Fulton, John Edwin (1869–1945) and Susan “Susie” Virginia (Newton) (1871–1950)

John Fulton was a missionary, minister, and administrator. Susan served as a counselor, carrying on many responsibilities entailed with mission work and raising children. John is referred to as the “Adventist apostle to the Fiji Islands.”¹

Early Life

John was born in Riversdale, Nova Scotia, on July 1, 1869² to George Noble (1843-1910) and Hannah née Cox (b. 1843) Fulton.³ At the age of six, he moved with his family to the United States where he grew up in California (1875-1878) and Oregon (1878-1884). His Presbyterian parents joined the Seventh-day Adventist Church after attending evangelistic meetings when he was about seven or eight. In 1885 he was baptized by C. L. Boyd at a camp meeting in Portland, Oregon, and subsequently entered Healdsburg College (1885-1890). He was the very first graduate of the biblical course at Healdsburg College. At school, he met Susan “Susie” Virginia Newton. Susie was born in Bishop, California, on April 4, 1871.⁴ She had given her heart to Christ at the age of 10 and also attended Healdsburg College (1887-1891).

The couple wedded July 25, 1891, and had three children, Jessie (1892-1972), Agnes (1893-1983), and George (1898-1905).⁵ Tragically, little George, at the age of six, was stricken down with “tropical dysentery.”⁶

Ministry

As a six-foot and two-inch student, John began as a colporteur and then served as a pastor in Smith River, California, and Crescent City, Oregon (1890-1893). He was ordained to the gospel ministry in Portland, Oregon, in 1892. From 1893 to 1894 he served in Washington, after which he and Susan responded to a call in 1894 to go to New Zealand, where John labored as an evangelist for a year before going to the island of Fiji. The Fultons were not the first Adventist missionaries to go to Fiji. On August 3, 1891, John and Hannah Tay visited Fiji on the first missionary voyage of the Pitcairn ship, but their stay was cut short when Mrs. Tay died after only five months.⁷ After the Tays, attempts were made to send other missionaries to Fiji, but the first permanent missionary presence came the Fultons’ arrival in 1896. They first stayed in the capital, Suva, on the largest island, Viti Levu, where they mastered the language. The next year John began to preach in it. In 1900 he began to publish a paper, Na Rarama (“the light”) which was the beginning of the publishing work there.⁸ Several books were issued in the Fijian language including translations of Bible Readings, an adapted version of The Great Controversy, and Early Writings. He also prepared a “simple book on physiology and hygiene, and a hymnal.”⁹ A training school opened in 1904 on a tract of land at Buresala, Ovalau.¹⁰ This school became known as the Buresala Training School.

John had a sense of humor,¹¹ which can be seen in one of his early reports about his mission experience in Fiji:

I was heartily received by these people in the several towns I visited . . . While in their towns, I was expected, of course, to partake of their hospitality, which I did to the best of my ability, though I must confess I made a poor show at eating their food . . . Their diet is a spare one, consisting chiefly of yams and taro. They occasionally have a vakalolo, or native pudding, which I like very much when it is made by cleanly persons. I found that as a rule, they are quite particular in the preparation of their food. One exception, however, on this trip set me for a time against their pudding. I was visiting a small town where they were about to prepare the taro and cocoanut for the pudding. My host hastily left his work, and in his excitement, or hunger, or for some reason, neglected to wash the perspiration from his dirty brow and hands. He untied from the wall-side of his house a wooden trough about eight feet long, which had not for some time, if ever, been washed. He then began to mash the taro in this trough, with a long wooden masher, which had evidently received about the same care as the trough, except that now and then when our good friend laid it down for a rest, the younger members of the family seemed interested in cleaning it. Knowing that I was expected to partake of this delicacy, I thought strongly of getting back to see the boat, and to make this feeling more urgent, I next saw two little boys enter the door, who, being interested in the vakalolo, got into the trough, one in each end, with their feet occasionally touching the taro, which they would not have noticed had it not been hot. At this juncture I excused myself, and on reaching the boat, told the Fijian boy who was watching the boat to take my place eating vakalolo.¹²

