Coverture and Its Legacy in Oklahoma

A carryover from English common law, coverture was an American legal idea and practice whereby "wives were understood to be 'covered' under the civil identity of their husbands."[1] As the English jurist Sir William Blackstone expressed it in 1770, "the very being or legal existence of the woman is suspended during the marriage, or at least is incorporated and consolidated into that of the husband: under whose wing, protection, and cover, she performs every thing."[2]

Coverture meant that a married woman's identity was subsumed into that of her husband's. Ideally, his duty was to protect and support her. Her duty was to obey and serve him. He would work for a salary or wages and represent the family in public. She would keep the home and nurture the children. According to this arrangement, women were not legal, political, or economic actors, at least not directly. They were domestic workers. More specifically, coverture meant that a married woman could not enter into contracts. As historian Richard White puts it: "The marriage contract . . . was a contract that took away a wife's right to make future contracts." Consequently, "only an unmarried adult woman had legal standing and full control over her property."[3]

Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, state laws typically called Married Women's Property Acts began to erode the older laws of coverture. Yet, as historian and legal scholar Linda K. Keber has pointed out, in spite of these legal changes "most people continued to think as the rules of coverture had taught them."[4] The cultural assumptions and legal traditions of coverture were slow to die. Along this line, Kerber points to two examples from Oklahoma history. According to one law established in Oklahoma Territory in 1893, "The husband is the head of the family. He may choose any reasonable place or mode of living and the wife must conform thereto."[5] Kerber's second illustration comes from the mid-twentieth century. Although by that time women had long since gained the constitutional right to vote in federal elections, women in Oklahoma were not permitted to hold statewide office until 1942.[6]

Notes

[1] Linda K. Kerber, "Why Diamonds Really Are a Girl's Best Friend: Another American Narrative." Daedalus 141, no. 1 (2012): 91. Accessed December 25, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23240304.

[2] Ibid., 96. Kerber, in her footnote 18, cites Sir William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England: In Four Books (1770; Washington, D.C.: 1941), vol. 1, chap. 15, 443.

[3] Richard White, The Republic for Which It Stands: The United States during Reconstruction and the Gilded Age (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 100. 

[4] Kerber, "Why Diamonds Really Are a Girl's Best Friend," 94.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Ibid., 97.

Meta Chestnutt Complains in the Gospel Advocate, 1895

The issue of the Gospel Advocate for August 22, 1895, includes an article titled "El-Meta Christian College." Although it appears unsigned, it was no doubt written and submitted by Meta Chestnutt. Several personal notes and a distinctive style mark the piece as hers. For example, in her unmistakable rhetoric, Meta refers to her school as "that from which early childhood was the star that glimmered in the distant future."[1] She credits T. B. Larimore for his encouragement and "wise counsel" while the school was still in the planning stages. But since her arrival in Indian Territory, only two other preachers had issued "one word of private cheer or public encouragement": J. H. Hardin and D. T. Broadus.[2] 

In addition to a lack of support from leaders, she complains about a dearth of financial support. She was "beguiled" by a promise now unfulfilled, a failure that now branded the movement "with deception and lying." Both "prog" (progressives among the Disciples) and "antis" (those who stood against instrumental music and missionary societies) "silently refused to send one dollar to aid in planting the standard of Jesus." In addition to the monies contributed by members of the Minco church and by other residents of the town, it would require only three thousand dollars more "to clear up the outside debts and finish the present building." Mission work like hers certainly merited "the consideration of those who feel it their duty to 'go teach all nations'."[3]

Although he disagreed with the assumption of Meta's article, true to form David Lipscomb, editor of the Gospel Advocate, published it. But he did include his own remarks at the end: "I have no doubt the El-Meta College deserves the help and good will of Christians, . . . but when any think they can lay the brotherhood of disciples under obligation of honor for work they undertake, they are mistaken. To charge a forfeiture of honor is a wrong charge."[4] In spite of what Lipscomb wrote, over fifty years later, Meta still believed "The church in the East gave me a mighty raw deal."[5]

Notes

[1] "El-Meta Christian College," Gospel Advocate (August 22, 1895), 532.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid., 532-33.

