All posts by Keith Call

Dr. C. Everett Koop and Wheaton College

Special Collections

Dr. Charles Everett Koop, former Surgeon General of the United States, died on February 25, 2013, at age 96. Sporting a crisp, double-breasted military uniform, Amish beard and stern aspect, he was an instantly recognizable father-figure during the 1980s, his expert eye continually examining the health trends of the nation. President Ronald Reagan, recognizing Koop’s extraordinary accomplishments in the field of pediatric medicine, appointed him as Surgeon General in 1982. Koop was affiliated with the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.

An outspoken Christian, Koop relates the circumstances of his 1948 conversion under the ministry of Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse, pastor of Tenth Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia:

The next Sunday…I finished grand rounds early, and found my feet taking me to Tenth Presbyterian Church, just a few blocks north of the hospital. I entered a back door and quietly slipped up to the balcony. I was just going to observe. I liked what I saw, and I was fascinated by what I heard….I heard teaching from one of the most learned men I ever knew, a true scholar who also possessed a gift of illustrating the complexity – and simplicity – of Christian doctrine by remarkable and incisive stories and similes….I understood that we are all sinners, unable to satisfy God’s standard of righteousness and justice, no matter how hard we try….The preaching from the pulpit made it all clear: that the essence of Christianity was not what we did, but what Christ had done for us. I understood the meaning of the crucifixion, I understood the meaning of Christ’s sacrifice, I understood the meaning of divine forgiveness…Most of all, I understood the love of God….This spiritual awakening had a profound effect on my life and influenced everything that happened thereafter.

Interestingly, Tenth Presbyterian was later pastored by Dr. Philip Ryken, who resigned from its pulpit in 2010 to assume the presidency of Wheaton College, an institution with which Koop enjoyed friendly relations.

As a prominent evangelical engaged in societal issues, Koop, staunchly pro-life, was invited to deliver the address for the 1973 Wheaton College Commencement, during which his daughter, Betsy, graduated. He warned his audience about the disastrous consequences of Roe vs. Wade, predicting that laws will be ridiculous. Soon, he said, teens requiring permission for ear piercing would not need permission for abortions, which will become increasingly common. Also, this legislation will accelerate moral laxity; of course, unknown at the time, it paved the way for the onslaught of AIDS in the 1980s.

Returning to Edman Chapel at Wheaton College for a public forum in 1990, Koop spoke on “Ethical Issues Arising from the AIDS Epidemic.” Discussing challenges and opportunities, he asked, “What better evangelical target than the sick, the homeless, the abandoned and the despised?” As always, he advocated abstinence and monogamy. Throughout the 1990s Koop occasionally appeared on the Wheaton campus, usually in conjunction with events sponsored by the Center for Applied Christian Ethics (CACE).

During a 1989 interview, Christianity Today asked Koop about his famous beard. He replied: “…I grew the beard as a lark when I went with my son Norman to Israel for two weeks. The night before we came home he shaved off his beard and kept his moustache; I shaved off my moustache and kept my beard. We did it just to shock our families. A few days later, when I looked at a picture of myself taken…before I started growing a beard, I realized I had three chins! And I didn’t have them with a beard.”

In 2002 he visited campus for “An Evening with C. Everett Koop,” conducted by Wendy Murray Zoba, heard here.

The papers of Dr. C. Everett Koop (SC-58), comprising manuscripts and correspondence, are housed at Wheaton College Special Collections, available to researchers.

George McGovern and Wheaton College

Wheaton College Archives

George McGovern, historian, senator and representative from South Dakota, died on October 21, 2012. Forty years ago, on October 11, 1972, he spoke at Wheaton College, a rather unlikely campaign stop for the Democratic presidential nominee against Republican Richard Nixon. The event was initially suggested by McGovern’s staff, asking for a venue in which he might engage Evangelicals. Activist Jim Wallis, attending Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, was asked to organize the senator’s visit, arranging a breakfast with prominent Christian leaders, in addition to an engagement at Wheaton College. “Actually,” writes Wallis, “the Wheaton Student Council, which issued the invitations to both candidates, accidentally switched the letters, sending Nixon’s by mistake to McGovern.” However, only McGovern accepted. A quiet man raised in a devout Methodist family, McGovern soon found himself in the pulpit of Edman Chapel, standing before an atypically divided house. A few supportive students cheered his unpopular anti-Vietnam War position, but many more booed, waving pro-Nixon banners.

