The William Jewell college story

Baptist History and Heritage, Summer-Fall, 1999 by David O. Moore

On 28 February 1962, President Binns announced his retirement. Enrollment stood at 1,012. New buildings surrounded the Quad. A grant from the Ford Foundation of $183,500 had been received to increase faculty salaries. It was "the best of times."

In successive administrations of H. Guy Moore, Thomas S. Field, and J. Gordon Kingsley, William Jewell moved through the restless sixties and the prosperous next three decades. In this time the college achieved respectable stability as an educational institution. Curriculum was revised, organizational structure amended with the faculty once more directly involved in programs. A campus abroad program was begun in central England and in Oxford. A grant from the Hall Family Foundation of $1.5 million helped endow study abroad for students in what President Kingsley called the Oxbridge Studies Program. Total endowment of the college had now grown to a book value exceeding. $50 million.

Taking office in 1996, W. Christian Sizemore led in providing a $1.5 million installation of more than 1,600 computer access points for a fully networked campus. The burgeoning field of information technology was now available to the campus. Binns's college--a faculty and students--could now connect from all over the world.

William Jewell's faculty is now engaged in implementation of Leadership 2000: A Strategic Plan for the new millennium. David Duke, a biblical studies professor, envisions Jewell's future. He states in The Strategic Plan that the college "must interpret liberal arts for everyone's clearer perception in a techno-professional society. She must define her Christian mission making clear the relationship between liberal arts and Christian mission. She must be loyal to the ideals of Christ and rooted firmly in her 150-year Baptist tradition." This faculty envisions a "new college in a new century," and it is setting about to realize it.

I close by asking once again, What's a college--this college? It is faculty and students. It is ideas, challenges, discipline, and devotion. It is traditions loved and visions yet unrealized. It is freedom of expression and the ability to control its direction. It is a community of learners and an openness to be taught.

What's a college? It is this place, this hill, these stones, this mortar. It is Dr. William Jewell's jewel, this William Jewell College. Deo Fisus Labora.

David O. Moore is the retired chair of the department of religion at William Jewell College, Liberty, Missouri.