[4] Ibid., 533. Lipscomb sometimes gave space in the Gospel Advocate to dissenting views. For example, on the subject of women's roles in the church he published a number of articles with which he disagreed, written by a woman, no less. See, for instance, Selina Holman, "Let Your Women Keep Silent," Gospel Advocate (August 1, 1888), 8; "The Scriptural Status of Women," (October 10, 1888), 2-3; "The 'New Woman'," (July 9, 1896), 438; "The New Woman, No. 2," (July 16, 1896), 452-53. For a good discussion of the exchange between Holman and Lipscomb, see C. Leonard Allen, "The New Woman," in Distant Voices: Discovering a Forgotten Past for a Changing Church (Abilene, TX: ACU Press, 1993), 126-35.

[5] Meta Chestnutt Sager to Eva Heiliger, November 18, 1946, Meta Chestnutt Sager Collection, box 3, folder 20.

Meta Chestnutt Appeals to the Disciples for Support, 1895

In late November 1894, Meta Chestnutt used the local paper to announce that the college would host a Thanksgiving Day social for the community. She asked friends of the college to bring a book to add to the school library. It would be a wonderful time of "music and social conversation."[1] By then, C.O. Robertson, who had apparently been Silas Kennedy's choice for president of the new college, was preparing to leave Minco for good. Also by then, it was clear that donations to the school would not be coming from Kennedy's network of churches and Christian friends. And that, of course, left open the issue of finances. How could the new college pay off its debt? In response to that question, Chestnutt decided on a path that Kennedy had avoided: a direct appeal to Disciples at large to support the college. In a long report she sent to the American Home Missionary, Chestnutt told readers about the origins, progress, and potential of El Meta Christian College. "This mission was established at Silver City, seven miles from its present location, September 8, 1889." Since then, the town had moved to meet the railroad. In the new town that residents established and named Minco on July 4, 1890, the school had flourished. The first term of the current school year had seen 94 students. For the second term, there were 97. The new building was "four stories, including the basement," and the five rooms on the first floor were nearly complete. With the growth of the school, more instructors would come on to the faculty.[2] But, Chestnutt added, the mission always involved more than education. When she had first arrived at Silver City in 1889, she not only began her school. She also "went to work in earnest, teaching the Bible every Lord's day." Five years later, the church that she planted still did not have a "regular preacher." Yet the congregation had never failed to meet "each Lord's day to study and teach the Word, break bread and contribute of our means to the Lord." About once every three months, the church at Minco got to hear a sermon from a visiting preacher like R. W. Officer, T. B. Larimore, Volney Johnson, and D. T. Broadus. With their help, the congregation had grown "from two to some fifty or sixty." Given such promise and the strong record of growth, "all Christians," said Chestnutt, should "consider favorably the efforts being made here in Minco, and help us raise the $1,000 needed to meet the present demand of patronage." Contributors would be helping "this little band of Disciples to fix firmly the standard of King Immanuel" in Indian Territory.[3]

Notes

[1] Minco Minstrel, November 23, 1894, 4. By this point, Joe Rogers, and not C.O. Robertson, was listed as the manager and publisher of the Minco Minstrel.

[2] Meta Chestnutt, "Minco, Ind. Ter.," American Home Missionary 1, No. 4 (April 1895), 61-62.

[3] Ibid., 61.

Meta Chestnutt in 1894

Previous posts have taken up the the story of the crisis and resolution that unfolded in Minco, Indian Territory in 1894. What follows here is a bit of interpretation. Why would at least some church and school leaders in Minco and Chickasha be motivated to more or less take over the school that Meta Chestnutt had established some five years earlier?

A young, unmarried woman, Meta Chestnutt was highly unusual for her time. As historian Richard White describes the U.S. during the Gilded Age, "single women who left their paternal homes to work were considered women adrift, moving outside of the usual and accepted cultural categories, and their conditions very often were unenviable."[1] Miss Meta had successfully defied the norms. She had earned a professional degree in Nashville. Later, she had left behind the comfort and security of her home in North Carolina and traveled halfway across America by herself in order to establish a school in Indian Territory. Just five years later, that school would soon be adding college-level courses in a brand new three-story building. Meta Chestnutt sometimes made it clear that she had come to I.T. "neither land hunting, nor man hunting." If she was merely looking for a man, she said, "there were plenty of them where I had come from."[2] For the moment, she was resolutely single, enjoying high status and a stable livelihood. She would have been the first to say that her life was far from glamorous. But to many people at the time, her social prominence and entrepreneurial success seemed more suitable for a man, especially a married man with a household to support.

