Part 3. INSTITUTIONS

1. Schools

HE Christian church is a pioneer in education. Into heathen and illiterate mission fields the missionaries have been compelled to bring not only the gospel but the means of conveying the gospel and the great facts of the faith and experience—a written language and other fundamental educational equipment.

     Much of the early education in America was church-supported, and nearly all of the early colleges and universities on this continent were founded by the church, which was for long years the chief sponsor of mental as well as spiritual welfare. However, in our democracies the demand for the opportunities of education have so increased that the state began to lend a hand to the church and then, because the state had the power of taxation, education has come to be largely a function of governments which can supply usually better buildings and equipment and often pay better for instruction than is possible in the church-supported institution.

     Because the state is so well equipped in a material way for the instruction of youth and because the church always has insufficient funds for any educational program which she undertakes it is often advocated that we leave education entirely to the state.

     But this belief that the Christian college is unnecessary is out of the assumption that the state is making a success of higher education, which is exactly not true. The oft-quoted William Allen White, discussing our modern education and the products of our universities, has this to say:

     “The state college and state university came, and the Christian college took second place in the educational program. Until fifty years ago state colleges drew their teachers from the men and women who had been trained in Christian colleges. These leaders preserved largely the noble academic tradition. Ideals were cherished. They sought the truth that it might make them free. But the kind of men and women which the state educational institutions have been turning out more recently is of a new breed. Something seems to be wrong with education. Either the new leadership which our educational institutions have trained lacks stamina to pursue its ideals, or it lacks ideals worth following. For certainly the mine-run of college men and women turned out by our great state-leader factories today contains a lot of poor stuff. Our modern America, above everything else, lacks leaders and leadership, and how the people hunger and thirst for it!

     “What then is wrong with higher education in America today? We are turning out more college people in proportion to population than any other land in the world, but why do these go back into their communities with little sense of duty and with little sense of the menacing realities of the times?

     “Of course this broad statement needs qualification. A few do understand their duty. But the trouble is with the material that is fed into the state colleges. I am not sure that the educational leaders are alone to be blamed for the grist which comes out of their mass-production mills. Think of the chaff that goes in!

     “But think also of how they seek that chaff. Moreover, think of the vast body of active alumni from which governing boards are chosen, fired by a lust to be known by its football team, to be recognized as a smart social organization, to be famed as a place where fast-steppers are bred. Over the arched gateway to the American college where once the shining words of Jesus gleamed out, ‘Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free,’ there now glares forth, ‘Hold that line!’ and ‘Get the money!’ Our great colleges no longer try to implant that noble vision without which the people perish, but instead cast their students in the brass molds which make smart, hard, acquisitive and professional gladiators, men and women with predatory faces, who flock out of our colleges like a cloud of bats, hurrying to prove their worth by the size of their bank accounts, and by very little else.

     “So, indeed, without vision the people perish.”

     This is a terrible indictment, but it comes from a man of wide observation and is supported by the moral backslidings and the reign of crime which America knows so well. As Calvin Coolidge lamented, we seem to lack sufficient public men who have at the same time intelligence and character for the places to which they aspire.

     George W. Truett, discussing education and Christian education in relation to the national leadership of the past, spoke as follows:

     “It is interesting to know that eight of our Chief Justices were college graduates, while seven of the eight were from Christian schools. Eighteen of our nation’s presidents have been college graduates, while sixteen of the eighteen were from Christian schools. Eighteen of the twenty-five masters of American letters were college men, while seventeen of the eighteen were from Christian colleges. Of the members of our national Congress whose accomplishments have secured for them a place in Who’s Who, about two-thirds were graduates of Christian schools.”

     So these authorities remind us that the state and secular education and secular occupations in general do most acutely need the products of Christian schools.

     However, the Christian school’s service to society and to the state, great as it is, is only a by-product. First of all, Christian leaders have seen the necessity of training youth for places of responsibility in the church. It was long ago observed that the state schools could not produce church leadership. B. T. Roberts, the founder of Free Methodism, and some of his associates were college men. They knew the value of education and felt that they must have some school which would prepare young men and women for the ministry, for mission fields, for the teaching profession and for their responsibilities as laymen in the new church. Also it must be admitted that these men had in mind that the young people who could obtain their education under strong religious influences were blessed above all others.

     With a plan to found a school in 1866, only six years after the birth of the church, B. T. Roberts purchased a farm at North Chili, New York, ten miles west of Rochester. Before suitable quarters could be erected school was opened in the home of Mr. Roberts (who lived at North Chili). This was afterward transferred to a building which had been a ballroom and tavern. The first school edifice was completed in 1869. Mr. Roberts and his wife carried the burden of this institution until nearly the end of his life, in 1893. It was in this first school that Miss Adella P. Carpenter, who was one of the most influential women in Free Methodism, taught for thirty-nine years.

     Through fires, terrible financial struggles, great sacrifices by faculties and friends of the school, the institution continues to our day. During the past seventy years there have gone from its halls one hundred missionaries to foreign fields, 450 ministers of the gospel, 500 teachers, and thousands of laymen who have blessed the church and the world. As the A. M. Chesbrough Junior College, the school is enjoying the largest attendance in its history and is doing its best work under the able leadership of Dr. M. G. Smith and his associates.

     The above school, being our oldest and serving well to illustrate the schools of the church, more space has been given to it than the limits of this book will possibly allow to the other schools. However, it should be noted that as the work spread, especially to the west, and as the distances from North Chili were considerable, the reasons which produced the A. M. Chesbrough Seminary produced the schools farther west and in Canada. Of these there can be but brief mention.