Wallis had asked black evangelist Tom Skinner to introduce McGovern:

…Skinner…was a strong supporter of the senator and also, remember, I was banned from speaking at Wheaton. In an embarrassing moment, the students almost booed Skinner off the stage. McGovern’s aides were astonished. When the senator finally came out, the Wheaton students booed him too — a candidate for President of the Unites States.

Despite a rude reception from this portion of the campus community, McGovern calmed the noise, speaking knowledgeably and even charmingly, stating that he had once considered attending Wheaton College, but did not because his family could not afford it. Wallis recalls: “McGovern then…gave a speech that was perhaps the best I have ever heard about the relationship between Christians values and public life.”

The speech is heard here.

Wallis also remembers:

…a question McGovern got from an aggressive professor of Christian apologetics who asked the senator how somebody who attended the liberal Garrett Theological Seminary could have an adequate view of the fallen state of human nature. McGovern surprised the evangelical leaders by giving a theologically knowledgeable and biblically balanced exegesis of the Apostle Paul’s view of the human condition and then ended with a joke that broke up the house: “So because I don’t fully subscribe to the theology of complete human depravity and because Richard Nixon practices it, you’re going to vote for him?”

According to English professor Paul Bechtel, “Challenging ideas were set before the students with conviction, with charitable fairness, with no evidence of hollow political cliches.” Alas, McGovern lost the election with 17 electoral votes against Nixon’s 520. McGovern’s books include Abraham Lincoln (2008) and What It Means to Be a Democrat (2011).

Jim Wallis’s essay, “The George McGovern I Remember,” is published in the October 25, 2012, online edition of Sojourners: Faith in Action for Social Justice. The papers of Jim Wallis (SC-109) and Sojourners (SC-23) are housed in the Wheaton College Special Collections, available to researchers.

The cartoons are scanned from Coloring Book of Wheaton College, Spring 1973.

Three Cheers for Prexy

Wheaton College Archives

Since its origin in 1855-60, the word “prexy,” representing a shortened term for “president,” was invoked for decades by students on American college campuses as a term of endearment for their administrative leader. At Wheaton College the term was applied to presidents Charles Blanchard, J. Oliver Buswell and, most familiarly, V. Raymond Edman. While visiting campus for reunions, generations of older Wheaton College alumni happily swap stories, often casually referring to the piety and dedication of their beloved prexy, not needing to explain his identity. Interestingly, “prexy” is not applied to subsequent presidents Hudson Armerding, Richard Chase, Duane Litfin or Philip Ryken, perhaps because it has simply fallen out of style.

The Crafty Mr. Ulricson

College-related Publications, Wheaton College Archives

Throughout his teaching career at Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois, Dr. R. Lance Factor, George Appleton Lawrence Distinguished Service Professor and Chair of Philosophy, had noticed several odd flourishes adorning the interior and exterior of Old Main, the historic central campus hall where Lincoln debated Douglas in 1858. Investigating its history, Factor unearthed fascinating secrets permeating the very foundation of the building.

Charles UlricsonKnox College, founded by rock-ribbed Presbyterian pioneers who despised both slavery and oath-bound fraternities, had existed for nearly twenty years when its crosstown competitor, Lombard College, founded by Unitarian Universalists, erected in 1855 an attractive central building. Anxious to equal or exceed this accomplishment, then-president Jonathan Blanchard and the Knox trustees concentrated on raising funds and locating an architect. Rejecting plans presented by a Calvinist firm in Chicago, Blanchard sought Mr. Charles Ulricson, the project’s contractor who had also designed churches, mansions and offices in Galesburg and other midwestern locations. A Swedish immigrant, Ulricson’s cool, competent demeanor appealed to Blanchard and the board, who nicknamed him “the urbane Mr. Ulricson.” Working quickly and efficiently, Ulricson presented an agreeable plan to the administration and construction commenced. Completed in 1857, the three-storey hall, topped by a temple-like belltower, commanded a magnificent view of the prairie, a benefit which the Lombard building did not offer, much to the delight of Knox constituents.

