Thoughts of Irina

June 18, 2010Collection-related Publications, Special CollectionsDavid Osielski

It is very important when one has a real aim. Sometimes this aim is more important than life. –Irina Ratushinskaya

In April 1987, Russian poet and human rights advocate Irina Ratushinskaya spoke at Wheaton College while she and her husband, Igor Gerashchenko, were guests of Northwestern University in nearby Evanston, Illinois. Irina was sentenced to seven years in a labor camp in 1983 followed by five years of internal exile. The main pieces of evidence presented at her trial were six poems rich in Christian imagery. According to her husband the poems were as remote from politics as the Lord’s Prayer, yet Irina was charged with subverting and weakening the Soviet regime. At the time Irina stated “our people take literature very seriously. It is our Russian tradition. No wonder when our government take literature very seriously, too. It moves people.”.

During her imprisonment, Irina endured beatings, forced feedings, and long periods of solitary confinement. She continued to write poetry, despite being instructed otherwise, and scratched lines on a bar of soap and committed them to memory before washing them away. The women in the labor camp helped her to pass completed poems to Igor, who in turn smuggled them via underground couriers to the West for publication. Irina and her fellow prisoners, most of whom were also believers, appealed to the West for help in a similar fashion. Irina attests that Western pressure was the cause of her release: “The KGB knew that if they killed us, there would be too much noise in the West. So they decided to release us.” She was freed, along with 108 other political prisoners, two days before the U.S. | U.S.S.R. Summit in Reykjavik, Iceland between President Ronald Reagan and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev in October 1986.

During her appearance at Wheaton, sponsored by the Slavic Gospel Association and the (former) Institute for the Study of Christianity & Marxism, and World Christian Fellowship at Wheaton College, Irina read three poems she had written while imprisoned. She also fielded questions about the Soviet Union, especially Soviet Christians. When asked about glasnost, the new Soviet policy of openness, Irina simply stated that there was no openness in the prison camps; Russian people generally do not believe the changes exist “because those changes are more in newspapers and TV sets than in the lives of Soviet people.”

Nearly twenty-five years later Irina’s life has taken her full-circle back to the land which once held her captive. In December 1998 she and her husband moved with their twin boys from London back to Russia in the former Soviet Union. She chose to educate her two sons in Russian school after years of procedures to restore her Russian citizenship and currently lives in Moscow.

(mp3 – 00:43:24)………………………..[Excerpted by Wheaton Alumni magazine, August 1987]

Jeremiah Wright’s “Invisible Giant”

June 10, 2010Entries with Audio, Wheaton College ArchivesDavid Malone

Jeremiah Wright has become a volatile political figure in recent years. Though recently retired from pastoral ministry, Rev. Dr. Wright has described himself as “toxic” to the Obama administration after his comments about the history of race and race-relations in America from the pulpit of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago were scrutinized in the press. Obama had been a member of Wright’s South Side Trinity Church.

Despite his recent tangles, in 1996 Wright’s expertise on African-American church history was recognized and he was invited to give Wheaton’s African-American Church History Lecture. He followed the previous appearances of Dr. Larry Murphy (Professor of the History of Christianity, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary) and Ms. Sherry Sherrod DuPree. The lecture series began in 1994 to introduce “interesting themes from a Black American religious experience and history to the Wheaton student body.”

Over 250 people gathered to hear Rev. Wright’s lecture “The Black Church Since World War II: The Invisible Giant.” He addressed the growth and development of the Black church and the impact on society in terms of facilitating the Black middle class, particularly highlighting the social transformation of the church and the way gospel music illustrates those changes, and the African heritage which continues to express itself in the church and community.

