Bea Richards and Martha Boss Collection

Bea Richards was born in 1904. Miss Richards was active in worship, and Christian education, teaching Sunday School for 50 years. She frequently made trips to the County nursing home to care for the ill and infirmed.

As a result of her close friendship with Deaconess Martha Boss, she became interested in the mission work in Hong Kong when Miss Boss took over the handicraft project at Rennie's Mill in Hong Kong. This provided support for people who used their talents and materials supplied by the mission to create craft items, which provided an income for the refugees. Miss Richards became a tireless volunteer salesman, displaying / selling these articles made by the Hong Kong refugees. In 1969 Miss Boss asked Bea to come to Hong Kong and set up a headquarters for the project. She retired and did just that. Except for a brief visit to Cleveland in 1983 for medical treatment, Hong Kong remained her home and mission until her death on February 8, 1985.

Martha Boss was born on January 31, 1913 in Cleveland, Ohio, the daughter of German immigrants. After high school, she received nurses' training for three years at Lutheran Hospital in Fort Wayne, Indiana. She then spent a year nursing at Saint Luke Hospital in Cleveland, and then went back to Fort Wayne for two years of deaconess training. She left the United States for China in November 1945 and began her work at a Lutheran Hospital in Enshin, Hupeh, China in January 1946. She left China for Hong Kong in December 1949 as a result of the Communist War. She then began missionary work in Hong Kong in February 1950. She worked at Saint John Lutheran Church, Rennie's Mill Village and opened the Hong Kong Handicrafts Society to help the poor in 1954. She also worked at Haven of Hope Sanitorium two days per week from 1957-1968. She organized the LWML in 1968 and opened an Aged Home with other churches in 1969. She also worked one or two days per week at Redemption Church, Holy Cross Church, Resurrection Church and Saint Paul Church, Macau from 1971-1973. In 1973, she also worked as a treasurer of the Hong Kong Conference of the LCMS in 1973. Miss Boss left Hong Kong for the United States on furlough on May 17, 1973 and was killed in an automobile accident in Elgin, Illinois on August 5, 1973 at the age of 60. She was the first woman to receive The Christus Vivit Medal from Concordia Seminary, Saint Louis, Missouri for distinguished service to the church. She also received The Spiritus Christi Medallion from Concordia Teachers College in River Forest, Illinois. She worked in China for four years and Hong Kong for twenty-four years. She served in many capacities; as the adviser of the LWML and five Rooftop Children Centers, supervisor and principal of Saint John Lutheran School and Kindergartern, director of The Hong Kong Lutheran Handicrafts Society and Mount Olive Lutheran Nursery, as well as treasurer of the Hong Kong Conference of the LCMS.