Blanchard Hall, the City of God?

College-related Publications

All editions of Pilgrim’s Progress describe a thrilling scene in which Christian is directed to the heavenly city by Evangelist. However, the 1931 Wheaton College Tower front flyleaf illustration slightly tweaks the old story, instead upholding Blanchard Hall as the celestial destination. Other such images are featured throughout the volume. Using the theme of pilgrimage, editors from the Junior Class write:

As Christian travelled his way full of difficulties and temptations toward the Light, we as students are wending our way to the same Light. Thus realizing these few years at Wheaton are but a milestone on our way, the Tower ’31 portrays our Pilgrimage.


Two Freds, One Faith

Special Collections

One could hardly imagine two more disparate Presbyterian ministers than Fred Rogers, best known as beloved children’s show host “Mister Rogers,” and Pulitzer Prize-nominated novelist Frederick Buechner. One man, wearing a zippered cardigan, sings “Won’t you be my neighbor?” before placidly discoursing on themes such as courtesy, personal hygiene or regular school attendance; the other writes decidedly “grown-up” fiction and non-fiction, frankly discussing the crippling tensions he has felt between faith and doubt. One man’s pulpit is television; the other’s pulpit is his desk. Both are influential in vastly different spheres.

Nonetheless, the two Freds interacted during the early 1980s. Among the papers of Frederick Buechner (SC-05) are three notes from Mr. Rogers. For the first two, dated July 14, 1981, Rogers thanks Buechner for a phoned chat, and for “…what you called out of me.” Rogers then invites Buechner to visit him during August if he is near Pittsburgh or his summer home in Nantucket. On the other note he writes his address. On the third, dated August 27, 1981, Rogers thanks Buechner for sending a gracious letter which welcomed his return to Nantucket. He also thanks Buechner “…for you and your superb work.”

(Researchers desiring access to those portions of the collection classified as Private Materials or Special Private Materials must obtain written permission from the Buechner Literary Trust.)

Wheaton College Awakenings: 1853-1873

College-related Publications, Wheaton College Archives

Before publishing Marching to the Drumbeat of Abolitionism: Wheaton College in the Civil War (2010), Dr. David Maas, retired professor of history, released Wheaton College Awakenings: 1853-1873 (1996), comprising 266 entries excerpted from correspondence, diaries, newspapers and other printed matter, chronicling early campus life.

A few examples:

#18. Discipline of studying, 1857. And if the discipline of study ever accomplishes anything it must be self-imposed. The student who needs a police force to exact obedience to academic law deserves no place in a respectable literary institution.

#37. Student attacks novel as trashy literature, 1857. The country is flooded with books and papers which have a tendency to excite and intoxicate the mind; consequently the mind becomes poisoned and the desire for useful information is destroyed and all the noble powers of the intellect die of starvation or from the want of wholesome intellectual food…[too many read] worthless nonsensical trash which has a tendency to destroy the virtue and morality of the consumer. [Great men of the past] Webster, Clay, Washington and Sumner…[did not] rise to the highest pinnacle of fame by spending their time novel reading…Young man, beware, beware of that young lady who spends most of her time in reading novels, talking nonsense and laughing at others…

#97. Professor critical of the architectural style of central section of Blanchard Hall, 1868. [Professor John Calvin Webster in address dedicating the cornerstone of the west wing of Blanchard Hall refers to the original center section as] the semblance of an old-fashioned New England cotton mill.

#106. Complaint of high costs of Wheaton, 1857. Although the world seems to frown on you now and by every means possible to take the last dollar you possess, particularly so if you are a student at Wheaton College.

#252. Student concerned about Civil War, 1861. It [imagination] sees the dark cloud which now overhangs our country roll away; and our nation purified by fire and blood – rising up with a halo of glory around.

At the Core

Alumni, Wheaton College Archives

by Ivan J. Fahs ’54 Professor of Sociology

During our first year of marriage, Joyce was finishing her work at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, and I was teaching high school in nearby Euclid. One of my responsibilities was to supervise a study hall in the school’s cafeteria where the students typically spread out around the spacious room, some of them taking up a whole table.

