Aces of Trades: God took Ohio farm boy around the world
COSHOCTON – His career might be summed, as he put it, “the Lord had other plans.”
“I grew up in a large family,” began Chris Jutte, “where my dad was a full-time farmer and a factory worker. Mom was a stay home mom. We were a religious family where church was important, and we were there often.
“Since there were so many of us in the family,” he continued, “we all had certain chores. One of mine was milking the cows in the morning and having it done before the school bus came at 7:15. Dad was also a mechanic and I got to help him a lot repairing the equipment around the farm and that is what got me interested in repairing items, cars, trucks and etc.
“Once I entered by junior year in high school,” he added, “I started working full time at a mink farm. I asked my dad if I could buy my own car and he said, ‘Yes.’ This got me more interested in maintenance since I repaired my own car. But never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d end up at MMS Aviation. I had no interest in airplanes, and I really didn’t know the difference between a propeller and a rudder.”
Today, Jutte is maintenance supervisor at MMS Aviation where they prepare, as their web site states, “people and planes for worldwide missionary service.”
Accordingly, Jutte explained, “I lead projects, train others, and encourage the team.”
Jutte, 61, grew up in Mercer County, graduated from Fort Recovery High School in Fort Recovery, Ohio, then studied auto/diesel mechanics at Lincoln Tech in Indianapolis.
“After tech school,” he said, “I worked at a used car dealership in Minster, Ohio, where I was a line mechanic working on cars, trucks, boats, tractors and other machinery, but never an airplane.
“Still,” he continued, “in 1989 my wife felt a tug from the Lord that we were to do overseas missionary work. I told her she was going off the deep end, for God does not use auto mechanics in the mission field. But we then applied with Wycliffe Bible translators/JAARS Inc. to serve overseas in Indonesia. We left to go there in 2000 and served with Wycliffe for 18 years, coming home to stay in 2018. In Indonesia I saw how important it was to have well-maintained aircraft. The area we were located was Papua Indonesia, which was very hot, humid and near the ocean, which caused a lot of corrosion on the aluminum skins of the planes.”
It was good experience, he said, to keep the planes airworthy at MMS Aviation. Jutte started at MMS in 2008.
“I really appreciate Chris and his patience and diligence as an instructor,” assessed Tyler Sensenig, an apprentice aircraft mechanic at MMS. “He has a wealth of knowledge that he readily shares about both the technical details of planes and also the non-technical aspects of overseas missionary work, which he was involved in for many years. I’ve learned a lot from him and appreciate the investment he’s made in my training.”
“I’m very pleased at where this life has taken me and my family,” Jutte responded. “Never in a million years would I ever think God could take a farm boy from western Ohio and send him around the world. We miss living in Indonesia, but we have grandchildren now and elderly parents we want to be with. Plus, I enjoy taking a skill that was given to me and pass it to the next generation.”
MMS Aviation is located at 24387 Airport Road in Coshocton. For more information, call 740-622-6848 or log on www.mmsaviation.org.
Aces of Trades is a weekly series focusing on people and their jobs – whether they’re unusual jobs, fun jobs or people who take ordinary jobs and make them extraordinary. If you have a suggestion for a future profile, let us know at ctnews@coshoctontribune.com.
This article originally appeared on Coshocton Tribune: God took Ohio farm boy around the world
