An excerpt from Ch. 6 in Dr. John C. Stevens' 1988 book No Ordinary University: The Story of A City Set on a Hill.
By John C. Stevens
(Author’s Note: The close of this chapter, like the Masten story, is told in the first person because of its personal nature.)
The writing of No Ordinary University gives me an opportunity to pay tribute to my colleagues in the Department of History through the years. When I joined the faculty in the fall of 1948, the history department comprised Earl Brown, Harry Payne and me. Brown had been at the college since 1922. Payne was beginning his second year. He taught two more years and then resigned to do mission work in Holland. I could not have had more agreeable fellow workers. My assignment was an impossible one for a new teacher, but it was fun for me: two sections of civilization past and present, a section of American history, an American government class, and a class in the history of the Far East. When taken into consideration that I was starting a new career as a college teacher and was busy getting myself married during that semester, one wonders what caliber of teaching was done. Our faculty "office" consisted of three small desks and straight chairs in one barracks room. When a student came by to see Brown, Payne or me, he or she automatically was meeting with the entire Department of History. In January 1950, I was named dean of men, and my teaching load was reduced. In 1956, I was appointed assistant president and was relieved of all teaching assignments in order to travel for the college.
In 1950, with Payne's departure, two scholarly historians arrived: Ralph Smith and Frank Rhodes. Smith had a passion for research, particularly in the history of the southwestern part of the United States and in Mexican history. Rhodes loved to teach the history of the French Revolution and Napoleon, but his specialty was American history. He succeeded Earl Brown as department head in 1966 and served until his retirement. Both Rhodes and Smith retired from the faculty in 1980.
Tommy Shaver joined the department in 1955 and taught three years. He then took a leave of absence to do his doctorate in Bible, in which department he taught until retiring in 1992. Taking Shaver’s place in 1958 was Benny Gallaway, who became a recognized authority on the history of Texas and the great Southwest. His book Texas, the Dark Corner of the Confederacy has gone through three editions since 1968, the latest by the University of Nebraska Press in 1994. His The Ragged Rebel: A Common Soldier in W. H. Parson’s Texas Cavalry, 1861-66 is now in its forth printing at the University of Texas Press.
In 1959, Bea Speck came aboard and taught, with time out while earning her doctor’s degree at Texas Christian University, until retiring in 1989. Dr. Speck was a popular teacher and speaker in demand especially as a book reviewer. She chaired the department from 1980-84. It was during her time as the leader of the department that I returned to teaching, including one semester when I had an upper division class in the American presidents. I have enjoyed immensely being back in teaching during these past 16 years.
Norman Hogan came from Freed-Hardeman College in 1961 and taught courses in American history for eight years before going back to Freed-Hardeman. He was always a popular teacher.
Joe Spaulding joined the department in 1964 and taught for eighteen years. He was a popular teacher. Spaulding especially liked to teach the course in Western civilization although his doctoral program primarily dealt with American diplomatic history.
John Robinson was added in 1965. His interests were primarily in Latin American, Asian, and United States history. He had a background as an operational intelligence specialist with the United States Air Force, 1953-57, and as an instructor in history and theology in the Philippine Bible College, 1962-65. He has written scholarly articles for a number of journals through the years, in addition to several books: David Lipscomb: Journalist in Texas in 1971; Living Hard: Southern Americans in the Great Depression, published by the University Press of American in 1981; and Bartolome Mitre: Historian of the Americas by University Press in 1982. In 1998, he is completing a book on ways in which American culture portrays Hispanics in a negative light. He was department chairman 1986-96.
James G. Burrow came in 1969 and taught for 22 years until retirement in 1991. He also taught once semester in the fall of 1947. He was a scholar with a national reputation. He wrote in the filed of the history of American medicine. His two books, Voice of American Medicine in 1963 and Organized Medicine in the Progressive Era in 1970, were published by the Johns Hopkins University Press. He was outstanding in the classroom. His lectures were so well prepared that he needed no notes.
Arlie Hoover came to the department in 1980. With a solid background in European history, including a Fulbright Fellowship for a year of study and research in the Free University of Berlin, 1963-64, and a research grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities for post-doctoral research at the University of Heidelberg in 1968, he was a tremendous addition to the European history offerings of the department. With research grants, he studied in European universities and libraries virtually every summer from 1985 through 1997. His publications are numerous; probably the three most in demand are The Gospel of Nationalism: German Patriotic Preaching from Napoleon to Versailles, 1806-1918, published by Steiner of Stuttgart in 1986; God, Germany and Britain in the Great War: A Study on Clerical Nationalism, published by Praeger in 1989; and Friedrich Nietzsche: His Life and Thought, published by Praeger in 1994.
Joining the department for a brief tenure was Richard Hughes. His first love was church history. In fact, he was much involved in writing his massive work Reviving the Ancient Faith, which was published by Eerdmans in 1995. He served as chairman of the department from 1984-86, but when he was offered a chair in church history at Pepperdine University, he accepted the California offer.
