Sarah Ellen Waldo, Miss (1.9.1845 – 15.7.1926)—Swamiji’s American disciple from Brooklyn. At first named by him Brahmacharini Yatimata for her deep interest in Raja-Yoga and later, Sister Haridasi. A woman with intellectual leanings, fascinated by Swamiji’s lecture at Brooklyn Ethical Association on 30.12.1894, thereafter attended all his talks and classes in New York. Well-versed in theosophy and comparative philosophy. One of the group at Thousand Island Park, The Inspired Talks (1908) is based on her notes of his classes there. Swamiji dictated the greater part of Raja-Yoga to her, taken down in long hand with painstaking care. Initiated into vows of brahmacharya by Swamiji on 20.2.1896 at New York, with a mantra of her choice. Ran Swamiji’s household in New York, commuting daily from her residence at 249 Monroe Street, Brooklyn—a two-hour journey. As observed by Sister Devamata, “She was truly a Servant of the Lord—her service was continuous and untiring. She cooked, edited, cleaned and took dictation, taught and managed, read proof and saw visitors” (Reminiscences of Swami Vivekananda, p. 126). Played an active role in the running of the New York Vedanta Society. Was given charge of the publication of Swamiji’s books in America in association with Mr. Francis Leggett. Held question-answer classes there with great efficiency. “Among the disciples, whom the Swami frequently visited in New York and with whom he spent many hours in discussing philosophy and plans of work, was Miss Waldo” (Life of Swami Vivekananda, Vol. 2, p. 536). When she was managing his New York household, on a free day he would make the two-hour trip to her house and cooked the meals. “He found genuine rest and relaxation in the freedom and quiet of Miss Waldo’s simple home” (Reminiscences of Swami Vivekananda, Sister Devamata, p. 127). Swami Abhedananda was her guest at Brooklyn immediately after his arrival in America. Her reminiscences of Swamiji published in the Prabuddha Bharata (January 1906) were incorporated in Reminiscences of Swami Vivekananda.
“It is a perpetual inspiration to live with a man Llike Swami Vivekananda.” In these words Miss Sara Ellen Waldo summarized her feelings about the spiritual uplift she experienced in Thousand Island Park in the presence of Swami Vivekananda, but her words are equally indicative of how well she grasped Swamiji’s teachings and how deeply she imbibed his divine influence. Though the period of her association with Swamiji was short, it was nevertheless charged with ardent devotion and untiring service to Swamiji and to his work in America.
When she first met Swamiji, Mrs. Waldo was a member of the Brooklyn Ethical Association. She had an interest in various schools of philosophy and had studied them. She was a distant relative of Ralph Waldo Emerson and was well acquainted with the Transcendental School of philosophy. She was an earnest reader of Max Muller and was eager to pursue Vedanta Philosophy. Swamiji’s lectures at the Brooklyn Ethical Association in 1894 created a tremendous spiritual impact upon her, the first of which she attended on 30th of December. From then on, in New York, she became one of Swamiji’s closest and most devoted disciples.
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Before J.J. Goodwin was engaged as a stenographer in December 1895 to transcribe Swamiji’s lectures and class talks, it was Miss Ellen Waldo whose task was to transcribe and finally edit these. She was close to Swamiji and was among those who best understood his teachings. He was aware of her ability to grasp his thoughts and so entrusted her with editing and preparing all his American publications. Confirming this, Sister Devamata in her preface to the first edition of Inspired Talks writes: “It was she also who prepared all his American publications for the press. And so great was Swami Vivekananda’s confidence in her ability, that he would pass the typewritten transcriptions of his lectures over to her with the instruction to do with them what she thought best.”
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There would not have been the book Inspired Talks without Miss Sara Ellen Waldo as there would not have been The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna without Mahendranath Gupta. The world is indebted to her for preserving the priceless and sublime utterances of Swamiji delivered at Thousand Island Park. By the middle of the year 1895, Swamiji was completely exhausted by his strenuous work in New York, which included numerous classes, lectures, and a voluminous correspondence. He badly needed rest and so accepted the invitation of one of his students, Miss Dutcher, to Thousand Island Park. In June 1895, he went to stay at the summer cottage of Miss Dutcher for seven weeks. A group of chosen and intimate friends followed. Miss Dutcher’s cottage was built amidst an enchanting panoramic view. Peace reigned all around in the serene landscape where the cottage was built. The thick wood of verdant green, the blue waters of the St. Lawrence winding its way through the islands lent an idyllic backdrop. There in the cottage, “built upon a rock”, Swamiji “taught like one inspired”.
It was in an exalted state of spiritual ecstasy that Swamiji unfolded himself through his teachings to the few who gathered around him. A letter written by Mary Hale from Thousand Island Park dated June 26, 1895, conveys fully his tranquil and exalted plane of consciousness. “A wonderful calmness is coming over my soul. Every day I feel I have no duty to do; I am always in eternal rest and peace. It is He that works. We are only the instruments.”