     The Michigan Conference took steps to found a school in 1871. The institution was opened at Spring Arbor, Michigan, in 1873. Three men who were afterward bishops of the church were numbered among its principals—W. A. Sellew, D. S. Warner, B. J. Vincent. This school now goes forward as the Spring Arbor Junior College, enjoying a fine enrollment; and under the leadership of its present president, L. M. Lowell, and his able assistant, C. D. DeCan, has come to the remarkable state of “no debt.” It is perhaps useless to remark that this school, according to its fewer years and its more limited territory, has done invaluable service to several conferences and the church. Nearly one thousand students have graduated from this institution, and about six thousand have attended as students.

     The Wessington Springs Seminary (Wessington Springs, South Dakota) was founded in 1886. This school also had its humble beginnings. The first sessions were held in the “Sheep Shed.” J. K. Freeland was its first principal. “It was through the unremitting labors of J. B. Freeland that the success of the school was largely due.” Through depression, grasshoppers, drouth, sacrifices of faculty, surviving all discouragements, the institution has been kept open until this time and now operates with a fine body of students and as a junior college under the leadership of President W. A. Harden. Among the former students, twenty-seven have gone to the mission field, hundreds have become teachers, and scores have entered the ministry and other places of usefulness.

     Seattle Pacific College, at Seattle, Washington, was founded in 1891 as the result of the vision of two Christian laymen, N. B. Peterson and H. H. Pease. Among the earlier presidents of the institution were Rev. Alexander Beers and Dr. 0. E. Tiffany. Until 191 1 this school attempted only secondary school work. At that time freshman college courses were added, which were followed by sophomore and finally full college work.

     From the institution have gone seventy missionaries, 120 former students have entered the ministry, and 225 are serving as teachers. During its brief history as a four-year college 252 have taken baccalaureate degrees, and 407 have received normal diplomas.

     C. Hoyt Watson has been president since 1926. Under his able leadership the school has come to be entirely free of debt and has the largest enrollment in its history—353 students.

     Greenville College, located at Greenville, Illinois, was founded in 1892 by the purchase of the Almira College building and campus, consisting of ten acres in the heart of the little city, for the modest sum of $12,200.

     Rev. Wilson T. Hogue, of the Genesee Conference, was the first president. Under his able administration this college pioneered higher education in the Free Methodist Church. His strong hand guided the school for twelve years.

     A. L. Whitcomb was president from 1904 to 1907. Then came Eldon G. Burritt, who, besides having served the school as dean, was president from 1907 until the time of his death in 1927. His successor was Dr. L. R. Marston (now bishop), and the present incumbent is Dr. H. J. Long. During the years new buildings have been added to the plant and the campus has been beautified. The property is now worth many times its original cost and value.

     One of the outstanding assets to Greenville College from its opening until failing health made his resignation necessary in 1926 was Professor John LaDue, head of the Bible department. Scores of men and women of Free Methodism who now hold places of responsibility felt the power of his character and scholarship. Besides the hundreds of ministers and the missionaries passed on to places of usefulness in the church by Greenville College there have been many instructors who have become members of the faculties of the other schools of the church. And hundreds of teachers and thousands of laymen have gone forth from those halls to live and serve as would not have been possible but for that school.

     Orleans Seminary was founded at Orleans, Nebraska, in 1884. This was succeeded by Central Academy and College, located at McPherson, Kansas. Situated in the edge of what has come to be known as the “dust bowl,” the school at Orleans suffered, besides all the usual hardships of such institutions, the frequent recurrence of drouth. At the latter place, and under the strong and spiritual leadership of President Charles A. Stoll (president since 1919) the school has maintained high educational standards and promoted spiritual religion. Its contribution to the work in the middle west is incalculable. (As this book goes to press announcement comes of the death of President Stoll, whose passing inflicts a great loss upon the church in general and the work of Christian education in particular.)

     Rev. C. B. Ebey was the founder of Los Angeles Pacific College. The Southern California Conference co-operated. The first building was completed in 1904. More than a dozen men have served as presidents of this institution. Rev. B. S. Lamson, who has held this office longer than any other (nine years) has piloted the school through the trying years of “depression” and “recession.” It is needless to say that during its history this school has been invaluable to the Free Methodist Church in the Southwest. Free Methodist and other families and hundreds of young people have been greatly served and blessed.

     Lorne Park College was founded as Lorne Park Seminary in 1924. The name was changed in 1927. The school was sponsored by the West and East Ontario conferences.

     The location is in a beautiful rural district, two and one-half miles west of Port Credit and twelve miles west of Toronto, Ontario. A twenty-six-acre fruit and truck farm is a part of the property.

     Rev. J. M. Eagle was the first manager and financial agent, and Rev. J. F. Gregory the first principal. Miss Alice E. Walls has devoted years to this school, serving part of the time as head of the institution. The new principal is H. W. Loveless. Though young compared to most of the institutions of Free Methodism, Lorne Park counts among its former students a goodly number who have entered Christian service, and some who have become teachers or entered other professions.

     The Oakdale Vocational School is located at Oak-dale, Kentucky. Because it belongs to the home missions’ program of the church it is usually not mentioned among our schools. However, here will be found a body of nearly one hundred and fifty bright students, taught by as self-sacrificing a faculty as can be found in all the church or in any church. Miss Elizabeth O’Connor is the founder of the institution. Many young men and women of those southern mountains will arise to call blessed the memory of this good woman and her associates.

     Besides the above, some schools have been started in Free Methodism which have been discontinued or consolidated with others because of disastrous fires or financial reverses. That the schools above-mentioned have continued while so many similar institutions have failed, and especially during the depression, is an achievement which tells of capable leadership and great loyalty and sacrifice by trustees, faculties, students and our people in general. If the schools have cost much— and they have—to the church and the students they have been worth far more than their cost.