This Week in Texas Methodist History, September 26 H. I. Robinson Reports on Organization of Texas Methodist Foundation, September 1939 Texas Methodist identity is usually dual. We claim identity as Texans and also as members of an annual conference. The record of the cooperation of the annual conferences in Texas in joint projects is one of the most intriguing aspects of our history. Soule University was projected as a project of both the Texas and East Texas Conferences. The Methodist Home was deliberately designed to bring unity to Texas Methodists divided by the Holiness Movement. Both Southwestern University and Southern Methodist University were joint projects of the conferences. In 1934 the annual conferences cooperated to celebrate their putative centennial. In 1936 they cooperated again to celebrate the Texas centennial. The Texas Planning Commission grew out of these centennial celebrations. What I find remarkable is that the Planning Commission did not dissolve after the centennial celebrations. Instead it created the Texas Methodist Foundation which continues to this day to help Texas Methodists in their financial affairs. In September 1939 Rev. H. I. Robinson informed the general Methodist population about the Foundation and its wealthy trustees. Here is the list of laity who served as trustees: Walter W. Fondren Houston James West Houston Joe Perkins Wichita Falls H. O. Wooten Abilene R. W. Fair Tyler \Boyce Martin Corsicana Will Clayton Houston H. E. Jackson San Angelo Most of these names are well known to students of Texas history and represent some of the most prominent philanthropists the state has known.

This Week in Texas Methodist History September 19 Olin Nail Pleads for Better Memorial in Conference Journals September 25, 1937 The Rev. Olin Nail was the most prominent Texas Methodist historian of the mid-20th Century. His contributions, including his editing the Texas Methodist Centennial Yearbook, are well known among Methodist historical circles. In September 1937 Nail publishing a plea for better memoirs in conference journals. Very early in Methodist history annual conferences began printing obituaries (memoirs) in their Journals. Later the memoir section was increased as clergy spouses were included. It is difficult to overstate the value of these memoirs to historians, biographers, and genealogists. The memoirs are almost always written by family members or colleagues and contain a wealth of information. Most Methodist historians spend hours reading memoirs, and we often find nuggets to share. In the 19th century memoirs were usually written by colleagues rather than family members, and a frankness sometimes comes through. My favorite is of a preacher who entered the Confederate chaplaincy and suffered recurring manic episodes and was hospitalized as a result. His memoirist writes, “. . .in his sane moments he was an effective preacher.” A few of the memoirs are practically useless. The fail to give the details of the life of their subject and instead praise his devotion to the Gospel, his Biblical knowledge, his sweet personality or something of that sort---nothing about the preacher’s life. After immersing himself in the Journals for his historical research, Nail wrote the editor of the Southwestern Christian Advocate pleading that a stand outline be created for Journal memoirs. He wanted the following: 1. full name (not initial) 2. parent’s names including maiden name of mother 3. Date of birth 4. place of birth 5. father’s occupation 6. name of spouse and date of marriage 7. the names of siblings 8. names of children and their addresses 9. when and where converted 10. when and where joined the church 11. education 12. when and where received the call to preach 13. when licensed to preach and by what District Superintendent 14. When admitted On Trial and by what bishop 15. When and where admitted to Deacon’s orders and by what bishop 16. When and where admitted to full connection and by what bishop 17. when and where located, retired, or superannuated 18. name and year of conferences tranfers 19. appointments served 20. general remarks I heartily endorse Nail’s recommendations.

This Week in Texas Methodist History September 12 Biracial “A Conference on Human Relations” Held at Huston Tillotson, September 12-13, 1957. The General Board of Social and Economic Relations of the Methodist Church held a series of conferences on race relations in 1957. The first was in Chicago. Others were held in Kansas City, Indianapolis, Louisville, Pittsburgh, and Daytona Beach (site of Bethune Cookman). The 12th in the series was held in Austin at Huston Tillotson College. Huston Tillotson had recently been created by the merger of Methodist Samuel Huston College and Tillotson College, founded by Congregationalists. The specter of Brown v. Board of Education hovered over the conference, and one of the unspoken objectives of the conferences was to equip Methodists to provide a calming influence over the battles of public school desegregation that were already occurring in the United States The General Board had added prestige to the conferences by securing the attendance of the bishops of the region in which they were held. In Texas that meant that Bishops A. Frank Smith and W. C. Martin of the South Central Jurisdiction and Bishop Willis King of the Central Jurisdiction were participants for both days of the two day conference. The conference heard presentations from both General Board staff and local church leaders---all male leaders! Don Redmon (Secretary of the Steering Committee and San Antonio DS), Floyd Curl (Chair of the Steering Committee), I. M. Loud (vice chair of the Steering Committee), Marvin Judy, Merrimon Cuninggim, and James Mathews. Worship services were held in University Methodist Church whose pastor, Edmund Heinsohn whose intellectual prowess and progressive outlook was covered in a previous post. Future Bishops Ernie Dixon, Kenneth Pope, Chess Lovern, Eugene Slater, and Kenneth Copeland were all there. So too were the Lay Leaders and WSCS Conference presidents. The workshop materials and plenary addresses were published by the General Board. The final report includes not only the Austin materials, but also substantial reports form the several of the other 11 conferences. The plenary addresses are unremarkable. They are mainly boilerplate platitudes one would expect from such participants. What is remarkable are the published dialogues among the bishops and their responses to audience questions. Nowhere in the dialogue or presentation could I find an expectation that integration of the races would occur at the local church level. There was one exception mentioned in the report. An unnamed Methodist church in the South Central Jurisdiction passed a resolution stating that the pastor was directed to welcome all persons of all races who came forth for membership. (The Discipline stated at the time that the pastor was responsible for determining eligibility for church membership. Some denominations require a vote of the congregation for new members.) Most of the discussion about future desegregation dealt with institutions beyond the local church in the church institutions. Various examples were given of tentative steps toward biracial summer youth assemblies, educational institutes, and mission studies. The elephant in the room during the Q&A with the bishops were the Methodist colleges and universities. Not one of European American institutions was fully integrated. SMU had just admitted a small number of African American students into the Perkins School of Theology, but they were the only ones. Bishop Smith had been President of the Board of the SMU Trustees for 18 years so if anyone should have known about future plans for desegregation, it would have been him. He bragged on the admission of the few theology students. He also bragged that SMU was the first football team in the Southwest Conference to accept a football game against an opponent with an African American on the roster. One of the questions from the audience was “What is the attitude of the other members of the SMU Board toward desegregation?” Bishop Smith’s reply should go down in history as a classic evasion. Remember that Smith had been President of the Board for 18 years. He replied to the question “Well the question has never come up.”