Professor Factor, continuing his careful perusal of ledgers, journals, correspondence and other documents, discovered that Ulricson had studied under renowned architectural masters in New York City, learning the principles of sacred geometry and alchemical engineering. A loyal disciple, he departed their tutelage a member of “the sacred priesthood of architecture” and eventually settled in Peoria, Illinois, happily applying his vast knowledge of mystic ratios and sacred numbers to his projects – chiefly Knox College. In brief, Old Main is a purely Masonic talisman. Its existence as a beloved landmark is particularly ironic considering that Jonathan Blanchard, later president of Wheaton College, founded in 1868 the National Christian Association as an instrument dedicated to eradicating the influence of Freemasonry from American church life. Undoubtedly he and the trustees were entirely unaware of the hidden esoteric meanings and sacred symbology woven into every tile, window and doorway. According to Factor, Ulricson likely believed that his building might capture the positive energies of the “the Great Geometer,” sanctifying and edifying its occupants. Through the influence of occultic design Ulricson might have sought to mystically unify the opposing, aggressive forces of Jonathan Blanchard and George Gale, founder of the college and the city. Both were strong-willed and often locked horns, fomenting division among the Galesburg citizenry. If Charles Ulricson was “urbane,” he was also surely crafty as he advanced the “craft” of Freemasonry through means both brazen and surreptitious.

Alan Loy McGinnis, Friend Indeed

Alumni, Books, College-related Publications, Wheaton College Archives

Alan McGinnisIt is prescient that Alan Loy McGinnis, the man who wrote the book on friendship, grew up in a happy, friendly family among the Society of Friends (also known as Quakers), in Friendswood, Texas. Accepting Christ at age eleven during a 1944 camp meeting, McGinnis initially hoped to pursue a business career like his father. But as he matured in the faith he felt the call of God, and consequently enrolled in Bible school. He first attended Bob Jones University, then transferred to Pacific Bible College (now called Asuza Pacific), then moved to Wheaton College, completing his undergraduate courses in 1955. Pacific’s president, Dr. Cornelius Haggard, comments in a 1952 letter to Wheaton’s registrar, Dr. Enock Dyrness, that this bright chap “…is an unusually fine Christian gentleman, thoroughly dependable and trustworthy. Intellectually, he is far above the average…his social abilities indicate outstanding leadership.”

McGinnis continued his studies at Princeton University, Fuller Theological Seminary and Columbia University, acquiring degrees in theology and psychology. Ordained as a pastor in the United Presbyterian denomination, he was also a licensed marriage, child and family counselor. Tragedy erupted for him in 1974 when, after serving congregations in New Jersey, Illinois and California, his twenty-year marriage ended. Shattered, he lent serious consideration to his own emotions. “After that experience,” he recalls, “I wanted to learn more about love…I found that the basic principles of friendship were at work in all intimate relationships: children, mate, parents.” His research led to The Friendship Factor (1979), which received the 1980 Campus Life Award as Best Book of the Year in the General Interest Category. Shortly after, McGinnis, certain that everyone has the ability to cultivate meaningful relationships, embarked on the lecture circuit, appearing regularly on radio and television, while also conducting workshops for large churches and motivational seminars for Merrill Lynch, General Motors, IBM, Metropolitan Life and the Marine Corps. Exploring similar themes, he followed-up with The Romance Factor (1982), Bringing Out the Best in People (1985), Confidence (1987), The Power of Optimism (1990) and The Balanced Life (1997), all written within a Christian context, but not explicitly religious in approach. His articles were published in The Saturday Evening Post, Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping, Guideposts and Christian Herald.Alan McGinnis

The first edition of The Friendship Factor (revised 2004) sold more than 350,000 copies, and has been translated into Finnish, German, Spanish, Dutch, Chinese and Afrikaans.

In addition to speaking and writing, Dr. Alan Loy McGinnis co-founded and directed Valley Christian Counseling Center in Glendale, California. The clinic attempts to combine the procedures of medicine with the principles of the Christian faith, desiring to heal the whole person, employing techniques pioneered by Dr. Paul Tournier. At the time of his death in 2005 at 72, McGinnis had been married to his second wife, Diane, for 31 years.

