Postcard message on the reverse side:
“Dear Friends in America,
“I made a visit this morning to a kindergarten of the Methodist mission, and when I entered that door I thought I had truly entered a flower garden. There was a round circle of blossoms, each on a tiny little chair.
“Of course, they were really children, but their dresses were red and green and brown and yellow, and their sashes hung over the back of the chairs like petals. Their cheeks were like red roses, and in the middle sat their lovely teacher like a radiant flower gardener looking after her freshly blooming garden. I wish you could see it.
“And all over Japan are many little children in kindergartens happy because their teachers know what Jesus means when He said ‘Suffer little children to come to unto me … for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.’
“Hoping you will never not forget the children in Japan, I am,
“Your friend in Nippon.”
Methodist mission kindergarten class, Sendai, c. 1920.
See also:
“Sendai Christian Orphanage, Girls’ Cottages”, Sendai, c. 1910.
Daini Middle School, Sendai, c. 1910.
Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, c. 1910.
“Miss Ellison W. Bodley, Sendai, Japan, writes: ‘The Lee Memorial Kindergarten continues to be a joy to the children and a blessing to each home represented. There are forty children enrolled, and a Mother’s Club of thirty-five members.
‘Last month the mothers of the graduating class presented the kindergarten with two fine swings for which had long been hoping. As these children are mostly drawn from the homes of railway officials in our immediate area, they bring us into touch with a spendid class of people.'”
– Women’s Missionary Friend, October 1924
“Christian Kindergarten”, c. 1920.