God’s Joke: The Surprising Gift of Holden Village
“A possibility is a hint from God.” – Søren Kierkegaard
Wesley Prieb was one of God’s amazing creatures. A rotund cigar-smoking South Dakotan with a wealth of bad jokes, Wes would spend the odd hour writing to corporations and privileged people who “needed” to give away their excess wealth. In 1957, Wes was in Alaska serving as a purchasing agent for the Army Corps of Engineers.
Wes Prieb demonstrating Holy Hilarity as Martin Luthor
In June, he read an article in the Anchorage paper reporting the closing of the Howe Sound mine at Holden, Washington. Wes wrote the first letter to Howe Sound on June 7, 1957. He asked for information since “the property could be useful for a church summer camp, or…a retreat center.” Howe Sound replied that the price was $100,000. The second and the third letters were dated April 1, 1958 and April 1, 1960 and sent from the Lutheran Bible Institute in Seattle. Before Holden the mining camp became Holden Village, the “foolishness of God” was at work and play: The mining company responded positively to Wesley’s April Fools’ Day letter of 1960.
Although Wes was a student at LBI, the administration of the school was unaware that his quixotic quest for a “desirable place for the use of the church …or the Lutheran Bible Institute,” was suddenly a reality. The Howe Sound Mining Company would sell the Village and the mine for $1 to LBI through its representative, Wes Prieb. When Wes finally told the president of LBI, Dr. Stime thought the whole thing “phony and a little ridiculous.” Phony it wasn’t, but the “gift” of a mining town (with attached abandoned mine), deep in a remote valley and abandoned for three years, was more than a little ridiculous.