Max Isaac Reich

Collection-related Publications, Special Collections

Max ReichAfter the death of his mother, Max Isaac Reich (b. 1867) came with his father to England from Berlin, Germany, to live with his stepmother, an orthodox Jew. Attending synagogue, he early discovered the glory of the LORD and the faithful traditions of his Jewish fathers. But one day he was faced with an intriguing challenge when, employed as a printing apprentice at a London firm, he asked foreman John Crane about the meaning of life. Crane simply responded: “Jesus.” Not long after that Reich heard one of the daughters of William Booth, founder of the Salvation Army, proclaim the love of Jesus, further piquing his ruminations. If that were not enough, D.L. Moody, famed American evangelist, preached forcefully during a London crusade, shaking the entire city. Though Reich was forbidden to attend, he relished the warm, pious atmosphere generated by the revival. At last he realized that Christ is “…the completion and fulfillment of all that was best and holiest and highest in the faith of my beloved people.”

He continues, “…Upon that confession it seemed as if a weight had been lifted off my heart and mind, and I felt as though the Father Himself had come forth and kissed me.” His conversion occurred on a Sabbath evening, Midsummer’s day, 1884. Ostracized by his Jewish friends, he was blessed to have been quickly taken under the tutelage of John Galway McVicker of the Plymouth Brethren, who encouraged his young disciple to study the life of Christ as it is presented in the Gospels. Reich did so with characteristic diligence. Other notable Brethren who provided lasting influence were George Muller, founder of the English orphanage, and Thomas Newberry, editor of the Englishman’s Greek and Hebrew Bible.

Max ReichIn 1886 Reich traveled to New York City to preach, then traversed the U.S. and Canada. Two years later he married Mary, “…a true wife and a good mother.” Moving west they ministered to Native Americans on the frontiers of Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas. With a family of five sons and four daughters, he moved to Scotland in 1892, then ministered in Europe, gaining proficiency in five languages. Long affiliated with the Plymouth Brethren, Reich in 1904 drifted toward Quaker convictions, eventually associating with the Society of Friends for the remainder of his life, though his sympathies encompassed truths treasured by all Christians. Soon he and Mary became overseers of Beth-shan in North London, a rest home for retired Christian workers. They returned in 1915 to the U.S. where he founded the Hebrew Christian Alliance of America, serving as its president from 1921 to 1927. Similarly in 1937, he founded the Hebrew Christian Alliance in London. In 1930 he joined the extension staff at Moody Bible Institute in Chicago, speaking at Bible conferences, preaching and interpreting prophecy, before joining the faculty as full-time lecturer of Jewish Missions. Instructors and students adored his humble, courtly demeanor and well-stocked mind. In addition to classroom teaching, he wrote articles and devotional verse for The Alliance Weekly (which he also edited) and various journals. These pieces were eventually gathered into books including The Deeper Life and Sweet Singer of Israel. As editor he occasionally published pieces by pastor A.W. Tozer and V. Raymond Edman, president of Wheaton College. Wheaton College conferred to Reich an honorary degree in 1936. After a distinguished fifteen-year career at MBI, he died in 1945 following an operation. He is buried beside a Friends Meeting House near his home in Pennsylvania.

Max Isaac Reich’s papers (SC-91), comprising his Bible, diaries, photographs, sermon notes, verse and journals are archived at Wheaton College Special Collections.

Zeke

Alumni, Books, College-related Publications, Wheaton College Archives

Zeke RudolphErwin Paul (Zeke) Rudoph II was a relaxed, vibrant young man of twenty, a student of English literature who also adored sports, particularly baseball. He possessed many friends and much promise. In 1967, after experiencing persistent vision impairment, fatigue and unsteady balance, he consulted his doctor. Enduring one exam after another, Zeke at last received the shocking prognosis. He had developed multiple sclerosis, an incurable disease. In this case, terminal.

A fiercely competitive athlete, he now faced opposition far more threatening than any he had ever encountered on the field. But Zeke held a steady course as he tackled his relentless stalker, first with a measure of frustration and apprehension, then with thanksgiving and confidence, and finally with tranquility, resting faithfully in the triumphant Savior “who hath abolished death” (II Tim 1:10). As Zeke’s stamina steadily diminished, his spiritual strength increased, allowing him to offer comfort to his comforters. With each day moving him closer to eternity, he inspired his family and Wheaton College classmates to deepen their communion with Christ, to assess values and align priorities for the uncertain path ahead.