(mp3 – 01:18:26)

Elihu B. Washburne

June 7, 2010Wheaton College ArchivesDavid Malone

One of the earliest endowed scholarships was made in the name of Elihu B. Washburne by his wife. Washburne was born in Livermore, Maine on September 23, 1816. He had attended the local common school and later become a printer’s apprentice, eventually becoming assistant editor of the Kennebec Journal in Augusta, Maine. He also studied law at Kents’ Hill Seminary and Harvard Law School. He was admitted to the bar in 1840 and moved to Galena, Illinois to practice law. A member of the House of Representative from Illinois, Washburne was also a delegate to the Whig National Conventions in 1844 and 1852. He served in Congress from 1853 to 1869, where he had been chairman of Committee on Commerce. A strong opponent of slavery, Washburne became a leading figure in the group that became known as the Radical Republicans (1854-1877). He was appointed, quite briefly (less than two weeks), Secretary of State under President Ulysses S. Grant, resigning a few days afterward to accept a diplomatic mission to France. He was the only foreign minister who remained at his post during the days of the Paris Commune in 1871, protecting Germans and other foreigners left behind by their delegations. In 1877 he returned to Illinois, settling in Chicago where he served as president of the Chicago Historical Society from 1884 until his death on October 23, 1887. Three of Washburne’s brothers (Cadwallader C. Washburn, William D. Washburn, and Israel Washburn, Jr.) were politicians and Washburne’s son, Hempstead Washburne, was mayor of Chicago from 1891 to 1893.

A Mammoth Undertaking

June 4, 2010Collection-related Publications, Entries with Audio, Wheaton College ArchivesDavid Malone

On October 16, 1963 on the property of Judge Joseph Sam Perry of Glen Ellyn, the remains of an over-11,000-year-old mastodon were found during digging for a man-made lake. Upon hearing this news Judge Perry called for help from Wheaton College, and Dr. Douglas Block of the geology department was soon put in charge of the excavation of the bones. More than 55% of the mastodon’s bones were found, and the basement of Breyer Building was used as temporary storage space for the skeleton for the restoration process. It was Dr. Donald C. Boardman, then chair of the geology department, who was placed in charge of the restoration, which eventually took over 11 years to complete. During this time Dr. Boardman visited every Mastodon exhibit in North America and Europe so as to see how best to display Wheaton’s skeleton. It was decided in the late 1960’s that the mastodon’s remains would be displayed in a special wing of the new science building that was being planned at that time; the wing was named the Edwin F. Deicke Exhibit Hall after one of the generous financial donors who made the Perry Mastodon project possible. Local Glen Ellyn artist, Richard Rush, designed the display that the skeleton now stands in. The Perry Mastodon Exhibit was officially dedicated on January 18, 1975. The Perry Mastodon is the second mastodon skeleton to be found in DuPage County, the first being found in 1869 by Ned Jayne.

One of the better student pranks in Wheaton’s history involved the Perry Mastodon not long after its dedication on the 22nd of November 1975. A phony recording was found to have replaced the original exhibit narration. This prank, since called the Mastodon tape prank, was the work of Larry Shackley (’77) who recorded the fake tape in the WETN studios. The tape told a reworked and fanciful history of Perry Mastodon that included being frozen in a giant ice cube for thousands of years, being tranquilized by Judge Perry after reawakening, having half of its body removed for use in the cafeteria, and knowing how to talk and dance among other things.

“Perry,” as the Mastodon is often affectionately called, was recently moved from is long-time home in the Deicke Exhibit Hall to a new home in the soon-to-be completed Science Center. Stealing their title for this blog, the Naperville Sun, along with many other news outlets, covered the event. With over a thousand people in attendance, “Perry” was carted by flat-bed truck to great fanfare and excitement. The fun can also be seen on Youtube. You can also view an online album of images from Perry’s discovery.

John Ortberg

June 3, 2010Alumni, College-related Publications, Wheaton College Archivesadmin

In recent weeks Dr. John Ortberg addressed the Wheaton College graduates of both the undergraduate College and the Graduate School in the May 2010 Commencement ceremonies. In the following excerpts, he exhorts the Class of 2010 to embrace Wheaton’s mission, “For Christ and His Kingdom.”