By 1901, due to Susie’s health, they began to contemplate leaving Fiji so that she could recover.¹³ At this point they had 28 adult Sabbath keepers with another 15-20 young people.¹⁴ John became so proficient in Fijian that he could read, speak, and even translate material into the language.¹⁵ In 1903 the Fultons went to Australian Missionary College where he coordinated with some students to help him produce several books in the Fijian language. The Fultons then returned to Fiji, where they continued to serve until 1906. Fulton expressed his philosophy of missions as twofold: to train and equip the local people and to make available Adventist literature in the vernacular language. He achieved both and learned “to speak the local language with almost true accent.”¹⁶ Early converts, who were taught to give up smoking and to not imbibe unclean foods and drinks, were given the name Lotu Savansava meaning “the clean church.”¹⁷

Administrator

In 1906 John became president of the New South Wales Conference. From 1909 to 1915 he was president of the Australian Union Conference. In 1912 Fulton prepared a volume of Bible readings in the Fijian language.¹⁸ From 1915 to 1921 he was president of the Asiatic Division, which included all of Asia at that time. In 1922 he became vice-president of the General Conference for North America (one year) before being called to return as president of the Australasian Division (1922-26).

From 1926 to 1934 John served as president of the Pacific Union Conference. He served briefly for a term as president of the Northern California Conference (1933-1936), and then briefly as president of the Southern California Conference (1936). He also served as chair of the White Estate Board of Trustees (1935-1936).

Poor health forced John to retire in 1937 when he made a final trip to Australia, and in 1939, he spent a good portion of the year in Hawaii. In his later years he was described as serving as an “active” and “beloved counselor” who served on many denominational committees and who was “a preacher of righteousness.”¹⁹

Death and Legacy

John’s ministry was known for his humility and “contagious earnestness.” He was “a man of intense purpose, with a keen sense of God’s call to him.” A man of “deep consecration,” he was remembered as someone who rose early every morning to pray. “He was on fire for this [Advent] message, and was consumed with a burning desire to see it finished and the Lord come.”²⁰ Another fellow missionary, described him as “the most lovable man I have ever known.”²¹ Susie, who was “never very robust,” “was not a public figure” having “a quiet retiring nature.” However, she was known for being “cheerful and resourceful” with a “quick wit [that] radiated from her pleasant personality.”²²

John died at the Glendale Sanitarium from a heart attack on April 23, 1945.²³ Susie died in Sunland, California, on March 30, 1950.²⁴ John and Susie are buried next to one another in Grand View Memorial Park in Glendale, California.²⁵ Today Fulton Adventist University College in Fiji (named after him in 1948) and Fulton Memorial Library at La Sierra University are both named after him.

Sources

Biographical Information Blanks, John Edwin Fulton, November 30, 1905, July 15, 1912, June 18, 1934. General Conference Archives, Silver Spring, Maryland, U.S.A.

Biographical Information Blank, John Edwin Fulton, June 18, 1934. General Conference Archives, Silver Spring, Maryland, U.S.A.

Biographical Information Blank, Susie Virginia Fulton, March 28, 1916. General Conference Archives, Silver Spring, Maryland, U.S.A.

Census of Canada, 1871, 1881, 1891.

Clapham, Noel. Seventh-day Adventists in the South Pacific, 1885-1985. Warburton: Australia: Signs Publishing Company, [1985].

Gates, E. H. “Introduction of Third Anel’s Message.” Australasian Union Record, January 1, 1901.

Hare, Eric B. Fulton’s Footprints in Fiji. Washington, D.C.: Review and Herald, 1969.

Obituary. Lodi News-Sentinel, April 25, 1945.

Obituary. Pacific Union Recorder, May 9, 1945.