One kid drew my attention. He was at a table by himself and was moving books and notebooks around, scribbling a note here and there. I noticed he was smiling, and I thought I could hear him humming, too. Now, when a teacher observes a kid smiling in a high school study hall, there are several possibilities–Is this kid concealing a frog or snake in his shirt and is he is planning to let it loose to test out this new teacher’s skill at riot control? And that smile–was it a smirk or a impious grin? Trying to appear authoritative, I wandered over toward his table. He was underlining in a book and sure enough, he was humming a bouncy tune, When our eyes met, I said, “You’re Brian, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” he said, And you’re new here, aren’t you?”

“Yes, I’m new this year. Brian, you seem to be enjoying yourself this morning. You’re smiling a lot, and I heard you humming a song. What gives? Why do you look so happy?”

Brian’s response was instantaneous and genuine. “O, that? That’s just the Lord shining through.”

Obviously, Brian had not been admonished sternly enough to keep God out of his life as a public high school student. The spontaneity and brightness of his faith–what was inside him–showed on his face and was evident in his voice.

Often many of us portray a positive appearance that does not nicely dovetail with the “stuff” inside ourselves. Which means that sometimes we force an appearance, and we deliberately, some would say dishonestly, act in such a way to appear to he something we really aren’t.

What is in the core of our being? When anyone is “in Christ,” that person becomes a new creation. Christ profoundly changes our core. With that transformation we become capable of absorbing and transmitting the qualities of His Spirit–love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and self-control.

This is the “good stuff” that presumably becomes integrated into the essence of who we are. If all that “good stuff” is an authentic part of me, then why doesn’t it bubble out more? Sometimes, I think it’s because we believe our Christian faith is a very private experience. But when we contemplate what Christ has done in us, how can we really keep it for ourselves? The “good stuff” is too good to be kept private. It is natural to spread the Good News everywhere. Another reason we don’t express what Christ has implanted in us is that we have not tended the garden inside adequately. Inside we are empty and sick and cannot bring ourselves to admit candidly how little of the “good stuff” we have. We need resuscitation, a new commitment to the Lord, or a refilling with His Spirit.

I struggle with dissonance between the realities of who I am and how I present myself. But I have learned from times like this that it’s okay, deeply okay, to let my core–even when my core is in a state of disrepair–to be revealed among caring people who love me in my brokenness; these people hold me up, and they send me on my way. That’s what Christian community life does for each of us who is needy. The personal and social toxins all around are minimized when caring people blow in spiritually pure air and offer us cool, refreshing cups of water. So even when we are less than the ideal, each of us has power to minister to one another with Christ’s Spirit and to overcome these toxins.

Because Jesus taught that every disciple when fully taught will be like his teacher (Luke 6:40), it is fair to ask who our teachers are. Cultural ways of doing things, religiously sanctioned beliefs, and focus on people’s physical appearances can distort the reality underneath. Our preconceptions about poorly clothed people, or someone illiterate or socially crude, can keep us from understanding the essence of who these children of God really are.

How well-rooted at our core are we in Christ-centered values? And does this “root system” function adequately when others need to see the authentic Jesus shining through? Does the Lord Jesus inside us make a difference in the way we appear to others? Does He come through spontaneously and joyously? Does He attract others to Himself?

I don’t know what is best for stirring us to deal with the incongruity of our inward reality with our outward behavior. Gentle persuasion and cogent argument work for some. A direct in-your-face approach works for others. It doesn’t matter. We must come to terms with a process of living before others in a way that draws upon the qualities God’s Spirit has imbedded in our inner core. Then we may be in the position where the mouth speaks out of the abundance of the heart (Luke 6:45).

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Twenty years ago, the Wheaton Alumni magazine began a series of articles, titled “On My Mind”, in which Wheaton faculty told about their thinking, their research, or their favorite books and people. Former Professor of Sociology Emeritus, Ivan Fahs ’54 (who taught at Wheaton from 1981-2001) was featured in the Autumn 1997 issue.

The Wheaton Anthology

College-related Publications, Wheaton College Archives

During its early decades, the Wheaton College Record, the student newspaper, published verse written by faculty and students. However, as the editors, Raymond Horton and Charles Seidenspinner, observe in their introduction, “to publish a poem in a newspaper is to bury it.” Seeking to rectify this, they scoured thousands of pages, seeking “…the best representatives of the literary talent which has appeared on the Wheaton campus.” Compiling the best of the best, they collect their choices into a book called The Wheaton Anthology, published in 1932. Brief in pages, the anthology contains a number of interesting pieces, including a poem by Jonathan Blanchard, first president of Wheaton College. Also included are poems by Elliot Coleman, who later gained renown as a poet and professor at Johns Hopkins, and Royal T. Morgan, professor of natural sciences.

