by Bangalore 27 Replies latest watchtower scandals
There is an interesting account of this case in the May 27, 1942 issue of Consolation. It runs to about 16 pages. The article is called "San Diego's Official Line Up Against New Earth's Princes." Beth-Sarim was the first choice for Rutherford's burial, the second choice was Beth-Shan, the secret property just near by. In fact this article is apparantly the only time Beth-shan is mentioned in the Society's magazines.
George
donny, I would guess they are buried in the area called the Launching Pad between then WT Farm 1 and WT Farm 2. I was on a jw bus trip that stopped there for a view. The stones are quite modest.
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We had a cemetary at WT Farms for the faithful. It was patheticaly unkempt. Weeds and bushes had overtaken it.
In a storage shed, my room mate found a stone marker of a mutual friend who died months earlier. The family of the deceased had paid for it, had it delivered, but no one was ever assigned to install it. My roomate complained to Lon Schilling who told him if he wanted, he could fix it up, but 'on his time'. So, my buddy organized a group and on a weekend they cleaned up the cemetary and installed the 'lost' gravestone marker.
All of these volunteers were very disturbed that it was so neglected and that nobody cared. In the same shed, they dug up two more markers, that were much older, that no one knew anything about.
At the time, I didn't think this, but I do now. Its exactly as Lady Lee said, once you are not producing, you no longer matter.
That burial chamber was probably a cool place to store liquor and beer.
It was said that Rutherford wore $100 silk shirts during the Great Depression and drove two V16 Cadillacs
It has been mentioned before, but this thread is a good place to comment again:
I (and others) have personally thought for a long time that this was evidence of the long-held antagonism between Knorr/Franz and Rutherford. It is entirely possible that Knorr and Franz wanted to minimize the burial place of Rutherford specifically to avoid it becoming a shrine. After all, post-era the death of Russell, a wide fraction emerged in the society and Knorr the businessman was not about to have this repeated. Russell himself had a sort of burial monument erected (the pyramid) by his grave, and probably they did not want a repeat. Note that if a respectable gravesite was desired, they did not exactly have to put up the Crypt at Beth-Sarim; the Society could have put it in a suitable legal cemetary if they wanted.
Along the same lines - they did not waste much time in getting rid of Beth Sarim and the other property, as well as the two famous Cadillacs.
Equally interesting is the treatment of the burial service - absolutely secretive, even if it actually took place.
Apparantly, Rutherfords own living family (and even the mistresses) had nothing to do with it.
Isn't he in heaven now, drinking whisky shots with JC and the rest of the dead anointed class waiting for the big takeover.
LD
Between Rutherford and his crony C.J.Woodworth, the Watchtower and the Golden Age (Awake!) began publishing anti-medical anti-science articles fomenting radical faddist notions and downright crackpot denunciations.
(There was a limit, however. Woodworth, the eccentric editor of The Golden Age, found that limit when he, in 1935, tried to persuade Rutherford and the JW community to abandon pagan month and day names. Rutherford harshly censured and ridiculed Woodworth in front of the whole ‘Bethel family,’ a spectacle that shocked many who may nevertheless have agreed with the sanity of Rutherford’s decision to not force such a radical change (Penton 1985, 66-7).
Woodworth was second only to Rutherford as an important influence on the JWs in this period.
One oddity about him was his burning hatred for medical professionals. He considered the compulsory vaccination programs a Satanic and commercial conspiracy to weaken Christians by introducing animalistic tissue into their veins, and he even rejected the germ theory of disease, preferring strange ‘electronic’ and ‘radio’ based apparatus instead. Actually, the Watchtower Society at one time marketed and sold alternative ‘medicine’ through The Golden Age. The only part of these ideas that remain in the JW organization and culture is the blood prohibition – which still gives the movement tragic headlines in the press worldwide – and perhaps a tendency among JWs today to be preoccupied with homeopathy and other ‘alternative’ quasi-medical procedures.
All of this really shows the cold-hearted political maneuvering that goes on with every leadership change in the Watchtower Society. It has happened every time: Rutherford had to dispose of an old guard from the Russell era; Rutherford was in fact deposed during the last years of life by Knorr and Franz; when Knorr died Franz really only gained a sort of ghost presidency because of the Governing Body setup; and so on.
Nobody gets much adulation after their time is over. Probably today's average JW would hardly know who Rutherford even was, or have any idea that his burial place is still something of a mystery.
I have pictures of the plot in Staten Island
