ERBC Through the Decades: the 1940s and 1950s
McMurchie cabin, Allen McMurchie’s original homestead, is still used as guest lodging at camp today.
Many people who have spent time at Echo Ranch - or have simply looked at some of our merchandise - could tell you that ERBC was founded in 1964. But the beginnings of Echo Ranch go back farther than that - all the way back to Wisconsin in 1901, with the birth of Allen McMurchie.
After serving in the army then spending a couple years in Bible school, Allen McMurchie came to southeast Alaska (then just a U.S. territory, not a state) in the 1930s to find work for the summer between semesters, but ended up ceasing his studies to stay in Alaska and homestead forty acres of land near Berners Bay, as allotted by the Bureau of Land Management’s Homestead Act, applied to the territory of Alaska in 1898. Allen logged in and around the Berners Bay area throughout the 1940s and 1950s (fun fact, he was drafted to serve in World War II but was then rejected for being “too old”… oof) and even raised cattle there. But he began to develop a dream for the property to become more. Decades later, Allen would write about the land that is today Echo Ranch: “When I first saw this valley [in the early 1940s], I felt that the Lord wanted me to have it. It seemed an ideal place to bring young folks to help them grow in the nurture and admonition of the Lord and to know Jesus Christ as their Savior.”
Allen got involved in the Juneau community in the 1940s, even taking on the responsibility of organizing the Fourth of July parade for a couple years. He met his soon-to-be wife Catherine at church in Juneau in the late ‘40s, and after a courtship that consisted of a lot of letters (they both traveled quite a bit), they were married in 1950 - both around the age of fifty. Conscious of adding on even more big changes to Catherine’s life, Allen proposed that she could live in a comfortable home in Juneau while he was out logging, but she wouldn’t hear of it; she quipped, “If I loved you enough to marry you, I love you enough to move to your homestead with you.” The two moved into Allen’s little log cabin near Echo Cove (the same one still at camp today, and in the photo above).
While the McMurchies continued to log and homestead in Berners Bay, Dr. Don Shidler, the president of Gospel Missionary Union (known today as Avant Ministries) visited Juneau for a missionary conference, and there he met Allen McMurchie and got to talking about Allen’s vision for his homestead. Allen got Dr. Shidler to come out to his property for a visit - no small feat in those years when the road north of Juneau was much shorter than it is today - and the two toured the land, dreamed, and prayed. They recalled specifically praying, in the spot where our present Dining Hall stands, that God would use the land to glorify Himself and bring many souls to Christ.
One of Allen McMurchie’s logging camps, at the base of Angel Mountain in Berners Bay.
The McMurchies and GMU stayed in contact and Allen’s hopes for his homestead started to move closer to reality as more volunteers and missionaries began to get involved, but the turning point came when Allen was approached with a grandiose offer. A pulp mill was very, very interested in obtaining his property to build an operation on it, and attempted to persuade him with a multi-million dollar figure and an all-expenses-paid ticket to relocate wherever in the world he wanted to go. Far from being swayed, Allen’s resolve was steeled; he responded, “The property is not for sale at any price, it belongs to the Lord.” And soon afterward, the McMurchies contacted GMU to begin the process of turning over the land to the mission. They started by giving sixteen acres for the purpose of establishing a Bible camp, and ended up officially deeding the entire property to GMU in 1973.
Allen and Catherine not only turned down an eyebrow-raising profit, they also completely surrendered control of their most valuable possession, the land. According to the wisdom of the world, this was a foolish decision - why would Allen give away the fruits of his life’s toil instead of reaping the wealthy reward? But of course, today we can see that, through this step of obedience, God answered Allen’s prayer over his property in an incredible way. Allen and Catherine McMurchie got to see just the beginnings of the outcome of their faithfulness as they saw their homestead turned into a Bible camp that would bring in dozens of kids to hear about God’s love for them in Christ, as well as volunteers from around the country. Little did they know that, beyond their lifetimes, “dozens” would become hundreds and then thousands, and countless people in southeast Alaska and beyond would come to know Echo Ranch as the place where they came to know the Lord.