Notes

[1] Richard White, The Republic for Which It Stands: The United States during Reconstruction and the Gilded Age, 1865-1896 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 239.

[2] Meta Chestnutt Sager to Eva Heiliger, September 3, 1944, box 1, folder 10, Meta Chestnutt Sager Collection, Oklahoma History Center, Oklahoma City. In her letter, Mrs. Sager underlined "man hunting."

S. E. Kennedy's Silence about the Christian College at Minco

In January 1895, Silas Kennedy sent word from Chickasha, I.T. to the American Home Missionary, a brand new, official publication of the Disciples of Christ dedicated to stateside missions. His report made it into the very first issue. Kennedy wrote that eleven people had recently been added to the congregation at Chickasha where he served as minister, and that he had recently established a church at nearby "Ninakah" (present Ninnekah, Oklahoma). Soon, along with "Bro. Hardin," Kennedy would dedicate a congregation at South McAlester. He noted that there were "ten towns on this Rock Island Railroad without a Christian preacher" and that Indian Territory would "perhaps double in population in the next year." The needs and opportunities were tremendous. Yet Kennedy said not one word about El Meta Christian College in Minco, an omission that by this point was a familiar pattern.[1]

It is hard to imagine that Kennedy's treachery would not become public knowledge. Before 1895 was over, he would be gone. In early December, the Chickasha Record reported, "Elder Kennedy who left here some time ago for Oklahoma City has moved to Lexington, O.T. where he has opened a store." The very next item in the paper said, "Elder Grogan has engaged as pastor of the Christian Church at this place."[2]

Notes

[1] S. E. Kennedy, "Chickasha, I.T." American Home Missionary 1, No. 1 (January 1895): 29. 

[2] Chickasha Record, December 5, 1895, 5.

S. E. Kennedy's Scheme Exposed

My post for June 14, 2020 raises a question: Why was it that in August of 1894, C. O. Robertson, the manager of the Minco Minstrel newspaper, was named the president of the new Christian college in Minco, Indian Territory? And why did Robertson leave Minco for good on Thanksgiving Day that year?

Here we must rely on Eva Heiliger, a great niece and frequent correspondent of Meta Chestnutt's and her uncritical biographer. According to Heiliger's unpublished book manuscript, in the early months of 1894, S. E. Kennedy, preacher for the Christian Church in nearby Chickasha, I.T., was telling the people of Minco that he had friends and knew churches in the east who were willing to sponsor a Christian school in Indian Territory that was under his direction. Their donations would lighten the financial burden associated with the college. Locals liked what they heard. Soon, townspeople who supported the school were suggesting to Miss Chestnutt that for the good of the future college she should let go of her leadership and make way for a new direction. What could she do but comply with that consensus? Broken-hearted, she immediately began packing for a trip to her old home in North Carolina.[1]

What no one at the time realized was that Kennedy had been sending photos of the impressive facility to friends and congregational leaders in distant places, telling them that it was a church building. As he described things to potential contributors, Kennedy was himself the minister of the church, a vital outpost of the kingdom of Christ in Indian Territory.[2] Why the deception?

