ADVENTIST HISTORY
Men of Muscle: Ellen White in Samoa BY MATTHEW LUCIO
Ellen White lionized her husband, James, as “the best man that ever trod shoe leather,”1 but the best evidence for their physical attraction was that they produced four children. Like many in her day, Ellen was practical in matters of love, and few would be tempted to put most of her marriage advice on a Valentine’s Day card. Here’s one example: “Time strips marriage of the romance with which imagination had clothed it.”2 Stop, Ellen, you’re making me blush. Although White spun words into webs by the millions, not
every part of her person was preserved in print. We are spoiled by the massive number of words she leſt us, but whatever feelings of physical attraction she felt toward her husband largely remained between them. “It is clear,” wrote Gerson Rodrigues and Demóstenes Neves da Silva of the Latin American Adventist Teological Seminary in Brazil, “that the love of James and Ellen did not fit the concept of romantic love of the nineteenth century.”3
6 AD VENTIS T T OD A Y
You might be surprised to learn, however, from one of my
favorite stories from Ellen White’s life, that she did notice and comment on male bodies.
The First Voyage On November 12, 1892, White boarded the steamship Alameda in San Francisco, en route to Australia to begin her missionary tour. Te Alameda first stopped in Honolulu, a city she called “especially attractive” and “very beautiful” aſter a week at sea. Aſter crossing the equator on November 24, White reached Apia, the capital of Samoa, on November 27. She described Apia’s harbor, like Honolulu, as “a beautiful expanse of water, shut in by coral reefs.” Tose reefs made it impossible for the Alameda to dock, so Samoans came out to the ship in canoes to escort the passengers to shore. Although she stayed aboard the Alameda, White wanted to
paint a picture for readers interested in her trip. She described the Samoans as “physically well-developed” and reported that they “are said to have the finest physique of any of the South Sea peoples.” She further observed, in her own guarded way, that “most of them are destitute of clothing except a cloth or mat about the loins.” She also noted that their skin was “of a light brown color” and “many are elaborately tattooed.” Tese
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