Surrounded by love and abiding peace, he died quietly at age 21 in Central DuPage Hospital. His pastor, Allyn Sloat of Wheaton Bible Church, performed the funeral. Chaplain Evan Welsh, whose brief visits and wise counsels to the dying boy were like “gentle zephyrs from heaven,” read scripture and commented on the brevity of other sanctified lives: Borden of Yale at 24; Robert Murray M’Cheyne at 29; and Christ himself at 33. The story of Zeke’s brief life and ultimate victory over death is eloquently chronicled by his father, Dr. Erwin Rudolph, in Good-by, My Son (1971). Rudolph, former Professor of English and Chairman of the Division of Languages and Literature at Wheaton College, offers hard-won observations on the nature of affliction. “We do not pretend to understand why God’s time-table differs so markedly from our own. But it was ours which was out of adjustment, not His…I strongly affirm that belief in Divine Providence affords the Christian an undergirding he can ill afford to lose. I also discover that God may personally allow suffering to come upon us for reasons which please Him. When He does, we ought not to demur, for God knows what is best for us.” Rudolph approached his son’s illness as a unique opportunity to serve rather than a hindrance.

John Piper, a student of Erwin Rudolph’s, was struck by the quote, “Zeke called death sweet names.” Underlining that phrase, Piper determined to live life seriously so that when death came upon him he could echo those words, knowing that he had lived well unto Christ.

Rudolph concludes, “To the Christian there is always tomorrow. This hope is based on Christ’s resurrection…Zeke has gone ahead to those green fields of glad service, while we remain to work here a little longer.”

Kilby and Gormenghast

Books, Collection-related Publications, College-related Publications, Special Collections, Wheaton College Archives

Clyde KilbyThe seven authors featured in Wheaton College’s Wade Center are well-known: C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Dorothy Sayers, George MacDonald, G.K. Chesterton, Charles Williams and Owen Barfield. The acquisition of manuscripts, both primary and secondary, surrounding these authors was masterminded by Dr. Clyde Kilby, professor of English. Through the 1960s and 1970s Kilby cultivated a wide-ranging network of relationships with collectors, authors and librarians, laboriously assembling the collection that provides the heart of the Wade Center. A lesser-known fact is that Kilby pursued material from other “mythopoeic” creators, most of which did not make it to Wheaton College. A spectacular example of “the-one-that-got-away” is Mervyn Peake (1911-68), English poet, illustrator and deviser of the gothic Gormenghast Trilogy. Peake, the son of medical missionaries to China, wrote of the ancient, gargantuan Gormenghast Castle inhabited by the mad Groan family and the subsequent birth and adventures of its royal heir, Titus GroanTitus. Peake intended to continue the narrative, but the series sadly ended with his early death from Parkinson’s Disease, leaving the third volume, Titus Alone, somewhat patchy. He counted among his admirers C.S. Lewis, who wrote at least two fan letters, and Orson Welles, who once bought cinematic rights, as did Gordon Sumner (also known as Sting) and Monty Python’s Terry Gilliam. Gormenghast was finally filmed in 2000 by the BBC, starring Jonathan Rhy Meyers, with Christopher Lee and Fiona Shaw among its supporting cast. The somber, opulent tale was voted by British readers as one of the Top 100 Books, ranked with such luminaries as Orwell, Austen, Tolstoy and Dickens. Though Peake was a contemporary of Lewis and Tolkien, he was decidedly bourgeoisie in taste and temperament, and viewed with disdain these seemingly-elitist Oxford dons. Shortly after Peake’s death Kilby contacted his widow, Maeve, requesting an opportunity for discussion regarding the archiving of Peake’s papers at Wheaton College. Maeve responded that, due to her still-raw grief, she was unable to talk at that time. They eventually met in England during the summer of 1969. However, the plan was aborted and Peake’s papers remain largely uncollected under one roof, though the family continues seeking an archive. Kilby’s papers (SC-90), including his correspondence with Maeve, are housed in Special Collections at Wheaton College.