It is His kingdom that we seek to be for, not ours. And this means a call to humility, because His kingdom is about something so much bigger, and so much more glorious, than our little evangelical subculture and institutions and movements and churches. But it’s also a call for great boldness, because to be ‘For Christ and His Kingdom’ means that we do not have to be nervous about this world. In a world where so much is down…where the economy is down…where employment is down…where consumer confidence is down…where marital stability is down…where, I know, the odds of finding a great job fresh out of college are down; people wonder is anything up? And some things are. The opportunity to serve a hurting world is up…the power of hope is up…the market for faith is up…and this is so because certain truths remain unchanged:

God remains sovereign…the beauty of forgiveness is still greater than the stain of sin…the Bible still pierces the human soul…prayer remains the most remarkable communication known to the human race…love still beats bigotry…joy still trumps despair…the greatest scandal of this sorry, dark world remains the scandal of the cross…God’s mercies are still new every morning…the tomb is still empty…the Spirit is still descending…the kingdom Jesus announced, which we seek to be for, is still expanding.

To be ‘For Christ and His Kingdom’ is to be for the world that God so loved that he gave His only begotten son.

John Carl Ortberg, Jr. was born in 1957 and was raised in Rockford, Illinois. While attending Wheaton College in the late 1970s, Ortberg was a member of the Scholastic Honor Society and graduated summa cum laude in 1979 with a B.A. in psychology. He played men’s tennis all four years, earned the College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin (CCIW) Most-Valuable Player award, achieved NCAA All-American Honors and reached the quarterfinals in men’s doubles at the NCAA Division III Tennis Championships. During 1978 and 1979 he was the #1 CCIW singles and doubles champion and ranked first in singles and doubles of the Wheaton squad while captain his senior year.

He pursued post-graduate studies at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland and later earned both an Master of Divinity (M.Div.) and a Doctorate (Ph.D.) in Clinical Psychology from Fuller Theological Seminary, where he is currently on the Board of Trustees.

He served as senior pastor at Simi Valley Community Church for five years until 1990, and then until 1994 at Horizons Community Church in Diamond Bar, CA. The Ortbergs moved from California to Illinois for John and his wife, Nancy to serve as teaching pastors at Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, Illinois for the next decade.

While living in the Chicagoland area, in March 1997 John and Nancy gave the McManis Lectureship Chapel “Recovering an Evangelical Spirituality” on the campus of Wheaton College.

Since 2003 he has served as Senior Pastor of the 4,000 member Menlo Park Presbyterian Church in California. Ortberg is also an author of such Zondervan titles as the 2002 Christianity Today Book Award winner If You Want to Walk on Water, You’ve Got to Get Out of the Boat (2001) and the 2008 ECPA Christian Book Award winner When the Game is Over, It All Goes Back in the Box.

In January 2007 Pastor Ortberg returned to Wheaton and addressed the campus for Spring Special Services in a series of messages entitled “Adventures in Faith.” His pastorate at Menlo Park was also highlighted along with other alumni in the Wheaton Magazine (Winter 2007) issue.

The Ortbergs have three children (Laura, Mallory and John) and live in Menlo Park, CA.

Angel Fall

June 1, 2010Books, Collection-related Publications, Special Collectionsadmin

It was the stillness. That’s what they remembered most about the beginning. A stillness that hung like ancient mold in the trees. But who could forget anything about Wind Sunday? The sharp acrylic memories painted themselves on their hearts and refused to dry. And ever after, touching the canvas brought tears…

An airliner crashes into the ocean and only three young people survive. For the Lancaster siblings, the strangest storm in history becomes a portal to an ancient world ruled by seven evil creatures of immense power. As the children descend into the terror and temptation of Boreth, every choice takes them closer to endless night. With dark, glistening strands from Lewis, Lovecraft, and Tolkien, the cloth of Angel Fall has been woven. But the journey it weaves is not just for Alex, Amanda, and Tori…it is for all those who cannot find their way home.