Obituary, ARH, May 24, 1945, 18.

Obituary. Pacific Union Recorder, April 24, 1950.

Obituary. ARH, June 1, 1950.

Seventh-day Adventist Encyclopedia. Second revised edition. Hagerstown, MD: Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1996. S.v. “John Edwin Fulton.”

Seventh-day Adventist Yearbook. Various years. https://www.adventistyearbook.org/.

Stewart, A. G. “In Memory of John Edwin Fulton.” Australasian Record, October 6, 1969.

Stewart, A. G. “The Later Sister Fulton.” Australasian Record, August 5, 1950.

Stewart, A. G. Trophies from Cannibal Isles. Washington, D.C.: Review and Herald, 1956.

United States Federal Census, 1880-1940.

Watson, Charles H. Adventures in the South Seas. Washington, D.C.: Review and Herald, 1931.

Notes

1. A. G. Stewart, Trophies from Cannibal Islands (Washington, D.C.: Review and Herald, 1956), 99.↩

2. Obituary, ARH, May 24, 1945, 18.↩

3. “George Noble Fulton,” Findagrave.com, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/26305240/george-noble-fulton. The identity of his mother is unclear as her name is often listed as “Mary,” and Fulton always lists her name as “Hannah” in his own biographical blanks. Since both of his parents were deceased by 1912, presumably “Mary” was his step-mother and his mother had died when he was young.↩

4. Obituary, Pacific Union Recorder, April 24, 1950, 12.↩

5. For genealogical details, see: https://www.ancestry.com/invite-ui/accept?token=F9kSYy7jHAhJckMy74Sjl9LSa49gJBlsC3RUeZ2QU6g=↩

6. A. G. Stewart, “The Later Sister Fulton,” Australasian Record, August 5, 1950, 2.↩

7. E. H. Gates, “Introduction of Third Anel’s Message,” Australasian Union Record, January 1, 1901, 5. Gates also notes that Brother Tay died on January 8, 1892.↩

8. See announcement under “Personal” in The Australasian Union Record, June 3, 1901, 14.↩

9. A. G. Stewart, “As a Missionary,” Australasian Record, June 4, 1945, 1.↩

10. A. W. Spalding, Christ’s Last Legion, 347-348.↩

11. A. G. Stewart, “As a Missionary,” Australasian Record, June 4, 1945, 2.↩

12. J. E. Fulton, “Fiji Islands,” ARH, October 19, 1897, 668.↩

13. Minutes of [Foreign] Mission Board Meeting, June 20, 1901, 16.↩

14. E. H. Gates, “Introduction of Third Anel’s Message,” Australasian Union Record, January 1, 1901, 5.↩

15. See note: Australasian Union Conference Record, July 17, 1901, 16.↩

16. Noel Clapham, Seventh-day Adventists in the South Pacific, 1885-1985 (Warburton: Australia: Signs Publishing Company, [1985]), 208.↩

17. Emma E. Howell, The Great Advent Movement, rev. (Washington, D.C.: Review and Herald, 1941), 179.↩

18. See ARH, May 23, 1912, 24.↩

19. Obituary, Pacific Union Recorder, May 9, 1945, 5; Obituary, ARH, May 24, 1945, 18.↩

20. S. V. Stratford, “As a Counsellor and Comrade,” Australasian Record, June 4, 1945, 3.↩

21. H. E. Piper, “As an Administrator,” Australasian Record, June 4, 1945, 2.↩

22. A. G. Stewart, “The Later Sister Fulton,” Australasian Record, August 5, 1950, 2.↩

23. “Brevities,” Australasian Record, May 14, 1945, 8.↩

24. “Necrology—1950,” Seventh-day Adventist Yearbook (1951), 465, accessed December 11, 2024, https://documents.adventistarchives.org/Yearbooks/YB1951.pdf.↩

25. “Elder John Edwin Fulton,” Findagrave.com, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/28800876/john-edwin-fulton.↩