Children of Two Adams

Alumni, Wheaton College Archives

by Laura Miguelez ’83

One of the most striking parallels the apostle Paul comments upon in Scripture is that of the First and Last Adam. The first Adam was to be the exemplar of all that is good in a humanity made in God’s image. Yet as Adam and Eve, who had only known good, chose to know evil in disobedience to their Creator, so follow we.

We, too, determine that God’s ways cannot be best and so choose to go our own ways. Nor do we see this condition as being problematic. When confronted with our failure to do good, we stand behind our first parents, claiming, “I’m only human”– claiming, that is, that we expect to fail in our quest to image a holy God.

Nor do we see how grievous this low expectation can be. We distance ourselves even more from our choices and speak of learning to “love the sinner” and “hate the sin” as though we were somehow capable of separating the two, not acknowledging that sin arises from the very inclination of our hearts. Sin is not ever disembodied “out there” somewhere, but exists in the context of the person committing it.

The only reality is that of the sinning sinner, and this is why Christ’s sacrifice is so pivotal: He died not for sin, but for sinners who could not keep themselves from sinning. We are children of the first Adam, a living being; children of dust. Yet we are called to be children of the last Adam, Jesus Christ, a life-giving spirit; children of heaven.

Jesus Christ–not Adam–is the one who defines for us what it means to be human. He chose to love the sinning sinner by dying on our behalf that we might know the love of God at work in our hearts by His cleansing Holy Spirit.

The basis of our being accepted before God does not change once we commit our lives to Him. We can come before God’s presence only because of what Christ has accomplished; we can remain in God’s presence only on the basis of the same.

And this is the great tension we feel in our earthly sojourn: that in God’s sight, as Martin Luther observed, we are at one and the same time both righteous–by Christ’s nature within us–and sinners–by our own nature. And although we continue to seek to
hide behind our human nature in explaining ourselves to ourselves, the reality is that Christ is the one to whom we should return. And this we will not do unless we understand ourselves to be sinning sinners.

Only we who are sick have need of a physician, and so we are told by Christ to “Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice’ For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners” (Matt. 9:12-13).

And herein lies our hope: “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain” (1 Cor. 15:58).

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Twenty years ago, the Wheaton Alumni magazine began a series of articles, titled “On My Mind”, in which Wheaton faculty told about their thinking, their research, or their favorite books and people. Former Assistant Professor of Theology, Laura Miguelez ’83 (who has taught at Wheaton since 1998) was featured in the Autumn 2000 issue

First Ladies of Wheaton College

College-related Publications, Wheaton College Archives

The presidents of Wheaton College are lauded for their leadership, guiding the institution through the decades, holding close its motto, “For Christ and His Kingdom.” But leadership is usually a partnership; and surely every man would respectfully defer to the invaluable contribution of his wife. Ruth Cording, former archivist at Wheaton College, composed a booklet, Romance, Roses and Responsibility, celebrating the lives of these faithful women. Cording profiles the following: 1. Mary Blanchard, wife of founder Jonathan Blanchard. 2. Margaret Ellen Milligan, first wife of second president Charles Blanchard, who died during her early motherhood. 3. Amanda Jane Carothers, second wife of Charles Blanchard, died from scarlet fever. 4. Frances Carothers, third wife of Charles Blanchard, who was a physician and wrote a biography of her husband. 5. Helen Spaulding Buswell, wife of J. Oliver Buswell, third president of Wheaton College. 6. Edith Olson, wife of V. Raymond Edman, fourth president. 7. Miriam Bailey, wife of Hudson Armerding, fifth president. 8. Mary Sutherland, wife of Richard Chase, sixth president. 9. Sherri Elizabeth, wife of Duane Litfin, seventh president.

Commenting on her use of the rose motif, Cording writes:

Mary Blanchard brought her roses from Cincinnati when she and her husband, Jonathan, Wheaton’s first president, came to Knox College in 1845. Those rose bushes were then transplanted to their home on South President Street when the Blanchards moved to Wheaton, In 1863 the bushes were moved to the college and planted in front of Blanchard Hall near the east door. Some of the bushes were also planted, at the request of Jonathan Blanchard’s granddaughter, Geraldine Kellogg Dresser, and when she died, former president V. Raymond Edman referred to the “heritage of roses,” stating that she “passed the Blanchard heritage to us with roses.” In 1984 I noticed that the roses in front of Blanchard Hall were just about ready to go into pink bloom, but that the remodeling of the front of Blanchard would threaten their blossoms. The college gardener was alerted and all the remaining bushes were moved to the front of Westgate, the current home of the Wheaton College Alumni Offices. They are now appropriately marked with plaques, showing that they were originally brought to Wheaton by Mary Bent Blanchard – 150 years ago!

