HEN Rev. Henry came to take charge in Fridhem, in the first part of June, 1918, the congregation had been without a pastor but one day. Rev. Berg had only two days before gone to his new charge at Genoa, and there had virtually been no interruption in the church work by reason of the change of pastors.

   The year 1918 was a year of great import for the United States. We had been in the war more than a year, and messages had long been coming telling of those who had laid down their lives for their country. The summer waned, fall came, and the portentous 11th of November dawned. This was the day the armistice was signed, and the whole world rejoiced. It was felt that the war was at an end. But the plague, that grim follower on the heels of war, had come, and his harvest was greater than that of the war itself. The "Spanish Influenza" had spread from the death-infected fields of Europe, until the graves of its victims dotted the whole earth. The Fridhem church was closed during December, 1918, and part of January, 1919, on account of the plague. It is true, the Christmas morning service was held by permission of the local Board of Health, but the Sunday-school's Christmas Tree Festival was postponed until it was deemed safe to hold it.

    The war work had not been neglected by the congregation, and while there had been no flare up or blatant demonstration of patriotism, it was nevertheless there -- a silent plodding determination to serve the country to the ut-

---

© 2002 for the NEGenWeb Project by Pam Rietsch, Ted & Carole Miller.