J. Earle and Nadine M. Roose International Student Scholarship Fund

J. Earle and Nadine Roose were raised during the Great Depression in Goshen, Indiana. While Earle was in the band at Goshen High School, he met a flute player by the name of Nadine Miller who would later become his wife. Nadine and Earle were married for almost fifty years. Together they raised two children: son, David, and daughter, Karen.

The entire family enjoyed the outdoors and travel, taking annual excursions to the Swiss Alps and other places around the world and within the United States.  Nadine and Earle traveled extensively in Europe and Asia until Earle’s health made it impossible to do so in the final year of his life.  In one of his letters Earle quoted St. Augustine’s view that “the world is a book and those who do not travel see only one page”.  Nadine and Earle saw many “pages of the world book” returning numerous times to places they especially enjoyed:  Switzerland, Turkey, Alaska, Hong Kong, etc.

Nadine grew up speaking Pennsylvania Dutch before English.  Her beginning years of education were challenging as she had to learn English as well as her various subjects.  As a youth she attended Eighth Street Mennonite Church in Goshen.  After her marriage to Earle her church commitments continued into her adult life.  She audited the church books, worked in the nursery, and was very active in the various women’s circles of the Methodist Church.  Nadine and Earle sang for almost 50 years in the Methodist Choir.

After graduating from Indiana University where Earle was an outstanding student and a member of the debate team, he was accepted at the University of Michigan Law School.  In his final semester of law, Earle was drafted.  With the bombing of Pearl Harbor, he enrolled in Officer’s Training School and went on to serve as a Lieutenant Colonel in the South Pacific until the end of World War II.

In 1946 Earle returned to the University of Michigan to complete his last few courses and upon passing the Indiana Bar Exam, began work as an attorney in Goshen.  He quickly became a dedicated community and church leader, serving on many boards and teaching Sunday school at the First Methodist Church.  In 1949 he married Nadine and together, they shared many interests, including a love of people, a love for travel, and a very keen interest in other cultures around the world.

Earle’s service in World War II, the family travel and his genuine interest in people and cultures led him to have a special place in his heart for all people, especially those with fewer resources.  Both Nadine and Earle were genuinely warm and caring.  William Barclay and Elton Trueblood were two men Earle especially admired.  It was due to Dr. Trueblood that Earle was inspired to organize Goshen’s Yokefellows’ Men’s Fellowship.

When Nadine first started college she had to work a semester in order to attend college the second semester.  With the arrival of her daughter, Karen, she postponed her own educational goals. She decided when her daughter reached the age of 12 she would resume her quest for her college degree.  When her son David was born she again postponed finishing college planning to return when David turned 12.  After a 24-year interim Nadine graduated in 1972 with a teaching degree in business . . . the same year her son David graduated from Goshen High School!  Education was a very important part of their family’s lives.

Nadine was a secretary and bookkeeper for Rieth-Riley Construction Company, worked in the Auditor’s Office, and later worked as a “temporary substitute” secretary for Davis and Roose Attorneys for 15 years!  Nadine’s activities were many and varied from being a den mother in Cub Scouts to volunteering at Red Cross for over thirty years.  She held leadership roles in most of the organizations she was in.

Earle was physically fit and regularly jogged for exercise, often on Goshen College athletic fields where he could run a ¾-mile loop on the grass.  He became known around the College as the “barefoot jogger” for, as the weather permitted, he liked jogging around the field in bare feet.  It was during those years that Ruth Gunden, a professor at Goshen College got to know Earle.

When Ruth became the director of the College’s visiting Chinese Scholar Program, she asked Earle and Nadine if they would consider hosting a Chinese scholar in their home.  They readily agreed and embraced the idea of getting to know visitors from other countries and helping where they could.  Earle was asked to help teach these visiting scholars about the American legal and financial systems.

As an attorney and a fervent student of history Earle presented to local churches “The Trial of Christ from a Lawyer’s Perspective” on the four Sundays prior to Easter.  He cited the Roman and Jewish laws, and their relationship to the death of Christ.

In Earle and Nadine’s last few years of foreign travel they returned numerous times to trace the footsteps of St. Paul in Biblical-times Macedonia (now Turkey).  Environmentalists, even into their 80’s, Nadine and Earle canoed, camped, and hiked in the wilderness. Earle loved to transplant from the woods countless numbers of six-foot maple trees into the yards of Goshen residents.

Their love of people, value of education, appreciation of the environment, sense of wonder, and love of history have been passed on to their children and their granddaughter.  It is our families’ hope to support these same visions in others who explore in the future.

With their strong interest in international travel and studies and the College’s strong programs in international education (both having U.S. students studying overseas and international students studying here in Goshen), this scholarship fund is a natural fit.