The Orange and the Blue

Wheaton College Archives

Like any campus, Wheaton College proudly displays its colors. Orange and blue. Visiting, you will encounter orange and blue t-shirts, pennants, banners, posters, jackets, flags, blankets; and, during athletic events, energetic, noisy fans displaying bright orange and blue facepaint. Why these colors? The origin dates to Jonathan Blanchard, the founder of the school. Historian W. Wyeth Willard writes in Fire on the Prairie – The Story of Wheaton College:

Like his parents and all true New Englanders [Charles Blanchard] was proud of his ancestry. “My father and mother were Vermonters. There can be no better blood; it seems to me, than that of the English Pilgrims and Puritans.” In many of the Blanchards’ published addresses this note comes out time and again, along with mention of Plymouth Rock. But that did not prevent the Blanchards from admiring people of other ancestries. Jonathan wrote concerning the Swedes, “the merging of northern steel with Anglo-Saxon iron.” And he suggested that the College colors be orange and blue — orange after that great Dutch patriot, William of Orange, and blue for loyalty.

Identity

Wheaton College Archives

Twenty years ago, the Wheaton Alumni magazine began a series of articles, titled “On My Mind”, in which Wheaton faculty told about their thinking, their research, or their favorite books and people. Former Assistant Professor of New Testament Studies Nancy L. Calvert (who taught at Wheaton from 1990-1997) was featured in the Spring 1996 issue.

Come late June, I’ll be getting married. It’s a big step, and I’m taking it later in life than most. David, my fiance, and I are glad to have found each other. We sense God’s timing in bringing us together in the midst of our busy lives and careers.

Yet each of us finds that we harbor some fearfulness about joining our lives. We have each established personal and professional identities. Getting married will involve sacrifice–but how much of our respective identities are at stake?

My approaching marriage has prompted me to examine the source of my identity more closely. I imagine that I am not alone when I admit that the person I have become is partially a result of my seeking the approval of others.

By taking on characteristics, however, that are deemed important by another person, or by performing according to someone else’s perceived standard, it is as if you and I believe that we are valued only if we can somehow earn another’s respect and love.

If this approval-based mindset is central to our identity, it can render us oblivious to the wonder of how God created us and to his purpose for our lives. It allows others to gain control of our lives–a control that ultimately belongs to God. In his book, A Pretty Good Person, Lewis Smedes wisely states, “One way to get in control of one’s life is surrender to unconditional love…I have to get back to that surrender now and then or I lose control again to the demon of other people’s approval” (p. 110). If our identity depends on others’ approval and not on God’s unconditional love, chances are that we will never fully discover what makes us able to serve God in our unique way.

Another source of self-identity is our life experiences. Yet at times, our experiences can become like prisons. It may be too threatening to actually discern what in our past shackled us to a certain perception of our world, ourselves, or God. But unless we are willing to name, evaluate, and revise the ways we perceive the world, we cannot freely embrace the life God has so graciously granted us.

In recent years, many scholars have examined the apostle Paul’s call to preach to Gentiles (one example is Krister Stendahl’s Paul Among Jews and Gentiles). In his providence, God gave Paul the background to succeed in his ministry to Gentiles. Paul was familiar with Hellenistic ways and philosophies, and Jewish culture and theology. He was also fortunate enough to be a Roman citizen, But in that dramatic encounter with the living Christ on the road to Damascus, Paul was blinded and his whole world turned upside down. He discovered that the very man whose followers he had been persecuting was actually the Messiah.

Once the Lord broke through his prison of misconceptions, Paul found his identity in Christ and his life’s focus in fulfilling God’s new purposes for him. He neither sought to gain the approval of devout Jews who knew him in the years before his calling, nor of those who believed that Gentile believers must take on the Mosaic law.

God may not use visions and blindness to bring us to a better understanding of his purpose for our lives. But he often uses events or people to get our attention, to help us better understand who we are and how we can serve God in our own unique way.

