(This is my attempt at an objective retelling of my grandparents’ story, as opposed to my experience of them.)
Papa (“Pap-aw”)
Papa’s real name was Ceylon “Cye” Cecil Coller. He was born in Herman, New York on August 21, 1924, two years before his only sibling, a little brother named Carl (1926–2017).
Papa’s dad’s name was Orange Coller, and Papa only knew about as much about him as you and I do, because no one ever talked about him. In fact, Papa only saw his dad twice – once in a tavern at 18, and a second time at his funeral when his dad, a warrant officer in the Army, lost a lung and died of pneumonia three days later, at age 57, in 1963. Orange had lived in Grand Prairie, Texas, and Papa would go back to visit his uncle, a model-T Ford mechanic, without telling anyone he had spoken with the shunned side of the family.
Papa’s mom, Ella, was busy as a school teacher for 32 years, so Papa was mostly raised by his grandparents during the week, and his Aunt Clara on the weekends. (We all just called her “Auntie”. She regularly sent us hand-written cards, birthday money, and a big, metal jug of grade-A maple syrup from their New York refinery.) Papa’s mom died at age 64, when Papa was 41. Auntie made it to just 3 months shy of her 100th birthday before passing away in May of 2005.
As a child, Papa’s whole family attended a Methodist church, and he was baptized at age 12 in Russell, New York, in a tiny church that had a stained glass window picture of Jesus holding a lamb. Papa’s mom told him repeatedly, “Someday, son, you will be a minister.”
All through high school, Papa tended horses and cows at 4am everyday, and again at night for Mrs. Newby and her daughter, horse trainers from Cheyenne.
World War II
In January of 1943, it became obvious that the United States was going to draft Papa and every able-bodied male his age into the military, giving them all a difficult choice: wait, and hope that they would not be drafted, or voluntarily enter the service for a specific job, giving them much better odds of not ending up in a foxhole on the front lines of a world war. Papa chose the latter.
He was already working as a sheet metal worker, creating aircraft parts in a Central New York State Air Force base, so he decided to take fate into his own hands and officially join the Air Force. Within a week, he was already grateful for his decision. He was shipped out of the dead of New York winter to 17 days of basic training for gunners in Miami Beach. He traded in his winter wool wardrobe for summer khakis, a better fit for his stay on the 10th floor of the Broadmoor Hotel on 72nd Street, on the ocean side with the coastal breeze coming in off the water.
His first flying buddies were Zig, Mok, Ben, Pat, and Ed. When he introduced himself as “Ceylon”, they chopped his name in half and welcomed him to their crew. Ever after, he would just be known as “Cye” (even to the extent that when my brother wanted to honor Papa, he gave his son the middle name “Cye”, and not Papa’s legal name).
Papa would only ever see two of them again: Zig, the upper turret gunner, a successful businessman who had early investments in KFC and a gas company; and Ed, a Brooklyn Jew who took Papa suit shopping before escorting him to the Copacabana and his other favorite clubs after the war.
After basic training, Papa was sent to the intensely dusty base in Wichita Falls, Texas for about 6 months of engineer and gunner training. The first real war story I remember Papa telling happened shortly after that.
The Truck
During a routine day in Biggs Army Airfield in El Paso, Texas, Papa was the last to jump on a truck full of airmen getting a ride across the base. The driver thought everyone was already in, and with Papa just getting his grip on the side, the 18-wheeled transport truck lurched forward, causing Papa to lose his grip and fall to the ground, where the back 4 wheels of the fully-loaded truck drove over his pelvis, breaking it in 7 places.
If it had caught him any lower, he never would have walked again. Any higher and he would have died instantly. And the dark miracles kept mounting. Though he required an IV for 37 days, and remained taped to a door for stability for another 31 days after that, he continued accruing flight pay and was eventually given the temporary job of jeep chauffeur for a one-star general on the base.
His crew replaced him while he was taped to the door, and flew their first mission over Munich. The entire crew was lost in battle. If he hadn’t been run over…
I heard Papa ask all the normal questions that so many military people have to face when presented with the inescapable horror of good fortune. Papa eventually answered his “Why me?” guilt with a resolute “For the sake of the gospel,” and he dedicated his life to earning the impossibly improbable blessing of living his life, when so many other good men had lost theirs.
First Mission
Papa flew many missions after that. I’m sure every airman’s first mission is memorable. In Papa’s first mission, the pilot was hit in the face with flak. Immediately unable to fly the craft, the copilot took over, redirecting them to Yugoslavia while Papa and the rest of the crew tried to clean up the pilot’s shredded face. The crew spotted a hole in the clouds and dove through, hoping for a miracle below. As soon as they punched through, they spotted a roof with a large red cross – a hospital. Both the pilot and the co-pilot made it through the war, though the co-pilot later died in a plane crash.