Kennedy understood that many members of Christian Churches and Churches of Christ were reluctant to contribute to Christian colleges. Ambivalence about colleges affiliated with the Restoration Movement reach back all the way to the very first one: Bacon College, founded in 1837 at Georgetown, Kentucky. As the school began, John Allen Gano, a well-known Kentucky evangelist wrote:

I am unwilling . . . that the birth of [Bacon College] . . . be viewed as a part or even an appendage of the reformation for which we plead. The cause of Christ is one thing--the college another--as essentially distinct as the Church of Christ and this republican government. Let every Christian parent bring his or her children to the Lord's house on the Lord's day, and teach them the Lord's word. This is the school of Christ--this is training up children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. The College, if they want, should have a paper of their own. The Christian should plead for Christ.[3]

Fifty years later, people of Gano's persuasion looked to leaders like Daniel Sommer, publisher of the Octographic Review. To his thousands of readers, Sommer emphasized that the churches of the New Testament spent money on two things: evangelism and benevolence. Christians of the apostolic age did not establish schools. Besides, Christian higher education tended to promote a clergy class and the idea that one could not be a worthy preacher without a college education.[4] Such prejudice against church support for Christian colleges generated the temptation for Kennedy to suggest that the building under construction was a church house, not a school. Meta Chestnutt's original school house in Minco served as both a school during the week and a church on Sunday. Perhaps Silas Kennedy rationalized that the college under construction would eventually double as a church house.

What he did not count on was the possibility that one of the men he had solicited for church funds would actually make a trip to Minco, Indian Territory, in order to see this "church building" for himself. When the unnamed visitor realized that he had just taken a tour of a school building and not a church house, he immediately notified others who were planning to send money to Silas Kennedy. It seems that the visitor also notified locals about the scheme. Soon, community leaders in Minco sent word to Meta Chestnutt, who had recently traveled from Indian Territory to her old home in North Carolina. She was welcome, they wrote, to return to Minco and assume control of the new college, the flower of the school she had established five years before.

Notes

[1] Eva Heiliger, "Born to Meet Adversity (and Rise Above It)," 93-95. This manuscript is part of the Meta Chestnutt Sager Collection housed in the Oklahoma History Center in Oklahoma City.

[2] Ibid., 94.

[3] John Allen Gano, Millennial Harbinger, August 1837, 384 (misprinted as 284).

[4] See, for example, in Octographic Review 31, Daniel Sommer, "Preachers and Preaching" (Feb. 16, 1888), 1; "Concerning Colleges" (Nov. 15, 1888), 1, 8; "Colleges Again" (Nov. 22, 1888), 1. For a brief description and analysis of Sommer's position on colleges, see Robert E. Hooper, A Distinct People: A History of the Churches of Christ in the 20th Century (West Monroe, LA: Howard Publishing Company, 1993), 20-21.

Colonies Church of Christ, Amarillo, TX, 2015-2020

Nearing the end of 2016, Dick Marcear expressed to the leadership of the congregation that the time was nearing when he would no longer fill the pulpit at the Colonies. Wisely, the elders at that time appointed a search committee. Over the next several months, the committee identified Jeff Keele--who was then preaching for a congregation of the Church of Christ in Riverside, California--as someone who might be a good fit for the Colonies.

By October of 2017, Jeff and Alli and their beautiful family had moved to Amarillo. This was a major milestone in the life of this congregation, not simply because we were welcoming a new preacher, but also because this church had never before had a preacher other than Dick. Now going on three years, the addition of the Keele Family and Jeff's ministry of the Word here at the Colonies has turned out to be a blessing.

As mentioned in a previous post, the Colonies Church faces a number of challenges. Yet, under Christ and guided by his will, this congregation can and will respond in faith, hope, and love. Currently, we are led by four elders: Russell Bailey, Mike Green, Ken McLaughlin, and Paul Sneed. Our ministry and support staff include Jeff Keele and Dick Marcear, Vicki Gordon, Randy Wilson,Bryce and Allison Ballard, Saundie Wade, Dusty Cooper, Riley Black, and Nikki Dunavin.

Currently, the congregation supports David and Lori French, and their daughter, Kerin French Mashekwa in their mission in Zambia, southern Africa. The church also provides support for Prissy Sellers and family in their work in the Philippine Islands. Other mission efforts assisted by this church include Eastern European Mission, Amarillo Bible Chair, the Sunset International Bible Institute in Lubbock, the Texas International Bible Institute in Houston, the High Plains Children's Home, Sharing Hope Ministries, SnackPak4Kids, the North Amarillo Church of Christ, and the Key to the Kingdom television and radio programs that feature the teaching of Bret McCasland, a member of the Colonies Church.

