This stone was one of many that had been delivered to the construction site. Who knows how many days it had laid ready to be used by the builder? Who knows how many times the hands of the builder passed over this stone and reached for another one?
There came a time when the stone was piled near the wall with the other rejected stones. Who knows why the stone was not used? Maybe it was too large or too small. Maybe it was the wrong shape or the wrong color. Maybe it was chipped or broken. We don’t know why the stone was not chosen by the builder, but it was not.
Many people lived in Chicago in 1912 and some of them must have passed by the building site. Nettie Tobin did. She was a Bahá’í who lived nearby.
Nettie had heard that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, whom she called the Master, was coming from way across the ocean to visit North America. He was traveling to Wilmette, Illinois, which is very near Chicago, where Nettie lived. He was coming to dedicate the land where the first Bahá’í House of Worship of the western hemisphere was to be built. Nettie knew it was important to begin building a House of Worship in this part of the world.
Nettie loved ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and she loved the Bahá’í Faith. She knew a great amount of money was needed to build this House of Worship. It was to be very beautiful. It was agift from the Baháis to the people of the world. Nettie wanted to give something. The problem was, she did not have much money.
She did have an idea. Nettie thought the Master needed a suitable stone to mark the spot where the House of Worship would stand.
Nettie had seen the builders working near her home. On the last day of April she went to the place where they were working. She looked at the pile of stones. She asked the builder if she might have one.
"Sure, help yourself. These are rejected," he said.
Nettie thanked the builder. She chose just the right stone from the pile. It was too heavy for her to carry a long way. She went home and got an old baby carriage. When she returned, she reached down, picked up the stone, loaded it into the baby carriage and hauled it home. The baby carriage bumped along the streets of Chicago.
The next day was May 1st. Nettie said her prayers that night and then lay down to sleep. She must have been excited to think about delivering the stone to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá the next day.
Early in the morning Nettie and a Persian friend wheeled the carriage to the trolley car line. They lifted the carriage with its heavy load onto a car. When the car moved forward the stone traveled on toward its destiny. Two times they changed cars. It seemed a very long trip to Nettie and her friend. Finally, they arrived with the baby carriage at the corner of Central Street and Sheridan Road.
When they pushed the carriage over some broken pavement, it collapsed under the weight of the stone. Nettie and her friend looked at the broken carriage. What could they do? They were near the House of Worship grounds by now. But they could never carry the stone there in time for the dedication service. Already the time had passed for the service to begin.
Then along came two boys with an express wagon. They lent their wagon to carry the stone the rest of the way. That is how it reached the grounds of the House of Worship. There, the stone rejected by the builder was touched by the strong and tender hands of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. The Master used it as the cornerstone. It marked the place where the House of Worship was later built.
Today when people come from all over the world to see the Bahá’í House of Worship in Wilmette, they see this same stone cornerstone. The stone is in a special room where people go to pray. Maybe you have visited the House of Worship and have touched this very stone with your own hands.
(by Linda Mui; adapted from ‘Vignettes from the Life of Abdu’l-Bahá’; 'Brilliant Star', vol. 29, no. 6, January-February 1998)