Papa completed many missions as a bombardier (the person in charge of releasing the bombs at the right moment to hit their target). He would recount to me how important it was to warn the whole crew to hold on, because the instant those thousands of pounds of munitions detached from the plane, it would jerk upward like a rollercoaster.
No Oxygen
It was on one of those bombardier missions, facing off, eye to eye with another plane’s gunner, that a heavy piece of cargo came loose, pinning Papa against the floor of the plane and crushing his chest. After several minutes of oxygen deprivation, and with no one to help him in the middle of the firefight, his extremities turned purple and he prepared to die. Just before blacking out, Papa freed himself as they exited the fight. Just another brush with death.
Divine Promises
In war time, the grim reaper is omnipresent, and each person needs a way to either make peace with him or ignore him. And so, during one mission, flying at 38,000 feet, surrounded by flak and the deafening blasts of friendly and enemy fire, indistinguishable from each other, Papa made his pact with his Lord, “If you get me back from this mission, I’ll become a minister.”
They both kept their end of the bargain, and Papa gave up his only vices: a good beer, and the bottles of Italian vino they could get for 8 lira. Almost as if to seal the deal, Papa was given two weeks at a rest camp in Rome, where he was allowed to visit the Catacombs and retrace the steps of the apostle Paul.
Post-War Salvation
The war ended September 2, 1945, and within a year, Papa found a job as assistant manager of Stanley Theater, while he attended Utica College of Syracuse University. Each night before studying, he would close down the theater, and receive a police escort at 12:30am to securely drop off the day’s profits.
A kindly typewriter repairman who worked late nights across the street watched this routine with compassion as he saw what he believed was a poor young man getting in trouble with the law, night after night. So he finally worked up the courage to invite Papa to a Christian Missionary Alliance church, “We’re having a protracted meeting at our church, and I think you should join us.”
Papa didn’t know what a “protracted meeting” was, nor the real reason for the repairman’s invitation, but he accepted, and three nights later (it was a very protracted meeting), officially committed his life to the Lord and was soon baptized in Delta Lake at their camp meeting.
Conflicted Interests
Meanwhile, a conflict was growing in Papa’s soul. On one hand, his mother had believed since he was a child that he was destined to become a Methodist minister. Plus, he had promised God he would fulfill that calling if he survived. On the other hand, Papa felt a strong disillusion with that occupation, based on the drunkards and liars who made up a too-large percentage of the ministers he knew.
When the pastor who baptized Papa told him, “You really should attend Nyack Bible College to become a minister!” that was the tipping point to make a decision. Papa shelled out the money for a $40/hour psychiatrist ($650/hour in 2022 money) who, after hearing Papa’s complaints, told him,
“Young man, you are looking for utopia. There aren’t any people like that.”
And with that final admonition toward moderation and acceptance, Papa’s objections to entering the ministry were overruled. Soon he was giving his testimony as a guest speaker in a Methodist Bible class of 400 men.
But when the pastor approached him afterwards with tears in his eyes and said, “I believed like that once, but they won’t let you preach like that here,” Papa knew he could never be a Methodist. It was Nyack for him after all.
Shifting Shifts
Near the Air Force base where he used to make airplane parts, Papa found a job working the graveyard shift, gauging GE tubing at the Revere copper and brass factory. One night he was suddenly awakened by his supervisor, “Cye!” Papa had fallen asleep on the job…again. “I want you to come see me in my office before you leave in the morning.”
“Yes sir,” he replied, realizing his exhaustion had probably just cost him his job.
He managed to stay awake for the rest of his shift, and as he retired to the office, his supervisor explained,
“Can’t you sleep days like the rest of us? You’re a good worker. Go home, get a good sleep, and come in Monday on the day shift.”
The truth was, Papa couldn’t sleep days like the rest of them. He was living in a boarding house, next to a greenhouse where they ground up leaves in the daytime, keeping him wide awake. But Monday morning he was alert and grateful to still have a job. As he was punching in, his former shift buddies were punching out, exhausted.
“Cye – you got a day shift!? How did you get promoted?” they demanded. Papa never told them his secret.
Touched By An Angel
It was later in that same job that he was steering a huge cart of brass tubing that was being pushed from behind with a tractor. Papa slipped and started to fall, and instantly realized the tractor driver could not see him. About to be instantly pancaked by four tons of metal, Papa was suddenly thrown clear of the cart by a mysterious and powerful force. He was sure it was an angel; further proof that God was ordering his steps toward ministry.
So when subsequent employers, like the Christian Scientist contractor who hired Papa to drive a gravel truck, tried to convince him to stay and work for them, Papa kept his eyes on starting a church.
