Pioneer self-supporting lay missionary in eastern Asia. Born in New Jersey, he spent his early manhood in California and Idaho, where he amassed and lost a considerable fortune in gold mining. He spent some time in the Hawaiian Islands, returned to California, and there, while working as a sheepherder, he accepted the Seventh-day Adventist faith. Immediately the new convert requested a mission appointment to China. The General Conference declined because of his advanced age and advised that he go to one of the Pacific islands. After spending a term in Healdsburg College, he worked his way to Honolulu, arriving in 1883 or 1884 with another colporteur, and sold books in the city and on the ships in port, with the result that W. M. Healey was sent in 1885 to establish Adventist work in the islands. In 1888 La Rue went to Hong Kong. He set up a seamen?s mission and for 14 years did colporteur work, mainly on the ships in Hong Kong harbor, but during that time he also made trips to Shanghai, Japan, Borneo, Java, Ceylon, Sarawak, Singapore, and once even to Palestine and Lebanon, selling books and distributing tracts wherever his ship stopped. Although he worked in Hong Kong chiefly for Europeans, he did circulate two tracts in Chinese, translated for him by a Chinese friend, a colonial court translator. In 1902 J. N. Anderson arrived in Hong Kong and baptized seven of La Rue?s converts, including six British Navy seamen. Until the time of his death in Hong Kong, La Rue was a man of tireless energy, with a rare gift in meeting people and conveying his own religious convictions.
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