Fred Arthur Bailey (a painstaking historian and prolific writer) arrived in 1984. His field is primarily Southern history, American social and intellectual history, and the American Civil War. His published books are Class and Tennessee’s Confederate Generation published by the University of North Carolina Press in 1987, William Edward Dodd: The South’s Yeoman Scholar published by the University of Virginia Press in 1997. He is currently working on a book, “The Southern Quest for a Suitable Past.” His journal articles are too many to mention, as are his awards. He received a one-year appointment by Johns Hopkins University to teach at the JHU-Nanjing Center for Chinese and American Studies. He and his family enjoyed their year in the Peoples’ Republic. Bailey was named chairman of the department in 1996.
The latest historian to arrive, in 1989, is Vernon Williams. He teaches courses in American history. His specialty is military history. He has written numerous scholarly articles and has two books in progress. One is Empire Marine: General Littleton T. Walker and the Growth of American Imperialism, 1856-1920, a full-length biography under contract with Praeger Publishers, and the other is Admiral of the Navy: George Dewey and the Development of the New American Navy, 1856-1917, a biography under contract with the Naval Institute Press. He is currently working to establish a museum in Abilene to house the papers and artifacts of the 12th Armored Division.
Through the years numerous part-time instructors have taught in the Department of History. One of the most distinguished in the 1990s is Abilene’s superintendent of schools, Charles Hundley, who during the fall semester teaches a three-hour class on Tuesday evenings to a roomful of students who enjoy his enthusiastic and skillful teaching.
Gone are the days when ACU history teachers simply taught classes and graded papers. Members of the department now are researching and writing books and scholarly articles.
In mid-1980, with the Masten case well on the road to settlement, I told Ray McGlothlin that I would be clearing out of the president’s office no later than June 1, 1983, and sooner would be all right with me. My plan was to go back to the history classroom. My coming to Abilene Christian in the fall of 1948 was for the purpose of teaching history, and although I had enjoyed administrative work, beginning as dean of men in 1950, serving as assistant president, 1956-69, and winding up my administrative career as president, I thought that after thirty years, the time had come to a return to the classroom.
Hence, the chairman of the board appointed a search committee to look for the person to nominate as the next president of Abilene Christian University. Dr. Roy Willingham was named chairman of the committee. It was interesting to me that a physician had been chosen to chair a committee. The chairman of the committee that nominated me was another well-known Abilene physician, Dr. John Paul Gibson. Other members of the Willingham committee were Bob Bailey, Oliver Jackson, Bill Johnson, Ray McGlothlin Jr., Tommy Morris, Wilson C. Orr, Lynn Packer, and Jack Pope. The committee went about its work methodically, considering persons on campus as well as elsewhere. The choice fell upon Dr. William J. “Bill” Teague. At the February 1981 meeting of the board, an official invitation was extended to him to accept the presidency, and at the May meeting, he was formally elected, with his appointment to become effective Aug. 27, 1981. At the same meeting, I was elected to become chancellor, effective the same date as Teague’s accession to the presidency. As chancellor I continued involvement in some travel, fund raising, and speaking for the university, but had no executive or administrative responsibilities. After 12 years as the chief executive, the chancellorship was a pretty nice job. This is not to say that the office of chancellor is a non-executive job on all campuses. In some universities, such as Texas Christian, the chancellor is the chief executive, but at Abilene Christian the president is the chief executive.
As for John and Ruth Stevens, we were glad to turn the presidency over to Bill and Peggy Teague. As stated, the first year out of office I did a good deal of traveling among our constituency in my role as chancellor. During the year, I mentioned to Dr. Speck, who was head of the Department of History, that I would like to teach a class beginning with September 1982. She mentioned that Spaulding was retiring and she could use me in a class of Western civilization. I had to get busy preparing to teach. A quarter of a century had passed since I had taught classes on a regular basis. After that much of a layoff, it is amazing how much work is required in preparing lectures and examinations. I had to hit the books again. It was, however, a real pleasure.
My good wife, Ruth, volunteered to grade papers for me. Then, after seeing a test or two that I had prepared, she volunteered to write the tests for me. She attended the class, took notes on the lectures, read my lecture notes, and spent a great deal of time reading the textbook and preparing questions. Then we would go over her tests carefully. I could discard any question that I did not like or could not answer, and that is the way it has been for the last 15, going on 16, years, although after the first year, she no longer attended my lectures. She had heard them. During these years, in addition to Western civilization, I have taught at various times the history of England and American history. Two other roles have come my way of late. When Bill Teague retired from the presidency, in 1991, the board elected him chancellor, and I became chancellor emeritus, and the new president, Royce Money, enlisted me as the researcher and writer of No Ordinary University, which meant he also enlisted Ruth for the book.
The end of the Stevens presidency, much like the end of the Cox presidency, returned to an administrator to his first love, teaching - in this case, the teaching of history.