Ministering To The Family
In 1949, home from Bible college for Thanksgiving, Papa’s mom arranged for him to give a message at the Methodist Church. She couldn’t have been prouder. When he broke Methodist protocol and gave an altar call at the end, his mom was one of the first to respond, kneeling at the front, with tears streaming down her cheeks.
“What did I say, mom?” he asked her.
“I don’t know. But whatever you’ve got is what I want,” she replied.
When they arrived back home for lunch, his aunt requested, “Ceylon, you say grace.” When he finished, she was crying.
“What did I say, Auntie?” he asked her.
“I don’t know. But whatever your mother found is what I want too,” she replied. So he led her in the sinner’s prayer as well. She became an avid Bible reader and quite involved in the church, nearly single-handedly funding the church’s handicapped elevator.
Likewise, Papa’s niece was influenced toward Christ when he sent her a Living Bible for her high school graduation. Just a year later, she was reading it and attending church. Papa’s pastoral ministry was just warming up, and already he had several converts. (His brother Carl did not attend church, but Papa called him regularly and prayed with him over the phone and trusted that Carl knew the Lord.)
The Librarian
After returning to Nyack college, Papa was exiting the library after studying late one night when he nearly bumped into the librarian, Pearl Peery. He had never seen her on campus before, a fact that concerned him almost immediately, as he thought, “Man, what’s wrong with me. All this time I’ve been here and she’s been here and I haven’t done anything about it!”
Who was this girl?!
Mama (“Mam-aw”)
Pearl C. Peery, the middle (and most extroverted) of 3 daughters, had been born in Denver, Colorado, to Ray and Grace Peery, in a small apartment above a store, on April 15, 1922 (the same month and day as her daughter-in-law, my mom, would be born 36 years later). Her dad was an interior decorator and painter, and the family moved constantly around the Denver area, often to homes owned by the company he worked for. But one thing that was consistent was their church attendance.
Mama’s mom, Grace, had been raised in the church, but her dad, Ray, had only become a Christian after they married. But he made up for lost years with his diligence, working hard for the Gideons, while Grace worked in the Gideon office.
Conversion
Ray carried Mama to his men’s Bible class at Evanston Evangelical Church when she was just 3 weeks old. And when Mama was bigger, he used a basket, sitting her in the front row with him at Beth Eden Baptist. It was at that church that Mama’s Sunday school teacher, Mrs. Weimer, told her 8-year-old class about salvation, and Mama accepted Jesus into her heart, beginning the life-long pursuit of ministry.
Like many young converts, Mama was determined to be a missionary to Africa. Like many young converts, that calling would be diverted by a romantic interest.
Ministry Preparation
Of all the ministries, Mama felt most fulfilled teaching children, starting to teach at Beth Eden at age 14, and holding multiple VBS’s most summers from about age 16 until she was married at age 29.
When Mama was about 20, her parents moved to Eugene, Oregon, and Mama attended Open Bible Institute in Des Moines for a year before moving closer to her parents and graduating from Eugene Bible College. (Later, Open Bible Institute and Eugene Bible College would merge with Dayton Bible College and become one school on the Eugene campus.)
Mama spent several years working as a secretary in insurance offices until, in 1949, a man named Hubert Mitchell (son of a missionary and brother to future Open Bible Missionary Secretary Bryant Mitchell) encouraged her to attend Nyack college in New York to prepare to become a missionary. Nyack had a strong emphasis on missionary work since its president, Dr. Thomas Moseley had been a missionary to China for many years.
She applied, and the following February 22, Mama found herself on stage, in front of 5,000 people at Carnegie Hall, reciting a speech that the Nyack faculty had chosen her to write about the islands mission field for the college’s “Congress of Bands” event.
Love In The Air
Somehow Papa hadn’t noticed her on stage, but walking out of the library next to her that fateful day, he knew she was a special gal. Unfortunately, the only time boys and girls were allowed to walk alone together was after Friday night missionary meeting. As Papa put it,
“One evening there was a beautiful moon over the Hudson River, three miles wide at Nyack. There was blacktop that wound around a high hill above the campus. We went walking on the blacktop, and made a mistake of looking at the moon from Inspiration Point. I guess it was the moon that got to us.”
He rushed to a local jeweler who upsold Papa to a platinum ring for an extra hundred bucks. He transferred one of the diamond’s from Papa’s ring into the new platinum setting, and Papa invited Pearl to his Uncle Wilbur’s balcony across the Hudson River, overlooking the city and the Empire State Building.
His plan worked, and June 6, 1951, the day after Nyack’s graduation, the two were married by Gilbert Johnson, Papa’s homiletics professor. Papa’s mom and aunt were in attendance, as well as about 30 others Nyack students and teachers. Musicians Uncle Wilbur and Aunt Addie played their Hammond organ and Steinway piano as the newlyweds sped away to the ferry boat that would take them to Sleepy Hollow in Terrytown.