Growth and Decline at The Colonies, 2005-2015

By 2005, the Church of Christ at The Colonies numbered about 324 households and employed six staff ministers.[1] It was past time for the church to appoint elders. That year, Eddie Brasher, Steve Nomelli, and Paul Whitfield became the first three men to serve in that role. They worked well together for several years to come. The November 2007 directory indicates that the elders were assisted by 38 deacons. By then, the list of addresses in the congregation numbered 356.[2] It appears to have been an exciting time in the life of the church.

In terms of numerical strength, 2011 may have been a high-water mark for the Colonies Church. A congregational directory published in that year includes 403 member addresses. The three original elders were still serving at that time. Just two years earlier, the church had completed another stage of their building agenda. The new parts of the facility included a children's and teen area, a gymnasium, and a large multi-purpose space that came to be known as the Great Room. The south end of the facility was converted into an area for 5th and 6th graders.[3]

A directory published around 2015 reveals what many in the congregation strongly suspected: the church had experienced numeric decline. In fact, by that time there were 65 fewer households listed when compared to the numbers from two years before.[4]

Notes

[1] "Church of Christ at The Colonies, Pictorial Directory, 2004-2005." The author counted 324 member households.

[2] Telephone interview with Eddie Brasher, July 24, 2020; "Church of Christ at The Colonies, Amarillo, Texas" church directory dated, November 2007. The author counted 356 member households.

[3] "Church of Christ at The Colonies, Church Directory, 2011"; Dick Marcear, notes for the New Members' Class, Church of Christ at The Colonies. A paper directory printed in 2013 numbers 400 member households, the first decline of the number of member households.

[4] "Church of Christ at The Colonies: Our Family Directory," published around 2015.

The Church of Christ at The Colonies: Early Beginnings

In 1975, Dick Marcear and his family moved to Amarillo where Dick became the preacher for the Central Church of Christ. For twenty-five years, he served admirably, with confidence in the Lord, and led the congregation to thrive. In 1980, for example, he was able to report that Central was growing at a rate of 14 percent. At that point, the church was holding five separate services every Sunday. [1] In the year 2000, however, the elders at Central announced that Dick would no longer serve as minister.[2]

Central Church of Christ, Amarillo, Texas

Beginning in November of that year, several people, current and former members at Central, began exploring the possibility of planting a congregation in the growing southwest part of the city. They included Dick Marcear, James McCown, Eddie Brasher, Madison Scott, and their families. The group made a commitment, and the new congregation began meeting at Puckett Elementary School in January 2001. They adopted the name Westside Church of Christ.[3]

It soon became obvious that the church would need a larger, permanent place to meet, especially if numeric growth was going to be sustained. During the summer of 2001, the congregation quickly raised more than the $300,000 needed in order to purchase 8.25 acres at the corner of 45th Avenue and Wesley Road. Because the property was appreciating in value, the church was able to borrow the money needed in order to build.[4] Builders completed the structure the following spring, and on Sunday, May 19, the congregation worshiped for the first time in the new facility. They took the name "The Church of Christ at The Colonies." Dick's first sermon was based on Mark 5:1-20 and titled "Tell How Much the Lord Has Done for You."[5] Already by March of that year, the directory numbered 176 member households.[6]

Notes

[1] For 1975 to 2000 as Dick Marcear's tenure, see Cheryl Berzankis, "God's rock for many: Central Church of Christ marks 100 years," Amarillo Globe-News, October 11, 2008. In 1980, on a single Sunday, the Central congregation committed to giving more than $2.2 million. The growing church needed a larger facility. See Ron Brown, "Amarillo church collects $2 million 'commitment funds'," Amarillo Daily News, October 20, 1980. In addition, miscellaneous church records indicate, for example, that in 1990 the church averaged a Sunday-morning attendance of 1,437. For two years, there are statistics for baptisms in the congregation: 1999 saw 45 baptisms. In 2000, there were 54 baptisms. Email message from Pat Dye, Secretary for the Central Church of Christ, to Judy Bower of Hope Network Ministries, January 30, 2001, a hard copy of which is in the "Church History" folder at the Central Church of Christ, Amarillo, Texas.