During these seven weeks Swamiji was most gentle and lovable. As Swami Ramakrishnananda says in his Preface to the second edition of Inspired Talks: “The cyclonic monk was not there carrying everything before him. There sat the peaceful Rishi mildly disseminating the message of peace and bliss to a few ardent souls fully ripe to receive them.”
Miss Waldo writes: “… those are weeks of ever hallowed memory, so fraught were they with unusual opportunity for spiritual growth.” The teaching seemed to be the outpouring of his own spirit in communion with himself. Swamiji later said that he was at his best at Thousand Island Park. Devamata adds: “Vivekananda, the friend, the teacher, the loving master, was known only to the happy few who had the rare privilege of sitting at his feet.” Miss Waldo will be most remembered for taking down some of these immortal words and handing them down to posterity. “She … preserved those saving words and did allow them to be lost in the abysmal womb of Eternity,” as Swami Ramakrishnananda wrote.
As Miss Waldo took down these notes in longhand, it was not possible for her to note everything Swamiji taught on the Bhagavad Gita, the Upanishads, the Vedanta Sutras of Vyasa and the Bhakti Sutras of Narada. He also dwelt at length on the subject of his great Master and the Divine Mother. He poured forth a torrent of the profoundest philosophy. Each subject he dealt with brought home the eternal truth, “I am He. I am He. So stand upon the Self.”
Miss Waldo was highly skilled in transcribing. Her expertise is revealed in the clarity, beauty, and depth of her notes in the Inspired Talks where Swamiji’s Vedantic thoughts are concentrated. Devamata wrote: “Through this constant faithful service with heart and brain, the disciple’s mind became so at one with the master’s that, even without the aid of shorthand, she was able to transcribe his teaching with wonderful fullness and accuracy. Once when she was reading a portion of these same notes to some tardy arrivals in the Thousand Island Park home, Swamiji paced up and down the floor, apparently unconscious of what was going on, until the travellers had left the room. Then he turned to her and said, “How could you have caught my thoughts and words so perfectly? It was as if I heard myself speaking.”
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Miss Waldo had the opportunity to watch Swamiji at very close quarters. From her accounts we come to know of Swamiji’s many-faceted personality. Recalling the days at Thousand Island Park, she wrote about Swamiji’s playfulness and love of fun, of his merry jest and quick repartee, but also add that, “he was never for a moment far from the dominating note of his life,” which was spirituality. He was rarely aware of his body. Miss Waldo told Devamata, who in turn wrote in the ‘Reminiscences’, that in those days the New York houses held on the first floor a long narrow drawing-room, with high folding doors at one end, two large windows at the other, and between them a mirror reaching from the floor to ceiling. “This mirror seemed to fascinate the Swami. He stood before it again and again, gazing at himself intently. In between he walked up and down the room, lost in thought. Miss Waldo’s eyes followed him anxiously. ‘Now the bubble is going to burst’, she thought. ‘He is full of personal vanity.’ Suddenly he turned to her and said, ‘Ellen, it is the strangest thing; I cannot remember how I look. I look and look at myself in the glass, but the moment I turn away I forget completely what I look like.’ “
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Swamiji was well aware of her knowledge, and power of expression. In a highly encouraging letter to her, written from Wimbledon on the 8th of October 1896, Swamiji asked her to organize and hold classes on Vedanta in New York. “Why do you not begin the teach? Begging boldly, Mother will give you all power…. Plunge in…. There is nothing in Vedanta, which you do not know, and you can argue it out and present it infinitely better than this boy (Roy). Plunge in bravely. Have faith you will move the world…. Make a blaze, make a blaze.” During the last three months of 1896 Miss Waldo commenced working by organizing classes and lectures, which drew applause from her audience for her “clear style and judicious manner of presenting the subject”.
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Swamiji was free to scold Miss Waldo. “One morning the Swami found Miss Waldo in tears. ‘What is the matter, Ellen?’ he asked anxiously. ‘Has anything happened?’ ‘I seem unable to please you,’ she replied. ‘Even when others annoy you, you scold me for it.’ The Swami said quickly, ‘I do not know those people well enough to scold them. I cannot rebuke them, so I come to you. Whom can I scold if I cannot scold my own?’ Her tears dried at ones, and after that she sought scoldings; they were ‘a proof of nearness’.”
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Born in 1845, Miss Sara Ellen Waldo died in 1926 at the ripe old age of eighty-one. In her service to Swamiji, there was a vigour and ebullience, which never went unnoticed. It is unfortunate that she is not in any photo taken during the period of her close association with Swamiji. Little is known about her after the death of Swamiji. But her spirit of loyalty and devotion makes Miss Sara Ellen Waldo, Haridasi, the Servant of the Lord; a person to be remembered along with other prominent disciples of Swami Vivekananda. (Source: Western Women in the Footsteps of Swami Vivekananda)