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Riley's Empire: Northwestern Bible School and Fundamentalism in the Upper Midwest

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

William Vance Trollinger Jr
William Vance Trollinger Jr
Affiliation:
Mr. Trollinger is assistant professor of history in The School of the Ozarks, Point Lookout, Missouri.
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Extract

In the 1920s a loosely united band of militant conservatives launched a crusade to capture conrol of the major Protestant denominations. These fundamentalists staunchly affirmed the supernatural character and literal accuracy of the Bible, the supernatural character of Christ, and the necessity for Christians to separate themselves from the world. Most often Baptists and Presbyterians, they struggled to reestablish their denominations as true and pure churches: true to the historic doctrines of the faith as they perceived them, and pure from what they saw as the polluting influences of an increasingly corrupt modern culture. But by the late 1920s the fundamentalists had lost the fight. Not only were they powerless minorities in the Northern Baptist and the Northern Presbyterian denominations, where the struggle for control had been the fiercest, but many perceived them as uneducated, intolerant rustics. The Scopes trial cemented this notion in the popular consciousness.

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 57 , Issue 2 , June 1988 , pp. 197 - 212
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1988

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References

Research for this article was made possible in part by a Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation Fellowship (1982–1983), and an Albert A. Beveridge Grant for Historical Research from the American Historical Association (1985–1986).

1. See, for example, Cole, Stewart, The History of Fundamentalism (New York, 1931), esp. pp. 35–40, 336–337;Google ScholarFurniss, Norman F., The Fundamentalist Controversy (New Haven, 1954), esp. pp. vii, 177–179;Google ScholarLeuchtenburg, William E., The Perils of Prosperity, 1914–1932 (Chicago, 1958), pp. 217–224;Google ScholarMcLoughlin, William, “Is There a Third Force in Christendom?” Daedalus 96 (1967): 45.Google Scholar

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4. For an extended analysis, see Trollinger, William Vance, “One Response to Modernity: Northwestern Bible School and the Fundamentalist Empire of William Bell Riley” (Ph.D. diss., University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1984),Google Scholar particularly chapter 4; and Trollinger, , God's Empire: William Bell Riley and Midwestern Fundamentalism, forthcoming from the University of Wisconsin Press in 1989.Google Scholar For an excellent work which concentrates on the Bible schools as educational institutions, see Brereton, Virginia Lieson, “Protestant Fundamentalist Bible Schools, 1882–1940” (Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 1981).Google Scholar

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7. Despite Riley's importance, very little of a scholarly nature has been written about him. One reason for this omission might be the fact that only one file folder of Riley's papers remains, housed in the Northwestern College library in Roseville, Minnesota. The best published piece is Charles Allyn Russell's sketch in Voices of American Fundamentalism. See also Hull, Lloyd B., “A Rhetorical Study of the Preaching of William Bell Riley” (Ph.D. diss., Wayne State University, 1960);Google ScholarJohnson, Dell G., “Fundamentalist Responses in Minnesota to the Developing New Evangelicalism” (Th.D. diss., Central Baptist Seminary, 1982);Google ScholarMcBirnie, Robert Sheldon, “Basic Issues in the Fundamentalism of William Bell Riley” (Ph.D. diss., State University of Iowa, 1952);Google ScholarSzasz, Ferenc Morton, “Three Fundamentalist Leaders: The Roles of William Bell Riley, John Roach Straton, and William Jennings Bryan in the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy” (Ph.D. diss., University of Rochester, 1969).Google Scholar

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9. “The Evolution of Northwestern,” The Pilot 8 (11. 1927): 4–5;Google Scholar“Opening Day,” The Pilot 16 (10. 1935): 3;Google Scholar“Northwestern Opening Reveals Largest Enrollment in History,” The Northwestern Pilot 26 (09. 1946): 334Google Scholar (The Pilot was renamed The Northwestern Pilot in 1944).