[2] This according to reports from several sources who witnessed and remember these events.

[3] Dick Marcear, notes for the New Members' Class, Church of Christ at The Colonies.

[4] Ibid.

[5] This according to the church bulletin for Sunday, May 19, 2002. A framed copy of the bulletin hangs in a hallway at the Colonies Church.

[6] "Church Directory, March 2002, Westside Church of Christ."

Amarillo, Texas, and the Christian Church/Churches of Christ

In the spring of 1888, Thomas G. Nance, a preacher for the Christian Church and Church of Christ--the names were interchangeable then--was on his way from Tennessee to his new home in Plainview, Texas. At the time, there was no train service to Plainview. During his stop at Amarillo, Nance preached at the home of Mr. and Mrs. William Harrell. Upon leaving for Plainview, he promised to come back and preach again sometime. True to his word, the preacher returned, riding on a freighter wagon. He committed to making the trip once a month and was usually paid five dollars each time. By 1889, several families with connections to the Restoration Movement, so-called Campbellites, had arrived in Amarillo. In August, Nance led this group to establish the First Christian Church. Since then, Amarillo has been home to several congregations of the Christian Church and the Church of Christ.[1]

Note:

[1] Herbert and Carolyn Timmons, "Christian Church From 1888," Amarillo Sunday News and Globe, Golden Anniversary Edition, 1938; Stephen Daniel Eckstein Jr., History of Churches of Christ in Texas, 1824-1950 (Austin, TX: Firm Foundation Publishing House, 1963), 173-74.

The School at Minco in late 1894

In late 1894, the Minco Minstrel reported on the opening of the new college on October 1. But earlier, a few other reports indicated a strange turn of events related to the school. Because S. E. Kennedy, minister of the Christian Church at nearby Chickasha, seems to have been the main person behind the construction of the college, it likely surprised readers when in mid-August the paper announced the following: "C. O. Robertson, formerly connected with the Minstrel, will have charge of the Christian college and church paper to be established here. Charley is a good man for the business."[1]

The Minstrel, published by Lewis N. Hornbeck, regularly listed C. O. Robertson as its manager. So, why was the manager of the local newspaper suddenly going to become the top person at the Christian academy? Why not S. E. Kennedy? Why not, of all people, Meta Chestnutt, a highly-trained educator and the town's very first school teacher? Was it then, around late August, that Meta Chestnutt, brokenhearted and without recourse, left Minco for North Carolina?

Either way, the paper indicated that she returned from the east coast to Minco on Friday, September 7, and that C. O. Robertson left Minco on Thanksgiving Day, November 29. Robertson was on his way to Indiana where, said the paper, "he will remain." His wife, still in Minco, would soon be joining him in Indiana. [2] What had happened?

Notes

[1] Minco Minstrel, August 17, 1894.

[2] Minco Minstrel, September 14, 1894; November 30, 1894.

Meta Chestnutt, S. E. Kennedy, and the Christian College at Minco, I.T., 1894

Chickasha, Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory, early 1894. The tallest man (second from left) is Silas E. Kennedy. Standing in front of him is his wife, Charlcy. The two men standing to either side of Mr. Kennedy are his sons. The woman standing quite close to one of the Kennedy sons is Meta Chestnutt. Further right is yet another Kennedy son, Luke M., a dentist. There came a time, later in the same year, when Meta Chestnutt would likely not stand so close to S. E. Kennedy.

For almost all of 1894, while some people were planning and building a college at Minco, the local newspaper barely mentioned the person who had always stood at the center of local academics, and never in connection with the college. Early that year, Meta Chestnutt appeared in the news only because she was sick. In January, after students had returned, the paper reported that "Miss Meta Chestnut [sic] was taken seriously ill," and had to temporarily close her school. Two weeks later, readers were informed that Miss Meta was "slowly improving." As late as March 2, the paper noted that Chestnutt was still "improving in health" [1] Was emotional stress the source of her condition? Did a prolonged illness make the single woman seem unreliable and vulnerable?

