James C. Thomson, Jr.

Thank You!

As you celebrate 50 years of Clarence Jordan's living vision of commitment and faithfulness, I am chagrined. I fear that I never said, "Thank you".

The year was 1950. My wife Pat and I, recent Penn State graduates, were staff trainees at the now defunct Christian Service Training Center in Frostproof, Florida. There we met C.Z. Ballard. That summer, on our way to an AFSC Peace Conference in Greensboro, CZ, R.C. Charma a graduate student from India and I visited the farm.

That August I received orders to report to Fort Dix as a Reserve Officer. I refused, and informed them of my whereabouts.

In early December CZ and I again visited Koinonia as I helped him move to a new project nearby (a precursor of "Partners"?). I returned to Florida and was informed by my wife that Army agents had been there. The next morning, while I was milking our cow, I was arrested and taken to Fort Benning. As a Commissioned Officer I was placed in a room next to the First Sergeant's office rather than a cell.

The point of this letter is that on Sunday morning I caught a glimpse of a visitor walking past my door, but before I could realize that it was CZ the Sergeant said the Prison Commander, Major Bullock, wanted to see me. The Major informed me that a group of people had come to see me, and he felt the least he could do was to interview me. In response to questions I said that I would be cooperative but non-military.

The group of people, of course, were friends from Koinonia. I did not get to see them, so I do not know who came other than CZ. I subsequently learned that the Major said I was "ornery as Hell and he wouldn’t let anyone see me."

So after more than forty years, if I didn’t say it then I say it now, "'Thank you, Koinonia friends!" Though I do not know who came to Fort Benning, from my 1950 visit to the farm I remember the Jordans, the Wittkampers, Howard Johnson and Bo Johnson. And, of course, Willie who married CZ. We visited them once in Michigan, but like so many of our old friends we have lost track of them.

Koinonia Kids - August 1958: front - Mike Goodman, Zenus Baer; middle - Lenny Jordan; back - Paulette Goodman, Carol Brown, Niamon Baer, Lora Browne and Jan Jordan. (photo by Cheryl Banks)

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