Ernest and Betty Wampler Chinese Textile Collection, 1929-1949 | Earl H. and Anita F. Hess Archives and Special Collections

Ernest Wampler was born on October 23, 1885, in Virginia to Frederick and Jane Wampler. He attended Bridgewater College in 1913 and married Vida Miller in 1914, with whom he had one daughter. Around 1919, Wampler went to China to serve as a Brethren missionary. His brother, Dr. Fred Wampler, was already in the country responding to an outbreak of bubonic plague and had established a Western hospital in Shanxi. One of Wampler’s first projects involved constructing a road to combat famine through accessible transportation, with an ultimate focus of evangelism. However, in 1922, Vida Wampler contracted tuberculosis, prompting the family to return to the United States. She passed away later that year. Six years later, in 1928, Wampler married Elizabeth Baker, who had worked in Dr. Fred Wampler’s hospital in China for some time prior. The pair returned to China in 1929 to continue their missionary work and had two children while abroad. Wampler was popular among locals for his farming background, which allowed him to engage in agricultural work in the area where he was stationed. At one point, Wampler engaged in a project crossbreeding sheep to create an animal which would yield more wool and could survive in the Shanxi climate. When Japan invaded China in 1937, Wampler continued work in the war zone and witnessed bombings, the deaths of Chinese friends, and destruction of surrounding properties. He oversaw the United China Relief program, an organization aimed at raising funds for medical and other needs of Chinese people affected by the war. The Wampler family home was at one point bombed, forcing the family to move into a cave and later into a Western-style home. Wampler occasionally returned to the United States, at one point giving an address in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania on his missionary work. In 1945, he published a memoir entitled “China Suffers,” reflecting on his experience aiding refugees in the war zone. Wampler remained in China with his family until 1949, when foreign workers and missionaries were expelled from the country. Wampler passed away in Harrisonburg, Virginia in November 1978.

Elizabeth “Betty” Wampler was born in Ohio in 1891 to William and Mary Baker. She served as a Brethren missionary to China around 1922, mainly as a delivery nurse in the Ping Ding hospital established by Dr. Fred Wampler. At some point, she returned to the United States, where she married Ernest Wampler in 1928. The pair returned to China in 1929 to resume working on evangelism, agriculture, medicine, and other projects in the Shanxi region. Wampler gave birth to two children while abroad, in 1933 and 1935. When Japan invaded China in 1937, Wampler began using her nursing skills to care for bombing victims in addition to other injuries. At one point, Wampler’s home was bombed with her and her children inside, prompting the family to move first into a cave and later into a Western-style home. Throughout the war, the family moved around the Shanxi region and to the United States, but left China as missionaries in 1949 when all foreign workers in the country were expelled. Wampler passed away in Bridgewater, Virginia in October 1984.

Gene Wampler was born on July 24, 1935, in Shanxi Province, China to Ernest and Betty Wampler. The son of Brethren missionaries, Wampler spent much of his early life in China before the family returned permanently to the United States in 1949. After returning to the United States, Wampler joined the Brethren Volunteer Service and served for two years aiding refugees in Austria. In 1959, Wampler graduated from Bridgewater College. In 1965, he earned his PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Michigan. Wampler married Theresa Shaft, with whom he had three children. Wampler taught for a time at the University of Connecticut Health Center before accepting a position with the Merck pharmaceutical company. There, Wampler was assigned to a project researching vaccine development for Hepatitis B, specifically aimed at finding a safe vaccine which could be administered to babies in China, where mortality rates from the disease were high. Having spent much of his childhood in the country, Wampler was in a unique position to develop and introduce the drug to China in the late 1980s through the mid-1990s. A contract was approved with the company, successfully introducing the drug developed by Wampler and his colleagues to China. During the years the project was conducted, and even after, Wampler was therefore able to make several professional and recreational trips to China with colleagues and family. Wampler was a recipient of the Merck Management Award in 1994 and the Bridgewater College Distinguished Alumnus Award in 1996. Additionally, he served on the board for several organizations and was an active member of the Indian Creek Church of the Brethren. Wampler passed away in Harleysville, Pennsylvania in April 2019.