The following is a history as presented by Betty Letzig at the 50th Anniversary Celebration.

 

While today we have come to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Brooks-Howell Home, our heritage is one that goes back at least to l896 when the first “vacation home” for deaconesses opened in Ocean Grove, NJ.  In a joint effort the New Jersey, Newark and Philadelphia Conferences rented a house so that “tired deaconesses” could enjoy the benefits of rest away from their appointments and gain both spiritual renewal from all of the “inspiring sermons, stimulating lectures and music of the great Ocean Grove program” (Meeker, p.211) and physical renewal by the seaside.  The same plan of rented facilities was offered the next year.  The appreciation expressed by the deaconesses and the obvious benefits to their work as a result of this time away led to the calling together of representatives from nine conferences in August of 1897, together with some national officers of the Woman’s Home Missionary Society, to form a Board of Management. 

When Mrs. George O. (Jane Bancroft) Robinson and Miss Henrietta Bancroft offered  two cottages and two lots at 72-74 Cookman Ave., in Ocean Grove, NJ, for a permanent rest home, plus a cash gift of $1000,  the gift was eagerly accepted, and the home named Bancroft Rest Home in their honor.    In 1901 it was winterized for year-round living. It  was renamed Bancroft-Taylor Rest Home, to honor the memory of Mrs. Martha A. Taylor, one of the founders of the board, whose husband offered to pay off all of the accumulated deficit on the home if she could be given recognition in the name.     Three years later Sunset Cottage was opened  to “receive the invalids into its peaceful and restful surroundings.” (Meeker, p..211) After a fire  destroyed the main building in l926, rebuilding began within a month and the new building opened just eleven months and one day from the date of the fire.  

A unique feature of Bancroft-Taylor was that in the early years girls from some of the WHMS girls’ homes and schools came each summer as helpers - opening to them both a work experience and an opportunity of broadening horizons.  It was also at Bancroft-Taylor that there is the first record of a bazaar sale being held with proceeds used for improvements!!

Three additional  rest homes were available in the summer of 1900:   Thompson Rest Home at Mountain Lake Park, Md., was the first for deaconesses and single-women missionaries.  Elvira Olney Rest Home, built on the lakeside near Ludington, MI , opened for deaconesses with space for five residents - the result of Mrs. George O. Robinson’s urging in a speech the previous year that a home be opened in that section of the country.  The money was raised and the home built within a year.  Mrs. P. D.Perchment, the first chairperson of the separate committee on homes, donated the rent of a cottage for use by deaconesses at Chautauqua.

Beulah Rest Home in Oakland, CA opened in 1912; and Skeer Rest Home in Newton, PA in 1914.  Fenton Memorial Rest  Home, on the grounds of the Chautauqua Institution, opened in 1917 -  the gift of  Mr. James Fenton, in memory of his wife and mother, and in appreciation  for the work of deaconesses.  The plaque over the door contains his quote: “May these women who so unselfishly devote their lives to others here find rest and recuperation.”  Chautauqua Mission House was purchased fully furnished in l920 and opened in l921.  Each year two rooms were reserved for foreign missionaries. If there were other homes, I found no record of them.

After Mrs. Robinson’s move from Michigan to California she was concerned that the deaconesses in that part of the country also have a rest home and in 1922 gave her large estate in Pasadena, CA - often referred to as “the castle” - as a rest home for deaconesses and home missionaries.   Southern California women came up with the name of Robincroft - “Robin” in honor of Mrs. Robinson, and “Croft” in honor of Henrietta Bancroft in recognition of their untiring support of the deaconess movement.  Robincroft officially opened on August l, 1924, for eighteen to twenty residents. In the remodeling, a portion of the Circle Drive between the tower and the main parlor was enclosed to form a beautiful sun parlor that contained the two stained glass windows from Mrs. Robinson’s Detroit home that now hang in the entrance lobby here at Brooks-Howell Home.  

Thoburn Terrace in Alhambra, CA was founded in 1923, a year prior to the opening of Robincroft, for deaconesses related to the Chicago Training School. Following Union of the three branches of Methodism in 1939, when all of the deaconness work came under the supervision of the Woman’s Division, Thoburn Terrace and Robincroft were considered sister retirement homes.   Later, as the need for medical services increased on both campuses,  Thoburn Hall was built on the Robincroft campus to serve as a joint health unit for both Robincroft and Thoburn Terrace.  In 1964, the Thoburn Terrace property was sold and the twenty-five residents were moved to new facilities on the Robincroft grounds.  It was also after Union when the work of the Woman’s Home Missionary Society and the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society were combined under the Woman’s Division that all of the homes were opened to single women missionaries as well as deaconesses. 

With retirement homes on both coasts, there was still a long waiting list for entrance that included both deaconesses and missionaries.   The Assembly Offering of l954 was designated “to be used in some way for missionaries and deaconesses.” A committee was appointed to determine what was most needed and decided on a retirement home.  Questionnaires were sent to all deaconesses and missionaries asking for preferences as to location.  As a young deaconess, retirement was the last thing on my mind when I got that questionnaire!  The preferred location was in the Southeastern Jurisdiction and in September 1956 the Woman’s Division voted to purchase the 29 Spears Avenue property here in Asheville, with the intent that a new home would be built as quickly as possible.  The stately old three-story residence was repaired, refurnished and made ready for eight guests in the summer of 1957.  Deaconesses Dorothy Dodd and Addie Greeley were the first to move in and serve as resident/hostesses. Soon thereafter, following her retirement after 25 years as director of Robincroft, Miss Mabel M. Metzger came to serve as Director while the new unit was being planned and built.  She served for four years before re-retiring to Robincroft. 

