A May to Remember

What a week that must have been!

Baccalaureate, Commencement, Dedications, Banquets, Receptions, Reunions, Trustee and Alumni Council Meetings and more. Kind of like Homecoming, Commencement, and Annual Conference all rolled together. But, then, all of these things were very interconnected. Many of the same people were involved, so it must have sounded like a great idea to do it in this way.

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Each of these events had one or more Bishops in attendance, and each of these Bishops were world leaders.

• May 26, 1953 was the 63rd Annual Commencement – with Bishop Corson as the main speaker.
• May 27, 1953 was the dedication of the Annie Merner Pfeiffer Library – which included Bishops Corson, Straughn, and Wicke.
• May 27-31, 1953 the West Virginia Annual Conference of the Methodist Church met on campus.  – Bishop Wicke presiding
• May 28, 1953 was the dedication of the Methodist Union Plaque in the Annie Merner Pfeiffer Library  -Bishop Straughn speaking. Read more about this here.

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Library Dedication

Since this event happened exactly 66 years today,  and since it included all three of these bishops, I would like to highlight this great event out of all of the others that happened that weekend. And to top it off, there is a major remodeling of the building happening right now that will honor all of these things into our future. I think they would be pleased!

We have priceless recording (32:21) of this event. Click on the link below  to listen to it. It is well worth downloading and listening. Dedication of Annie Merner Pfeiffer Library

It is worth the half an hour or so because not only will you hear the actual voices of these great men, you will even hear a very familiar train whistle making several appearances! It sounds just exactly the same…close your eyes and you can be transported to 1953.

I have transcribed the prayer from that recording, and have included a transcript of the Dedicatory Address by Bishop Corson. The litany and full program can be found here.

Bishop Straughn gave the opening prayer:

Let us unite in prayer.

In this moment, our Father, of dedication of brick and mortar – of stone and wood and iron and steel – we dedicate more than a structure or a building in which certain things may be learned and discovered.

We are building into ideas. We are searching after truth. We are trying to discover the ways of life for the world that is, the directions for the world to be.

And here we shall discover much. Much that godly men and women have put down in books and on paper telling us what they have discovered and what they have found. What they know about Thee. What Thou hast told them.

We are seeking after eternal truth leading unto eternal life.

Here, perhaps, we shall find the way from having discovered the way of life through the mind as well as through the heart. We shall pursue after the things which we may have discovered, and shall not lose the way in our pilgrimage through this world.

And yet, we know there is so much that has not yet been put down. Yet waiting to be told to us. Waiting for minds and hearts receptive under Thy leading and direction. Minds and wills and hearts that shall become obedient, and a new truth that Thou shalt speak unto them who are the youth of this day – and the rest of us who still want to know.

And, believing that there is so much yet to be known. So much yet to be  found out, but each for himself. Remembering as we do what one of Thy blessed disciples put down in the good book, that there were so many other things that Jesus did which are NOT written in the book, but which if they had been recorded and told that not even the world itself should be able to hold the books in which those things might be written.

Help us, then, that on the basis of what we know, that we may face up to the things that we do not know and are yet to discover. Grateful for leading and for guidance.

So we bless the day when a dear woman looked this way and sent to this blessed institution something of the gains of life that could be put into structure and form, and to make these things possible. God bless her memory unto us this day, and may the fine sweet spirit of that dear woman be maintained alive and alert on this campus for the guidance and inspiration of the boys and girls who here may be seeking the way of truth and the light.

Bless us, then, this afternoon. We give Thee our praise and we give Thee our thanks. In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

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Click here for a full transcript of this wonderful Dedicatory Address.

The Annie Merner Pfeiffer Library is still actively fulfilling the purposes that he mentioned 66 years ago.

Those with inquiring, developing, responsible, and open minds still use the collections – although they are now in many formats not dreamed of in 1953. They still use the place to contemplate and discuss ideas, and learn to use those open minds to go out and create a better world.

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Yes, May 1953 was certainly a May to remember.