Barbara & Deane Genge in Argentina and Bolivia

by Barbara Whitfield Genge, submitted December 2023

I found the faith through Candee Pritchard Grant in September 1966, while studying at Parsons College. We were a small group but we prayed together and had a great fireside every Friday night. Gerry Robinson and Sam Jackson came every weekend to help our little group. We ended up having 20 or more youth participating and a number of them became Baha’is. I met my husband because he was rooming with Stan Bursting, who was a Baha’i. He did not declare while at Parsons but we dated and he became a Baha’i in January 1970. We later got married on the east coast and left to go pioneering two weeks later!

We traveled to a big Baha’i conference in La Paz, Bolivia in August 1970,  stopping in Peru to visit pioneers on the way. We later went to Uruguay and the Falkland islands visiting Bahai friends there. Later we went to Paraguay to see Moses and Lucinda Edwards who had been on the State Goals Committee with me in Iowa. Then to Argentina and back to Bolivia, where we met Hooper Dunbar, who convinced us to stay in Argentina. We went on pilgrimage to get the strength to live in northern Argentina, where we stayed for 13 years raising our two kids. We had local Baha’i activities at our house and had several youth who lived with us. I taught English while Deane worked for different companies that had projects in the area. We were in the town of Tartagal, province of Salta, Argentina from mid-April of 1970 to December 1983. We left because there was no more work.

We moved to Cochabamba, Bolivia in January 1984 to work at the American school, where our kids learned English and were able to study in the States, after serving at the world center before college. We have been in Cochabamba Bolivia for 40 years, serving on the LSA and many local actividades. Deane served on the Radio Committee for several years and has been the administrator of our Baha’i Institute. We are still here in Cochabamba. Our kids married here. Our daughter lives in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. They have two sons who are working in the States. Our son and family are living on the west coast in Washington. They have two sons, one out of college and working the other is still studying. We are getting up in age and not as active as we used to be!

In general that is an overview our Baha’i lives that all started in Fairfield, Iowa!

Loving Baha’i Greetings!