June 1915, Orie received his bachelor’s degree in English from Goshen
College. In addition to his English concentration, he had taken a wide
variety of liberal arts courses such as history, astronomy, physiology, and
German. His grades were evenly divided between As and Bs. . . .
One can hardly overestimate the influence of Goshen College on
Orie. There he formed a network of friends and colleagues, mentors and
teachers—relationships he would continue to nurture to the end of his
life. There he met Elta, with whom he would share life for forty-three
years. Goshen gave him a broad liberal arts education with a concentration
in classical literature and an introduction to systematic theology and
biblical studies. From his faculty post, he observed the church at work.
Theological wrangling and partisan politics among church leaders that
could have caused Orie to become cynical, as it did some of his peers,
instilled in him instead a sense that the church and its institutions were
worthy of his loyalty and service. Whether east or west, at its best or its
worst, the church was still the body of Christ.
On July 7, his twenty-third birthday, Orie was reflective. His first
twenty-three years had prepared him for the next twenty-three, which he
expected to be his most productive years. He was beginning to make the
mental transition. His Indiana
