Collection is open to the public. Collection must be used in Special Collections and University Archives Reading Room. Collection or parts of collection may be stored offsite. Please contact Special Collections and University Archives in advance of your visit to allow for transportation time.
Letha Evangeline Ward Wakeman was born in 1898 in Alton, Illinois. She was the daughter of Thomas and Effie Ward, missionaries to Lagos. Wakeman was educated at Ouachita Baptist University, Arkadelphia, Arkansas. She married Andrew Vergil Wakeman, Baptist missionary to the Congo, where they lived from 1922-1926. They returned to the United States when Andrew contracted filariasis. His condition worsened and he spent much of his later life institutionalized. Letha Wakeman became active in the Oregon Migrant Ministry, especially the Migratory Mission, known as Eola Village, in Yamhill County. She became director of the Gleaners Chapel and was named Oregon Mother of the Year in 1973. Wakeman died in 1974.
The collection comprises Letha Wakeman's diaries, 1921-1930, 1942-1943, 1956-1961, and her personal correspondence, 1934-1974. Correspondents include Gilbert Gordon, 1943-1965, missionary teacher at Cameroon Protestant College, Bali; F. Richard Schneider, 1959-1972, director of Eola Village, director of social services, Winnebago Children's Home, Neillsville, Wisconsin, and regional welfare representative, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Bethel, Alaska. There is a file of missionary letters from the Congo, 1932-1974, and a miscellany of Congo mission publications. Family letters are from the Wakeman children and Andrew V. Wakeman, whose letters from the Oregon State Hospital are of clinical interest. There is one letter from Effie Ward, written from Lagos in 1908, and a memoir by her, written years later. Included in the collection is a file of the records of the Oregon Migrant Ministry, which include items from Eola Village, Gleaners Chapel, and the Yamhill County Migrant Committee, 1955-1974. Miscellaneous files include a biography, in manuscript, of Letha Wakeman, by Colena M. Anderson. The correspondence is arranged by sender in rough chronological order.