Lincoln Anderson
Passed away on August 26, 2005.
Longtime Presbyterian minister Lincoln Anderson, 90, of Great Falls, who served as pastor of Sunrise Presbyterian Church for 17 years, died of natural causes Friday at Peace Hospice.
Survivors include: his sister, Wyona Allred, of Ogden, Utah; his three sons, Norman (Marcia) of Great Falls, Timothy (Ellen) of Sudbury, Massachusetts, and Daniel of San Francisco, California; and his grandchildren, Duncan and Isabel.
Lincoln was born Aug. 1, 1915, in Battle Mountain, Nev., the second son of Frank and Ilda Anderson. After struggling with tuberculosis and losing his father, brother, and a younger sister in his childhood, he graduated from high school at Mountain View, Wyo., in 1932. He earned a scholarship for tuition and books to the University of Wyoming, but was unable to attend because of the Depression and the need to provide for his remaining family. For the next ten years he worked in the Uinta County Bank, helped put his sister through nursing school, built his mother a house, and became very active in the local Presbyterian church.
In September 1942, Lincoln enlisted in the Army Air Corps. He soon found himself stationed in England as part of the 8th Air Force, where he completed 25 missions as the top turret gunner and engineer in a B-17. For his service, he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Air Medal with three oak leaf clusters. Upon completing his final mission, he kissed the ground and said, "Lord, there has to be a better way!" He devoted the rest of his life to that course.
He returned to Wyoming and briefly resumed his work at the bank, but with the GI Bill, he was finally able to enter college in the fall of 1946. Convinced by the war of his calling in life, he served as a student pastor as he studied. In 1950, he graduated at the top of his class at Westminster College in Salt Lake. On Aug. 27 of that year, he married Jeannine Slater in Sinclair, Wyo., a union that lasted until her death in 2001. He graduated from the San Francisco Theological Seminary in 1953.
Lincoln received his first call at the church where he had been married in Sinclair. There he served as a mobile minister for several small communities in southern Wyoming. After three years, the family moved to Soda Springs, Idaho, where he served the Presbyterian Church for seven years. In 1963 the family moved to Great Falls, and Lincoln was the pastor at Sunrise Presbyterian until his retirement in 1980, guiding the church into financial viability and membership growth. At the same time, he was active in state and national Presbyterian leadership.
Upon his retirement as an active pastor, Lincoln continued his church ministry in many ways while adding several new occupations. He was a mentor to new ministers, he served churches without a pastor, and he mediated difficulties in churches around Great Falls. He participated in building cabins at the Glacier Presbytery church camp on Flathead Lake, where he had earlier served as camp director. At the same time, he worked at cabinet making and home contracting, and started a business that installed security systems.
He remained a vital part of the church families at Sunrise Presbyterian and Christ's Church on the Hill, preaching and teaching a regular Bible study. He was active in the Exchange Club of Great Falls, where he served more than 40 years as the secretary.
A major effort in the past several years was to assist in the fund-raising that led to the recent development of Heren Park.
Lincoln fought a long battle with various types of cancer beginning in the 1970s. Despite two major surgeries and two bouts with chemotherapy, he was busy and stubbornly independent to the very end of his life.
He preached his last sermon shortly before his 90th birthday, and quietly continued his ministry during the week he spent in the hospice. A life that began with so many difficulties concluded with a ministry that extended fifty years and touched countless lives.
Memorials may be sent to Sunrise Presbyterian Church or Peace Hospice of Montana.