Hollywood screenwriter, executive producer, and Special Collections author, Coleman Luck recently finished the above novel after twenty-five years of labor. Preliminary drafts of his work entitled Wind Sunday are available in the Coleman Luck Papers. “Early in his Hollywood career, Coleman began writing a novel to entertain himself and his family. Over the years whenever he had a few months free he would take it out and work on it. Sadly there were many busy years in which he wasn’t able to work on it at all. Consequently his children grew up with a half-finished story stuck in their memories. The new century arrived and some close friends came to visit. Coleman read the unfinished manuscript to them and their children. The children encouraged him to finish writing it promising that if he didn’t they would grow up, come back and kill him. With his own children and a new set of children goading him on, the novel was finished and became Angel Fall.” *

* Excerpted from Coleman Luck’s biography.

Saint Nicholas

May 24, 2010Wheaton College Archivesadmin

Buswell Library is certainly familiar to staff and students of Wheaton College, but it is relatively unknown that the structure to which it is attached was originally called the Nicholas Building, until expanded in the late 1970s. A portrait and a plaque, until removal in 2006, commemorated the contributions of a man named Robert E. Nicholas.

He was born oldest of eight children on a farm in 1882 in Caledonia, Ontario, Canada. “The village declared no holiday,” he writes, “the whistles did not blow, nor did the church bells ring when it became known that I had made my appearance in a world which already had problems enough.”

Raised among believing Methodist parents, Nicholas early learned the value of hard work as he milked cows, drove horses and plowed soil. After graduating from business college, he visited with an uncle who had attended the 1893 Chicago World Fair. Uncle William confidently stated, “There are a hundred ways of making a living in Chicago.” So Nicholas decided to discover one for himself. Meeting cousins living in the Windy City, Nicholas toured the Art Institute, the Stockyards and the Public Library, accompanied by a warning to avoid the red light district. Eventually he and his friend, George Rogers, using borrowed capital, started a hardware business in Oak Park, Illinois, a small town promising big returns. During this period Nicholas roomed in the home of A.T. Hemingway, General Secretary of the Chicago YMCA and grandfather of Ernest, the novelist. (The attending physician at the birth of Nicholas’ first child was Dr. Clarence Hemingway, Ernest’s father). Nicholas’ store specialized in builders’ hardware for commercial development, and soon he and Rogers enjoyed a sterling reputation among Chicago’s architects and contractors. Nicholas was also instrumental in attracting Loop department stores to establish satellites in Oak Park.

In addition to local commerce, he influenced community life as a member of the Christian Businessmen’s Committee for Chicago, successfully barring Sunday movies from Oak Park. In 1928 he was invited by Dr. James M. Gray, President of Moody Bible Institute, to join the Board of Trustees of MBI. He was elected, and soon became a member of the Executive and Investment committees. One year later he sold his business to pursue other enterprises, while also joining the Wheaton College Board of Reference. In 1932 he was elected to the Board of Trustees, replacing Fleming H. Revell, D.L. Moody’s brother-in-law, serving as vice-chairmen of the board under Herman A. Fischer. Combining wealth with consecration, Nicholas generously donated funds, usually anonymously, to churches, philanthropic activities and mission agencies. He remarks in his 1962 memoir, Life Has Been Good:

Indeed, I consider among the most rewarding experiences of my life, my association with the presidents, trustees and staff of Wheaton College and Moody Bible Institute. The fine men who comprise the trustee boards and give so freely of their time and means are an inspiration and a blessing. Their leadership, devotion and counsel given in a Christian spirit with independence of viewpoint, but without contention, could well be an example for other Christian organizations. The president of Moody Bible Institute, Dr. William Culbertson, and the president of Wheaton College, Dr. V.R. Edman, are two of the finest men it has been my privilege to know, and my own life has been enriched by working with them. No one could serve actively on the Trustee Boards of Moody Bible Institute and Wheaton College without realizing that the students for whom these institutions are maintained are among the finest in the land.

