Basketball and Compassion
Washington, Indiana, is a quiet hamlet of 12,000 souls in a rural area of southwestern Indiana, a town best known for the prowess of its high school basketball teams. In an era of open tournament competition among as many as 700 high schools, Washington High School hoisted state championship trophies in 1930, 1941, and 1942, an unprecedented accomplishment. And it has won at least four more since the onset of divisional playoffs, second overall in state championship victories, trailing only the renowned Bearcats of Muncie Central, a school in a much larger city and a much larger enrollment.
The WHS gymnasium seats nearly 7,100 people, huge by national high school standards but not even the largest in basketball-crazy Indiana.
I know Washington well. I grew up there. Basketball was king and, to most of us, India was only a place on maps that nobody in Washington seemed to know or care about.
We were wrong. A local family had visited missions in South India in 1949, starting a connection that has lasted 77 years.
The relationship was renewed last year when Dr. Mini Paul, clinical director of an important South Indian medical center, visited Washington and nearby Indiana communities.
Glenda Scudder recalls that she met Dr. Paul when Mini addressed the congregation at Glenda’s church, the Plainville Christian Church, in June of 2025. Here’s Glenda’s report.
“South India has been a ministry interest in Daviess County churches since the Art Morris family went to South India (Madras and Madarapakkam ) from Washington, Indiana, in 1949.
Mini was happy to share pictures and talk about “Aunt Ida” long before I shared my own Scudder connection. When she learned I was a relative of Ida Scudder her joy and gratitude overflowed.
My connection to Ida Scudder is through my late husband, Doug Scudder. In 1985 Art Morris invited us to come see and help at the small hospital in Madrapakkam where he and his family had lived in the early years of mission work. Doug’s sister, Ellen Scudder Jones, had interned with them in the summer of 1976.
Doug had hoped his pharmacy degree could be put to use but he spent most of his time building tables and benches for use in the orphanage as well as giving devotional thoughts each morning at the hospital and speaking on Sundays. The children thought it was great fun to play duck duck goose with Doug!
I oversaw the making of clothes for the children and did some organization of letters from the children to their sponsors.
One of my favorite memories is from our first day in the village. Several boys were chasing a squawking chicken. Our interpreter told us they were catching our supper!
We were thrilled to see the hospital in Vellore and when Art told them we were Scudders, the “red carpet” was rolled out, and we toured everything from the kitchen and laundry rooms to the operating theaters. We even stayed overnight in their accommodations for families in the hospital.
I was touched by the Ida Scudder memorial wing and the appreciation for her work that is still so evident.”
Dr. Paul tells her story in Panel 2 of this website.
