The second month was the same in the mornings, but afternoons were devoted to house-to-house preaching. Can you imagine? Still not knowing the language and with just a memorized introduction written on a card, Rita and I went out in the house-to-house work all by ourselves!

I recall knocking on a door in Vallecas, a working-class section of Madrid. With my card in hand, just in case, I said in Spanish: “Good morning. We are doing a Christian work. The Bible says (we would read a text). We would like you to have this booklet.” Well, the lady just looked, then took the booklet. When we made the return visit, she invited us in, and as we spoke, she just looked. We started a Bible study with her as best we could, and during the studies, she just listened and looked. After a time she finally told us that she had not understood what we had said on our first visit but had heard the word Dios (God) and that this was enough for her to know that it was something good. In time, she took in considerable Biblical knowledge and was baptized, becoming one of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

Marvelous Experiences in Madrid

The house-to-house preaching was carried out very cautiously. The daily hubbub in Madrid was an advantage, screening us so that we were not too conspicuous. We tried to dress and act like others so that we would not stand out as foreigners. Our method of door-to-door preaching was to enter an apartment house, knock at a door, speak to the person, and then leave the building, the street, and the area. There was always the possibility that the householder would call the police, and therefore it was not wise to stay in the neighborhood. In fact, even as cautious as they were in using this method, Paul and Evelyn Hundertmark were apprehended and expelled from the country in 1960. They went to neighboring Portugal, serving there for several years, with Paul caring for the underground branch office. Today he is the city overseer in San Diego, California.

However, for us an equalizing took place. Just a few months later, six missionaries assigned to Portugal were ordered to leave that country! This brought a happy development because Eric and Hazel Beveridge, who were also in our class of Gilead, were now directed to leave Portugal and come to Spain. So there we were in February 1962, at the Hotel Mercador once again​—this time to welcome Eric and Hazel as they arrived.

It was during these early days in Madrid that Rita and I had a personal experience with religious hypocrisy. We studied the Bible with a couple, Bernardo and Maria, who lived in a shack made out of any discarded pieces of building material Bernardo could find. We studied with them late at night, and after the study, they would offer us bread, wine, and some cheese or whatever they had. I noticed that the cheese was just like American cheese. One night after the study, they brought out the can that the cheese came in. It had written on it in large letters, in English, “From the American people to the Spanish people​—not to be sold.” How did this poor family receive the cheese? The Catholic Church was used by the government to distribute it to the poor. But the priest was selling it!

Fruitful Ministry With the Military

Soon something wonderful happened that would turn out to be a rich blessing for us and for many others. We received a notice from the branch office asking us to visit a young man by the name of Walter Kiedaisch, who was stationed at the U.S. Air Force base at Torrejón, located a few miles out of Madrid. We visited him and his wife, starting a Bible study with them and another Air Force couple there.

During that time, I was conducting about five Bible studies with U.S. Air Force personnel, all in English, of course. Of those, seven were later baptized, and after returning to the United States, four of the men became congregation elders.

This was a time when there were very few ways to get books, magazines, and Bibles into the country because of the ban on our work. However, some literature was brought in by tourists and by our American contacts. I was assigned by the branch to operate a secret literature depot. It was in a storage room in the back of a stationery store in Vallecas. The owner’s wife was one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Though not a Witness, the owner respected our work, and even at great risk to himself and his business, he allowed me to use this rear area to prepare packages of literature to send to cities throughout the country. Since this room always had to look like what it was supposed to be​—a dusty, cluttered room full of cartons—​I had to build a workbench and bookshelves that could be set up and ready for work quickly and then concealed in seconds. At the end of the day, I would wait until there was no one in the store and then quickly exit with my packages.

It was a real privilege to share in distributing spiritual material, such as the Watchtower and Awake! magazines and other literature, to congregations throughout the country. Those were exciting times.

Rita had the joy of conducting 16 home Bible studies, about half of whom became baptized Witnesses of Jehovah. Dolores was a young married woman who spent the cold winters in bed because of a heart problem. In the spring she could get up and be somewhat active. Dolores’ faith was strong, so when the time came for our district convention in Toulouse, France, she wanted very much to go. She was cautioned by the doctor that it would be unwise because of her heart condition. Wearing a housedress and slippers and with no luggage, she went down to the train station to see her husband, her mother, and others off. Tears in her eyes, she could not bear to see them go without her, so she climbed on the train, and off she went to France! Rita did not know that this had happened. But there at the convention, what a surprise when she saw Dolores, smiling from ear to ear!

An Unusual Bible Study

We cannot close this account of our Madrid assignment without including Don Benigno Franco, “el profesor.” A local Witness took me to visit an elderly gentleman living with his wife in a very poor apartment house. I started a Bible study with him. After studying for about a year and a half, he asked to be baptized and become one of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

This elderly gentleman, Don Benigno Franco, was the cousin of Francisco Franco, the dictator of Spain at that time. It seems that Don Benigno was always a freedom-loving person. During the Spanish Civil War, he sympathized with the Republic and was against his cousin​—the general who won the war and established a Catholic dictatorship. Ever since 1939, Don Benigno had been denied the right to work, and he was limited to a very meager living. So it was that the cousin of Generalissimo Francisco Franco, caudillo of Spain, became one of Jehovah’s Witnesses.