Nicholas entered unexpected and invigorating spiritual heights when on a Sunday evening his train stalled in Minneapolis. Seeking a church, he wandered downtown until he passed First Baptist, pastored by Dr. W.B. Riley. Stepping in, Nicholas heard the powerful preacher expound on the Second Coming, about which Nicholas knew little. But it was just what he needed. “I realized how hungry I was to hear about the return of the Lord Jesus, now that I had dedicated my life fully to him.”

Dr. Edman devotes to Nicholas a chapter called “The Satisfying Life” in They Found the Secret: Twenty Transformed Lives that Reveal a Touch of Eternity, an examination into the spiritual crisis experienced by prominent Christian men and women. He quotes Nicholas:

By this experience, and by others which have followed, my life has been changed from that of a nominal Christian to one with purpose and convictions. There has been an abiding sense of the Holy Spirit’s presence in my life. He has given me an appetite for the things of God and an appreciation of the Scriptures. In answer to prayer he has given me ability in business, strength under strain, confidence and courage can understand why so many Christians do not have the joy they might have, or do not have overflowing praise in their heart…There must be a full surrender of life to the Savior to have the fullness of the Holy Spirit…

Recognizing his dedicated service, Wheaton College conferred on Robert E. Nicholas an honorary doctorate in 1963, and in 1967 re-named its library, of which he had originally paid all construction costs, after him. He and his wife, Mabel, raised three sons and one daughter. Still appreciative of his good life, he died at 94 in 1977.

Change of Heart

May 17, 2010Books, College-related Publications, Wheaton College Archivesadmin

“Although I am an older person,” begins Doris Dresselhaus Menzies in her memoir, Young At Heart (2007), “I have a much younger heart.” She explains her cryptic remark as the story unfolds.

Born in Decorah, Iowa, in 1932, Doris lived peacefully with her family and worked hard on the farm. At age nine she fully committed to Christ at the local Assemblies of God church. She was baptized in a lake, and shortly thereafter during an evening service received her baptism in the Holy Spirit. In 1951 she enrolled at Wheaton College where she studied elementary education. Because there were no Pentecostal churches in Wheaton at that time, an Assemblies of God campus fellowship provided a venue where Doris could meet students of similar conviction, including her future husband, William Menzies. “Neither of us could imagine the adventures in faith that would be ours when we met at Wheaton College,” he reflects. Later Bill would pen Anointed to Serve (1984), the definitive history of the Assemblies of God.

After their marriage in 1955, Bill and Doris served in various midwestern churches until he was called to teach at Central Bible College in Springfield, Missouri. From there he moved to other teaching positions at home and abroad, until he and Doris were called to be regular missionaries for the Assemblies of God. In 1989 they relocated to the Philippines, where Bill served as president of Asia Pacific Theological Seminary. As he taught and lectured at the school, Doris quietly mingled with the people of Baguio City, personally leading many hungry hearts to Christ. Their lives proceeded busily until one day Doris suffered sharp chest pains, indicating severe cardiac arrest. Transferred to Salt Lake City for specialized care, it was concluded that she required a heart transplant. With that stunning report came the additional bad news that she would need to await a donor. And so for fourteen months she and Bill patiently waited in Salt Lake, until at last it was announced that a heart had been located, belonging to a young man from Oregon who requested that his organs be donated should anything happen to him. To the delight of all, the operation was a smashing success. As she writes, “There was thanksgiving and joy in my new heart.”

But Doris was not entirely free of physical affliction. In 2003 she was diagnosed with lymphoma cancer. After an onerous series of chemo and radiation treatments, she lost her strength, appetite and all her hair, but the disease was finally controlled. Her hair has since regrown, and she has regained the weight.

Summing up her eventful life, Doris Menzies expresses her joy: “I have appointments to see my oncology doctor, and also blood tests to send to my heart transplant doctor…I also see my internist, my neurologist, and my foot doctor on a regular basis. But my Great Physician continues to be God Almighty, my Creator and Redeemer. To Him I give all glory for each day!”

ReCollections

Re-telling stories from Buswell Library Special Collections

Jeremiah Wright’s “Invisible Giant”

Elihu B. Washburne

Saint Nicholas