James Bond at Wheaton College

Uncategorized

Ian Fleming wrote 14 James Bond titles before his death in 1964. The series was continued with varying degrees of success by Kingsley Amis, John Gardner, Raymond Benson (who resides in suburban Buffalo Grove, Illinois), Sebastian Faulks with Devil May Care (2008) and Carte Blanche (2011) by Jeffery Deaver, who hails from Glen Ellyn, Illinois. Reviewing Dr. No for Christianity Today, professor Clyde Kilby remarked: “I discovered no St. George but only a salad of mystery entertainment, with a tart dressing of sex. On the whole…a very contrived performance.”

Amid all that globe-hopping, did Bond visit Wheaton, mistaking it, perhaps, for Monte Carlo? He came closest in Benson’s brief tale, “Live at Five,” which places the Brit in Chicago on a mission. Fleming himself once visited the Windy City, touring mob-related hotspots; and the Ian Fleming Foundation is currently located not in London, Rome or Paris, but in Kankakee, Illinois. However, Bond’s other literary and cinematic guardians are aware of us. For instance, in his Memoirs, Amis — who penned the 007 pastiche Colonel Sun and allegedly finished The Man With the Golden Gun, incomplete at Fleming’s death — laments the absurdity that Malcolm MuggeridgeMalcolm Muggeridge’s typewriter is displayed “…in a glass case as part of a collection…including T.S. Eliot and C.S. Lewis.” (Actually, the typewriter is in Special Collections SC-04.) Another contributor to the 007 mythos is Bono, who visited Wheaton College with his entourage in 2002, drawing attention to the AIDS crisis in Africa; he is co-lyricist (with The Edge) of the title song for Pierce Brosnan’s GoldenEye, sung by Tina Turner. There is Marvin Hamlisch, who conducted the campus orchestra for the Artist Series in 2004; he achieved fame composing music for several hit films, notably the soundtrack for Roger Moore’s The Spy Who Loved Me. And then there is Dr. Michael Ward, C.S. Lewis scholar and author of Planet Narnia, who has spoken at Wheaton College. Portraying Q’s assistant in The World is Not Enough, Ward hands Pierce Brosnan a pair of x-ray sunglasses.

Trumpet Call to Wheaton

Uncategorized

It has been wisely suggested that each incoming Wheaton College student mandatorily read The Silver Trumpet (1930) by J. Wesley Ingles. The Silver Trumpet received the John C. Green Award from the American Sunday-School Union as its unanimous choice for a manuscript whose subject was “the heroic appeal of Christianity to young people.” It went through nearly two dozen printings through the 1950s, later republished under the title The Amazing D. Randall MacRae (Moody Press) and has made its way online as an “on-demand” book through Amazon.

Silver TrumpetDedicated to “President Charles A. Blanchard who, of all my teachers, has left the deepest and most abiding impress upon my life,” the novel follows the fortunes of D. Randall MacRae, wealthy worldling and hotshot football hero who, pursuing a pretty young lady, reluctantly transfers from magnificent, ivy-walled Princeton to backside-of-nowhere “Wharton College,” a repressive “fundamentalist” institution situated somewhere west of Chicago. MacRae painfully adjusts to campus life, fumbling about with less certitude than his athletic reputation might suggest. His anxieties are gradually lightened as the semester progresses and he at last secures sweet romance–along with a genuine, humbling faith in Christ. An airy, wholesome romp, Ingles’s tale conjures the gentler, courtlier moods of the pre-War Midwest, the imminent thrill of the Big Game against North Central, autumn’s chill and the coloring leaves against gray skies, blossoming friendships in depressed times and the promise of bright young lives wholly devoted to Christ. In a day when there was no other “safe” place to attend college, alum of a certain age point to an early reading of The Silver Trumpet as the deciding factor for choosing Wheaton College, a fact bolstered by Rudolph Nelson in his biography of Edward Carnell. He notes that “Dr. V. Raymond Edman…administered a questionnaire to freshmen one year during the forties. In response to a question concerning their reasons for having decided to attend Wheaton, more than half of the entering class included in their list a reading of The Silver Trumpet” (p. 28).