Baptist Student Union SIU Forties and Fifties and Sixties

Baptist Student Union
SIU 40s, 50s, and 60s
Contact - helen@BSU-SIU.com

Our BSU Story

Baptist Student Reunion at S.I.U., Carbondale-- 1940s, 1950s and 1960s
By: George Casey

I attended the recent reunion of 100 men and women who were members of the Baptist Student Union at Southern Illinois University during the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s. The reunion was at First Baptist Church, Vandalia. Ginger (Mrs. Gene) Wells, a member of the church, is president. Helen Galloway, president for eight years, helped build the attendance from an initial 25 or 30 to 100.

It's an amazing group! Most came from Illinois, while others came from 14 states, from as far away as Texas, Arizona, Wisconsin, Florida, Alabama. Most were in their 70s and 80s. Their speaking and singing voices were strong, clear and expressive!

A web site (www.bsu-siu.com), started six or seven years ago, is used by many of the BSU friends for helps in a number of ways. It is rated as one of the best.

Driving home to Ohio after the reunion, I wondered why these senior citizens would travel so far to attend a reunion of an organization they were part of half a century ago. What was special? What created that bonding?

Perhaps a brief story from one BSU-er would help answer those questions.

My parents left me, a 15-year-old, green, soon-to-be freshman, at the steps of Doyle Dormitory in September 1949. I doubt seriously that I would have survived at the University without the help and support Illinois Baptists provided at the Baptist Foundation.

Most students in Doyle Dorm were Baptists. I soon saw that the Christian students had a quality of life that I did not have and became a Christian at the beginning of my third year at S.I.U.

Gradually, I became involved in the BSU. Dorm devotions. Visits to Sunset Haven, a nursing home. Banquets, one with an extra purpose of raising money to support Summer Missionaries to Alaska and Hawaii. Weekend retreats. Youth Revivals. Street preaching in downtown Carbondale. Baptist Training Union at University Baptist. The Chapel Choir. I went to Kansas in 1953 as a missionary and helped in Vacation Bible schools, took religious surveys, and helped in the state youth camp. And more.

To support myself I worked four years in the Foundation cafeteria and a fifth as custodian at Johnson Hall, finishing college with no debt.

S.I.U. accepted up to 15 hours University credit for classes taken at the Foundation. I took Bible classes from George L. Johnson, religious education classes from Harral A. Hall, music classes from Gene Quinn , and joined the Chapel Singers. A journalism class initiated my interest in writing and became invaluable in my profession.

One roommate, Dale Clemens, went on to Southern Seminary, was pastor at Meadow Heights Church in Collinsville for many years and was a president of IBSA. He stated that one of the years he was there 90 young untrained preachers were enrolled in Dr. Johnson's Bible classes. That was the only training they ever received.

Another roommate was George Kunce. He and Juanita taught high school in Herrin and were pillars of First Baptist Herrin.

Another roommate, Tom Purcell (more about him later), stirred my interest in photography, and it became very useful in many ways.

The BSU at SIU shaped and formed my life in many, many ways. Fred McCaulley, Home Mission Board, and Harold Graves, Golden Gate Seminary president, visited the Foundation, spoke at chapel, and were instrumental in stretching my vision. In March 1954, I went to California to work as a Tentmaker during the summer and enter Golden Gate Seminary in the Fall.

One of my seminary classmates became my wife, and we've worked together in churches more than 54 years, she in music, and I in education and in directing capital funds appeals for churches and community organizations.

Returning to the questions raised at the beginning, what are the answers? The BSU was a combination the influences of many, many people on my life. It was not just one event or one person, but many. What created the bonding? Spending time with people, studying with them, going on a retreat, to a nursing home, to a banquet, and even to playing ping pong.

Thank you, Illinois Baptists of the 1930s and 1940s for providing a home for colleges students at SIU!

During the 1960s several complex issues changed the ministry of Baptists at S.I.U.. The University initiated a conversation with the IBSA to trade land at Mill and Forrest for the Foundation buildings. The buildings are now used by the University, and Illinois Baptists have a relatively new Baptist Student Center there. Tom Purcell, University Baptist, Carbondale, who retired as Associate Director of Institutional Research and Associate Professor of Psychology at S.I.U., stated that there were two reasons why the BSU (now Baptist Campus Ministry) diminished its activity on campus.

"First, there was the civil rights emphasis and the corresponding social prohibition on excluding non-Baptists from living in the quarters. It became non-acceptable to have a place designed for Baptists with all the morally based regulations on living style.

"Second, the university finally disallowed university credit for credit hours taken through the foundation, and later discontinued the religious studies program as well. The Illinois State Board of Education may have forced that issue.

"I am not sure when these happened, but it is what finished it all off."

Yes, in Vandalia, as the old saying goes, "We met, et, and had a great time." But it was much, much more!
Additional Information. presentations from BSUersl

Several BSU-ers shared their personal stories of their ministries since completing work at the Foundation and S.I.U.

Don Davis, a fellow Doyle Dorm resident, and Ann, his wife started using vacation time from Lifeway to work with the Foreign Mission Board, starting in 1977, and led 76 field missions trips to 70 different countries. Lifeway wrote a feature article about them in the November-December 2009 issue of "Facts and Trends.'"

Bill Eidson, who came to the Foundation a few years after I did, shared these thoughts about the value of BSU to him.

"It is difficult to know how much impact certain situations or certain people have on your life. Yet I have no doubt that my life was influenced significantly by the Baptist Student Union. I was frequently challenged to be a better person and a better Christian by a myriad of speakers and by what I saw in the lives of fellow students. Without a doubt the most important impact came from the people I met and loved at SIU . Friends who laughed with me and at me. Friends who prayed with me and for me. Friends who listened carefully to what I said. Friends who spent considerable time with me, Friends who challenged me to be better. Friends who accepted and loved me, warts and all."

Lora L. Blackwell and Joanne Dale, members of First Baptist Church, Anna, Illinois, shared about the influence of the BSU on their lives. Lora is the State Director for the Fellowship of Baptist Educators, a service organization of more than 700 Baptist educators across North America who use their educational skills to fulfill the Great Commission. Joanne is intensely involved in teaching English as a second language. She shared one story of teaching English to 34 Korean teen-agers. Lora and Joanne have also gone to China and Liberia as members of a team that was coordinated by the National WMU.

Two BSU-ers put together a list of 46 missionaries who came from the BSU at SIU. This does not include countless others who served as teachers, business men, professionals in many fields, farmers, etc.

Illinois Baptists made significant financial investments, mostly during the 1940s. in the facilities and leaders at the Foundation, and those investments have paid spiritual dividends daily for more than half a century. These facilities were a home for BSU at SIU.

I suggest that this investment in young people has been one of IBSA's best investments in the Lord's work.

Sue Glasco, Marion, Illinois, shared her story about the Reunion: "After accidentally starting with three or four couples at a garage sale those many years ago, this reunion on the fourth Thursday and Friday in September has grown to include not just those who were members in the 1940s, but gradually to include those of us in the 1950s and 1960s.

"New friendships have been formed and old ones renewed. Group jokes have developed, including the story of the long ago filling station owner who sniffed at the banner on the BSU bus heading to Ridgecrest : “Those college kids don’t even know how to spell bus.” Because I no longer hear well, I was not sure if our new president Ginger Wells explained that the large program title “18th ANNUAL BUS REUNION” was intentional or not, but we liked that spelling and the common memory."

Helen Galloway and Patty Bellinger put together a list of BSU-ers who became missionaries. I counted 46 names. This does not include those who became pastors or other vocational workers in churches. Click here to see the list.

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