Gleysteen, William Henry ("Will"), 1876-1948 age 71

GLEYSTEEN, VANDERLINDEN, CARTER, CULVER

Posted By: Lydia Lucas-Volunteer (email)
Date: 11/21/2011 at 11:55:31

REV. WILL GLEYSTEEN DIES AT JENKINTOWN AFTER HEART ATTACK

William H. Gleysteen, 71, retired missionary to China and educator, died Saturday at his home in Jenkintown, Pa. following a heart attack, according to an Associated Press item in the Des Moines Register.

Dr. Gleysteen was born in Alton, youngest son of pioneer parents here, Mr. and Mrs. Dirk Gleysteen. He attended Grinnell College, the University of Michigan, and Union Theological seminary. As a young man he went to China to do educational work at Peking, and lived most of his adult life in that country, where he became a prominent educator. His children received their college education in the United States and Dr. and Mrs. Gleysteen also returned here preceding the late war, making their home at Jenkintown, near Philadelphia.

A sister, Mrs. John Meyer, lives at Webster Groves, Mo., and a brother, Dr. D. V. Gleysteen at Long Beach, Calif. Another sister, Mrs. Cynthia Zwemer, who had worked with him in China, passed on recently in Massachusetts and burial rites were held in Alton Thankgiving week.

The Rev. Gleysteen was held in high regard by many friends here who sincerely regret his passing.

Source: Alton Democrat, January 22, 1948.

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ALTON: Rev. William Gleysteen Dies

Rev. William Gleysteen, 71, died in Jenkintown, Pa. after a heart attack. He was born in Alton, the youngest of the 11 children of Mr. and Mrs. Dirk Gleysteen, pioneer citizens of Alton and Sioux County. He was a graduate of Northwestern Academy, and then attended Grinnell College and the University of Michigan. Upon his graduation he taught in the Academy for several years, and then attended Union Seminary in New York.

In 1905 as a student volunteer he went to China. The following year Mr. Gleysteen was granted a three month furlough and then was married. His bride accompanied him back to China. They were the parents of four children. Mrs. Gleysteen died in China before the family was grown up, and after her death his sister, Mrs. Cynthia Zwemer, went to China to assist in the care of the children. Later Mr. Gleysteen was united in marriage to Miss Theodora Culver who went to China as a missionary in 1917. To this union four children were born. The children came to the United States for their education and most of them now have homes of their own in this country. The Gleysteen family [illegible] home five years ago on a [illegible] furlough, and since that time has been living in Jenkintown, Pa., where Mrs. Gleysteen's mother lives.

Surviving are the widow and [illegible] sons and daughter and two sisters, Mrs. John Meyer of Webster Grove, Mo., Mr. and Mrs. Charles Bosworth of Oklahoma City, and Dr. D. V. Gleysteen at Long Beach, Calif.

Dr. Gleysteen was in charge of a boys' school in Peking, China.

Source: Sioux County Capital, January 27, 1948.

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REV. WM. H. GLEYSTEEN WAS DISTINGUISHED WORLD CITIZEN--RITES AT JENKINTOWN, PA.

From The Times Chronicle of Jenkintown, Pa., comes the following obituary of the late Rev. Wm. H. Gleysteen, distinguished native Altonite. It will be noted that funeral services were conducted by another prominent native son of a pioneer Alton family, Dr. John Muyskens of Jenkintown.

Reverend William Henry Gleysteen, Presbyterian minister, missionary, and educator in Peking, China, for 40 years, died at his home, 201 Greenwood avenue, on Saturday morning, January 17. He was 71 years old.

Funeral services were conducted by Dr. John Muyskens at the Grace Presbyterian Church on Tuesday afternoon at 2 o'clock. Assisting in the services were Dr. Lloyd S. Ruland, China Secretary of the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions and Dr. John D. Hayes, a former colleague in Peking, now a minister at the National Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C. Representing Mr. Gleysteen's many friends among the Chinese was Y. T. Lo, of Peking, China. Pallbearers were: Robert Carnwath, Jr., Lloyd H. Fallows, Arthur C. Argue, all of Jenkintown; Theodore C. Torrey, Hallowell, Pa.; Ambrose Miller, Glenside, Pa.; Liu Chan Au, Peking, China. Mrs. Robert J. Horne, Jenkintown, was at the organ. Interment was at the Hatboro Cemetery.