As David and I enter marriage, we must remember that our identities are ultimately rooted in Christ–though the counsel of others may be important. Together we must work in such a way that God can best fulfill his own unique purposes for us in the arenas of our professional and married lives. Doing so won’t be easy; we may have to expose one another’s shackling misperceptions from time to tune. Our identities will probably be remolded to some degree. But it would seem that only in this way can we even begin to find the joy of living together according to God’s loving guidance.

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The following statement was included at the time of publication:

Dr. Calvert is assistant professor of New Testament studies. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Sheffield, England, her M.Div. from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, and her B.A. from Wheaton. She is an ordained Presbyterian minister (PCUSA) and serves as parish associate at the First Presbyterian Church of Glen Ellyn. In her spare time she likes to listen to classical music, read, watch “Frasier” and films remakes of Jane Austen novels. But mostly she corresponds with her fiance via e-mail.

What Does Our Speech Reveal?

Alumni, Wheaton College Archives

by Dr. Edwin A. Hollatz G.S. ’55

The Bible has much to say about human speech, about the way we use this wonderful gift that God has given us. This investment of creative expression through language is perhaps one dimension of the image of God imbued in the very nature of human beings, spoken of in Genesis 1-2.

It is this which lifts us from the level of the dumb brute and enables us to express not only what we think and feel, but who we really are. We can conceive of anything in words and images, with limitless possibilities of fact and fantasy. The panoply of literature throughout human history gives evidence of that which is most exalted as well as most debased.

During this past Christmas season we were reminded again of God’s supreme communication to us in His Son, Jesus Christ. The Apostle John, in Chapter 1 of his Gospel, speaks of Jesus Christ as the Word of God, which became flesh–a veritable transmutation of the eternal, divine, creative Word, now come in human form. That Word, full of grace and truth, has the power to redeem us, bringing light and life so that we might receive Him and become children of God.

As new creations in Christ, what about our words? How true and clear are their statements in revealing the character of the life of a follower of Jesus Christ? Are our words an adornment to the power of the gospel of Christ?

In Matthew’s Gospel, Peter twice denied being one of Jesus’ followers, even using and oath. But others standing by said, “Surely you are one of them; for your speech betrayeth you” (Matt. 26:73 KJV).

The Book of Judges relates another incident in which one is betrayed by one’s speech. The Gileadites could distinguish an Ephraimite if he mispronounced the word “Shibboleth.” If he said “Sibboleth,” he would be seized and killed (Judg. 12:5-6).

These two episodes from Scripture vividly portray how one’s speech accent may have unfortunate consequences. But at a more significant level, the “accent” provided by our manner of living can be crucial. Around 40 B.C. the Roman Publius Syrius said, “Speech is the mirror of the soul. As a man speaks so is he.”

Some 70 years later Christ said, “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. The good person brings good things out of a good treasure, and the evil person brings evil things out of an evil treasure. I tell you, on the day of judgment you will have to give an account for every careless word you utter; for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned” (Matt. 12:34-37, NRSV).

The Apostle Paul warns us, “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up accordmg to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen” (Eph. 4:29, 31-32, NIV).

May the eloquent words of the old Anglican hymn be true of us as gifted human beings, created in the image of God:

God be in my heart,
and in my thinking;
God be in my head,
and in my understanding;
God be in my mouth,
and in my speaking.

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Twenty years ago, the Wheaton Alumni magazine began a series of articles, titled “On My Mind”, in which Wheaton faculty told about their thinking, their research, or their favorite books and people. Former Professor of Communications Emeritus, Edwin A. Hollatz ’55 (who taught at Wheaton from 1954-2000) was featured in the Winter 1998 issue.

Having worked at the College since 1955, Dr. Edwin A. Hollatz has taught speech, coached award-winning debate teams, served as faculty advisor to WETN radio, and helped establish the theater program. He has held offices in professional organizations, authored numerous journal articles, and been chosen for membership in several honorary societies. Dr. Hollatz is a frequent speaker at Wheaton Club meetings and received the Alumni Association’s 1993 Distinguished Service to Alma Mater Award. He and his wife, Joanne Simon Hollatz ’55, whom he met when Joanne joined Wheaton’s faculty, held their wedding reception in the Memorial Student Center. They are the parents of Cheryl Hollatz-Wisely ’85 and Celia Hollatz Bergman ’87.