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17. The Pilot 10(01. 1930): 132;Google ScholarThe Pilot 11(07 1931): 301;Google ScholarThe Pilot 14(01. 1934): 114;Google ScholarThe Pilot 16(08. 1936): 333;Google ScholarThe Pilot 19(01. 1939): 118;Google ScholarThe Northwestern Pilot 25(04. 1945): 214;Google ScholarThe Northwestern Pilot 26(11. 1945): 44.Google Scholar

18. Granting the problems involved in using current data, I used Rand-McNally's 1980 list of metropolitan areas to gain an indication as to whether or not Riley's empire became more or less urban over time. In 1925 21 percent of the Nothwestern ministers in the upper Midwest (Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin) held urban pastorates. In 1945 the figure had risen to 26 percent. Including Minnesota is problematic, however, in that some of these ministers were current Northwestern students who were temporarily serving in Twin Cities pulpits as part of their “practical work experience”; upon graduation many would become pastors of rural churches. Excluding Minnesota, in 1925 11 percent of Northwestern ministers in Riley's empire were in metropolitan areas, while in 1945 the figure had jumped to 24 percent. World Atlas: Census Edition (New York, 1981), pp. 123–146;Google Scholar Trollinger, “Response to Modernity,” appendix.

19. Kommer, Henry Van, “‘Northwesterners’ in Minnesota,” The Pilot 18 (10. 1937): 22.Google Scholar

20. Ibid., pp. 15, 22; Riley, William Bell, “Dr. Riley and His Boys,” The Pilot 23 (11. 1942): 56.Google Scholar

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22. Bowers, , Country Life Movement, p. 114.Google Scholar For two rather patronizing references to the resistance of rural people against the consolidation of their churches during the Great Depression, see the following volumes in the Studies on the Social Aspects of the Depression series: Kincheloe, Samuel C., Research Memorandum on Religion in the Depression (New York, 1937), pp. 134–135;Google Scholar and Sanderson, Dwight, Research Memorandum on Rural Life in the Depression (New York, 1937), pp. 91–95.Google Scholar

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40. For examples, see Riley, William Bell, “Twelve Days with Northwesterners,” The Pilot 22 (08. 1942): 311;Google ScholarRiley, William Bell, “Northwesterners Visited On Our Western Trip,” The Northwestern Pilot 24 (04. 1944): 227;Google ScholarRiley, Marie Acomb, “My Day,” The Northwestern Pilot 25 (08. 1945): 307, 319.Google Scholar

41. Richard V. Clearwaters, interview with Dell G. Johnson, as reported in letter to author, 3 July 1984; Riley, William Bell, “Northwestern Boys as Church Builders,” The Pilot 17 (08 1937): 341–342.Google Scholar

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43. “The Sixty-Sixth Annual Convention,” North Star Baptist 11 (11. 1926): 3;Google Scholar“Carleton College,” North Star Baptist 11 (12. 1926): 10–11;Google Scholar“Alumni Attend Baptist Convention,” The Pilot 9 (11. 1928): 17.Google Scholar

44. MBC, Minnesota Baptist Convention Annual, 1936, (Minneapolis, 1936) pp. 12–13;Google ScholarRiley, William Bell, “Recovering Majority Baptist Rule!” The Pilot 23 (08. 1943): 312;Google ScholarJohnson, , “Fundamentalist Responses,” pp. 49–50.Google Scholar

45. Ray Anderson, interview with author, Minneapolis, Minn., 25 August 1986.

46. It should be noted that many separatist fundamentalists, including many former colleagues in the Baptist Bible Union, bitterly attacked Riley for not leaving the denomination until months before his death. For an in-depth discussion of the MBC conflicts with and eventual separation from the denomination, see Trollinger, , “Response to Modernity,” pp. 198–230.Google Scholar

47. For a particularly incisive critique of “personality cults” within fundamentalism, see Fackre, Gabriel, The Religious Right and Christian Faith (Grand Rapids, Mich., 1982), pp. 74–80.Google Scholar

48. Central Baptist Seminary (1956) and Pillsbury Baptist Bible College (1957), and the new Northwestern College (1972), represent the two sides of this school split.

49. Russell, , Voices of American Fundamentalism, p. 103.Google Scholar For an in-depth discussion of the collapse of the Riley empire, see Trollinger, , “Response to Modernity,” pp. 231–246.Google Scholar