Mr. Gleysteen was born in Alton, Iowa, on July 17, 1876. His parents, Dirk and Klazina van der Linden Gleysteen, had migrated from the Netherlands and were pioneers in northwestern Iowa. The youngest of twelve children, he attended Northwestern Classical Academy, Orange City, Iowa, and Grinnell College before graduating from the University of Michigan in 1897.

In 1905 William Henry Gleysteen sailed for China as a missionary. For the next 40 years he was intimately connected with educational work in the Presbyterian Mission in Peking, mainly at Truth Hall, a high school for boys, but also in the task of organizing Christian education in North China.

While in Peking, he was president of the American Association, and served as a director of Yenching University, the Peking American School, and the College of Chinese Studies. For a period he was a member of the International Famine Relief Commission. He was also active in many other religious, civic and educational enterprises. Mr. Gleysteen was a life-long friend of J. Leighton Stuart, formerly president of Yenching University and now United States Ambassador to China.

At the outbreak of World War II, Mr. Gleysteen was interned by the Japanese in Wei Hsien Camp in Shangtung, China. He and his family were repatriated on the Gripsholm in December, 1943. He had traveled extensively, had wide interests in varied fields, and had a great many friends all over the world.

Surviving are: his widow, Theodora Culver; four sons, Theodore Carter, of Furling, Bucks County; Culver, Vice-Counsul at Dairien, Manchuria; William Henry, Jr., and Dirk, both students at Yale University. Four daughters, Mrs. W. Scott Morton, of Edinburgh, Scotland; Margaret Gleysteen, of Washington, D.C.; Mrs. Elmer E. Kramer, of New York; Mrs. Robert W. Newell, of Nutley, N.J. A brother, Dr. Dirk V., of Long Beach, California and two sisters, Mrs. Charles Bosworth, of Oklahoma City, and Mrs. John W. Meyer, of Webster Groves, Missouri.

Source: Alton Democrat, February 5, 1948.

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An article in the Alton Democrat, December 24, 1904, just prior to his leaving for China, gives additional information about his education and preparation for mission work, and includes a photograph:

GOING TO CHINA

"Rev. Will Gleysteen expects to leave next week for the Pacific coast whence he will ship on the tenth of January for China to enter the mission field.... Rev. Gleysteen goes out under the direction of the Presbyterian Missionary Board of the United States. He will be directly supported by a church at Watertown, New York which has elected him its 'mission pastor.' His field will be city mission work in the great Chinese capitol Peking. He will enter an old established mission where sixteen other American missionaries are already laboring. For a year he has been delving into Chinese language and literature and history....

Rev. Gleysteen was born in 1876 in the residence east of Postmaster Meyer's home [in Alton]. He attended public school here till he was thirteen and then took a three year's course in the Northwestern Classical Academy at Orange City. From there he went to Grinnell one year and thence to Ann Arbor for three years. He then taught English in the academy at Orange City for three years. The next four years he studied at Columbia college New York City during its sessions and spent his vacations doing city mission work in Detroit and elsewhere. He took the degree of Master of Arts from Columbia and after some work which he will complete while abroad will receive the degree of Doctor of Philosophy....

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An article in the Alton Democrat, February 5, 1943 gives news of his internment: "Rev. Will Gleysteen, former missionary and teacher of Peiping, China, is in a concentration camp in Tokyo, with 350 Catholic and Protestant missionaries, according to a telephone message received by his nephew here, Dr. D. J. Gleysteen, from Dr. Beach of Hull, who heard Rev. Gleysteen speaking over short wave radio from Tokyo last week." Their six children in this country had not heard from their parents since last summer.

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Alton Democrat, February 17, 1944: Dr. and Mrs. William H. Gleysteen, along with their two youngest sons, Bill and Dirk, arrived in the U.S. from an internment camp in China, where they were held by the Japanese. They wrote an "absorbingly interesting" account of their experiences, which they distributed to family and friends. William was for many years in charge of the Peking American School, where the family was living when the Japanese attacked Pearl harbor. His letter is printed in this week's and the following week's issue of the Democrat.

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His first wife was Alice Carter. From the Alton Democrat, December 14, 1907:

Alton relatives and friends of Rev. Will Gleysteen who is now just back from the Chinese mission field have received invitations to his wedding on December twenty-seventh at Montclair, New Jersey to Miss Alice Carter who is also a missionary to the Chinese.