Meager Beginnings
Three days later, they were back at work and living in a recent graduate’s apartment at 17 Washington Street. The previous tenant hadn’t had a chance to take his furniture, so they agreed to take care of it during their stay. One night they returned home from work, and the entire apartment had been emptied, save for their few possessions. Their time there, it would seem, was over.
With nowhere to live and no way to afford a place, Papa bought bus tickets to Charles City, Iowa, placed their last $5 in his pocket, and shipped their few belongings – just enough to fill one crate – ahead of them. Of course, they had no money to ship the crate, so they would have to find jobs before they could retrieve the contents.
They found a lady with an upstairs apartment for rent. When she asked for a down payment, Papa asked, “How about $5?”
“Okay, kids. You can stay,” she said.
Diligence Pays Off
Papa found another contractor he could drive for, this time hauling concrete, for $1.25/hour. As finances continued to be unbearably tight, Papa approached his boss, “I really need a 25-cent raise.”
He boss laughed in his face, “Our men work months for 5 cents.”
“Please,” Papa said, “I really need it.”
As always, Papa had been a reliable worker, so his boss bargained with him, “I’ll give it to you, but if you tell any of these guys, I’ll know who told them and you’ll be fired.”
Mama (Pearl), meanwhile was proving to be worth more than her insurance office wage as well. On a routine trip to the bank to make the office deposit, the banker asked, “Are you happy where you’re working?”
“I guess,” she replied.
“I’ll tell you what,” he said, “come work for me, and whatever you’re getting paid, I’ll give you 50 cents more.”
Mama immediately took the offer back to her employer and negotiated for the same raise without having to change jobs.
Ministry
While living in Charles City, they started a church with just a blacksmith, his wife, and a female pianist whose husband refused to attend. By the time they left, just two short years later, the congregation had grown to 80. Papa would see nearly another 70 years in ministry, mostly through Open Bible:
- 1951-1953 Charles City, Iowa. Papa’s first child and only son, Duane, my father, was born in Charles City in 1953. Duane would be given his only sibling, a baby sister, just 21 months later.
- 1953-1956 Pella, Iowa. Pastor
- 1956-1959 Urbandale, Iowa. Pastor and Central District superintendent
- 1959-1962 Billings, Montana. Associate church planter (to future Open Bible president Ray Smith) and Mountain District superintendent. Papa also sold “The Book of Life” door to door, and made an extra $26 as a bonded mail carrier to the Crow Indians in the Red Tail Dam Area at Saint Xavier, who also gave Papa orders for groceries and other items they wanted from town.
- 1962-1979 Des Moines, Iowa. Pastor at “Fort Des Moines Open Bible” (probably the second-most significant Open Bible church, the first being “First Church of the Open Bible”, also in Des Moines) and Central District superintendent. These were the most formative ministry years for Duane, who was ages 9-26 while Papa was pastor at “Fort”. Duane had his first son, my older brother, in 1979.
- 1979-1986 Pittsburgh (Springdale), Pennsylvania. Pastor and superintendent of the Allegheny District from Buffalo, New York to Greenbrier. Papa wasn’t actually voted in here, but received an emergency, 2-year appointment by the regional superintendent after the church had split and voted out the previous pastor after just 1 year. When Papa’s 2-year appointment ended, the church voted him back in for another 5 years. This was Papa’s most financially prosperous season, and the church’s as well, paying off the church mortgage shortly before Papa left. Mama continued to use her teaching prowess in Springdale, leading a “Women of the Word” class and prayer meetings, where they testified to several miracles, including the healing of cancer.
- 1986 Des Moines, Iowa. This is where I really met them. Papa was the district superintendent, but was not a pastor, for the first time in 35 years. Instead, he found assorted employment, like driving for Laboratory of Clinical Medicine at Mercy Hospital, visiting doctors’ offices and picking up items for the incinerator. In 1990 he officially became the chaplain for Des Moines’ Valley View Village retirement home, a position he would keep until 2004.
Papa loved people; loved knowing them and loved helping them. That’s probably why the most fulfilling part of ministry to him was the funerals. It’s such a vulnerable time for families, when they are in deep sorrow and often need the comfort of a compassionate spiritual guide. Papa conducted 379 funerals in total, 156 of them at the retirement home, and 13 for a single family during his pastorate in Fort Des Moines.
Several times he told me the story of the youngest person he conducted a funeral for. A newlywed couple, ages 17 and 18, had lost their newborn baby, and Papa carried the tiny white casket out to the frozen ground before praying with them that they would find the strength to carry on.
After Mama passed away in 2012, Papa sold their house in Iowa, and moved to California to live with his son, and continued leading ministry groups until about 2020, when his health began to decline. He passed away from complications related to pneumonia around 2am on Saturday, April 29th, 2023.