Plans for the new unit got underway immediately. The name Brooks-Howell Home was chosen to honor both Mrs. Frank G. Brooks, by then the immediate past president of the Woman’s Division, and Miss Mabel K. Howell, former professor of missions at Scarritt College, whose own home in retirement was just up the street on Merrimon Avenue and who had been very active in the selection of the site. 

The Assembly Offering of $98,203.17 was the major source of funds for the new building, plus funds from both the Departments of Work in Home and Foreign Fields and a number of special gifts.  Funds from the Michigan Conference furnished the rooms occupied by missionaries from that conference, plus equipment for the beauty parlor.  A new spinet piano was the gift of another Michigan friend, and a second-hand piano the gift of several residents.  Central Methodist Church in Asheville gave looms and weaving equipment.  One room was for the art studio, and a snack room was equipped by the residents for the use by small groups.   It was ready for occupancy in October 1961 - and was rapidly filled.

Churches of the Asheville area warmly welcomed the new residents whose wealth of experiences and leadership skills enriched the congregations and greatly expanded their sense of mission.

With a long list of retirees still waiting for entrance, additions to the main building followed: the Chandler-Burris apartments, named for Mrs. Helen Chandler, president of the Brooks-Howell Advisory Board, and Miss Emma Burris, staff of the Woman’s Division, as liaison to Brooks-Howell; and the Cadwallader apartments. The sale of Mrs. Ruth Jones Cadwallader’s home in New Orleans which she had left to the Woman’s Division as a home for retirees, but which proved impractible for that purpose, provided the major source of funds for those apartments.  Later the house next door was purchased for staff housing and named in honor of Miss Reba McNabb after her retirement as Director.

Reorganization of the Board of Missions in 1964, which removed from the Woman’s Division the direct supervision of personnel and projects, meant that the Division’s responsibility for pensions and health care was thus limited to those already in service.  Consequently, with no new personnel coming into the ranks the demand for space gradually  resulted in declining occupancy at both Bancroft-Taylor and Robincroft.    It was at this time that my responsibilities in the new National Division began to include an official relationship with the Committee on Homes first as the interim executive in the Deaconess Office and later as the Executive for the Office of Social Welfare and Medical Work with adjunct staff responsibilities for the Woman’s Division.  The future of all of the homes was a priority issue.  An offer by the Methodist Homes of New Jersey to purchase Bancroft-Taylor was accepted with the provision that those in residence there who wished to remain could do so.  Some did choose to stay, but others chose to move to Brooks-Howell.  It was with that move that the nursing wing here was named the Bancroft-Taylor Unit to continue to honor these early founders.

A professional survey was made which included individual interviews with most of the residents of both Robincroft and Brooks-Howell, and many retirees still living independently as a way of determining the best course of action for the Woman’s Division.  One salient finding was that the retirees were so self-directed and strong in both body and spirit that the surveyor determined he should add five years to the normal actuarial tables used for making his recommendation.  The recommendation was that the home at Robincroft should be closed and all future expansions be at the Brooks-Howell site; and that the major need of the future would be for additional health care facilities there.   Later the Cummings Health Care Unit met that need.

When the recommendation to close Robincroft and to move the residents wherever they chose to go was approved, three of us were directed to leave the sessions of the Women’s Division to communicate in person the action taken: I, as the staff person responsible for work with Robincroft,  along with Mary Yaggy, chair of the Committee on Homes, and Rebecca Lyons from the treasurer’s office.  We flew  overnight to Los Angeles so that we could get to Robincroft before the news got there ahead of us.  We met first with the director and then with all of the residents.  After the announcement had been made and many questions answered, there was a rather prolonged silence.  Suddenly, one of the residents rose up and said, “The Woman’s Division and the Lord have always looked after us!  Let’s start packing!!”    Some residents moved to Brooks-Howell immediately; some moved to other retirement homes closer to family, but the majority moved some months later to the Covenant Home in Spring Valley into the new Robincroft building which had been built especially for them.   

Today Brooks-Howell Home stands as the sole retirement facility of the Women’s Division, but continues to embody the heritage of the homes of the past.

What had begun as vacation homes for rest and inspiration, then became a necessity for invalids and ultimately became a form of “old age security” for retirees that enabled them to live out their lives in comfort, free from anxiety, surrounded by a ministry of love in sickness and in health. (Meeker, p 210).

Thus it is that those of us here today - who are privileged to live  at Brooks-Howell among the beautiful furnishings and artifacts from around the world that remind us daily of those who have gone before us; who enjoy the comfort of good food and exceptional health care and who revel in the constantly changing vistas of flowers, trees and mountains - give thanks to the Women’s Division and all of their predecessor bodies for their vision and their provision for those for whom they feel a special responsibility.  It is their care for us that enables us to continue to serve each other, our churches and the community.

10/19/07                         Betty J. Letzig

References:

• DO YOU KNOW? Work of the Home Department, Woman’s Division of Christian Service,  Board of Missions, The Methodist Church, Literature Headquarters, Cincinnati, Ohio, l956.
  
• Meeker, Ruth Esther:  SIX DECADES OF SERVICE 1880-1940.  A History of The Woman’s Home Missionary Society of  The Methodist Episcopal Church.  The Continuing Corporation of  The Woman’s Home Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, l969.
  
• Metzger, Mabel M: ROBINCROFT: A History of Service.  Education and Cultivation Division, Board of Global Ministries, The United Methodist Church, 1975.