Either way, just a few months later, construction of the college received plenty of publicity. Throughout the summer, the paper offered regular reports. In early July, for example, readers were told, "Workmen are engaged in excavating the basement of the Christian College." Six weeks later, the foundation was nearly ready and timbers were "all cut for the first and second floors."[2] It appears that the community supported the project. For example, near the end of August the school hosted a fund-raising "phantom party," at which performers wore disguises. Although concealment was likely not the goal, the paper failed to report the names of those who had organized the event, and did not know the amount of money that had been raised.[3] In fact, over the first eight months of 1894, not one newspaper report identifies anyone connected with the construction of the college.

But that changed in September. In a lengthy article titled "An Appeal for the College," S. E. Kennedy announced a celebration for the opening of the school on October 1. It would be a grand event. Attendees would hear "the Silver Cornet Band of Chickasha," see a parade, and take in something straight out of a Wild West show: a "blood-curdling warwhoop by the Comanche, Kiowa, Wichita and Caddo Indians from Anadarko." After the Indians had whooped, several white men would speak. They included J. H. Hardin from Cincinnati, Corresponding Secretary of the American Christian Missionary Society, G. W. Muckley, from Kansas City, one of the original trustees of the Disciples' Divinity House at the University of Chicago, and Ira Joy Chase, Christian church minister and former governor of the State of Indiana.[4] Although it seems clear that they did not attend, Governor Jim Hogg of Texas, father of Ima, and President Grover Cleveland were sent invitations. Kennedy spoke directly to "the people of Minco." Triumphantly, he reminded them: "when I came among you and asked you to give ten acres of land and $3,000 in money to start this College I gave you my sacred word of honor that if you would be patient and trust me I would build in your town a College of which you and your children would not be ashamed."[5]

Over the next few weeks, things did not turn out the way he imagined they would.

Notes

[1] Minco Minstrel, January 12, 1894, 3; January 26, 1894, 3; and March 2, 1894, 3.

[2] Minco Minstrel, July 13, 1894, 3; August 24, 1894, 3.

[3] Minco Minstrel, August 31, 1894, 3.

[4] S. E. Kennedy, "An Appeal for the College," Minco Minstrel, September 18, 1894, 3. On J. H. Hardin, see John T. Brown, Churches of Christ (Louisville, KY: John P. Morton and Company, 1904), 156. On G. W. Muckley, see The Disciples' Divinity House of the University of Chicago: Preliminary Bulletin (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1894), 6. On Ira Joy Chase, see Alan K. Wild, "Ira J. Chase," in Linda G. Gugin and James E. St. Clair, eds., The Governors of Indiana (Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Society, 2006), 198-202.

[5] Kennedy, "An Appeal for the College."

A. D. Nock on Adhesion and Conversion

Arthur Darby Nock (1902-1963)

In his 1933 book, Conversion: The Old and the New in Religion from Alexander the Great to Augustine of Hippo, the Harvard classicist A. D. Nock distinguished between two understandings of and approaches to religious initiation: adhesion versus conversion.

Adhesion, said Nock, involves the "acceptance of new worships as useful supplements" but "not as substitutes." It does not involve "the taking of a new way of life in place of the old."[1] Adhesion is an understandable, maybe even preferable practice whenever two non-exclusive religious traditions meet. It simply involves the adoption of whatever one finds useful in a tradition that is new to him. The tradition, or folkway, has no absolute truth to tell. It has an outlook, accompanied by rituals or other practices, that might be attractive to the newcomer.

By contrast, Nock defined conversion as “a re-orientation of the soul, a deliberate turning from indifference or from an earlier form of piety to another, a turning which implies a consciousness that a great change is involved, that the old was wrong and the new is right.”[2] Conversion takes place when the truth claims of a religion, which are thought to extend to all of humanity, require the hearer to make an either-or choice. It requires "either the renunciation of his past and entry into a kingdom, . . . or the refusal of this dream as chimerical."[3]

As this overview suggests, Nock explained these two distinct approaches as stemming from two separate types of religion. Adhesion correlates to religion that is merely traditional. It is common wherever one's religion has for him "the emotional value attaching to a thing in which he has grown up."[4] In this circumstance, religion amounts to a set of time-honored customs. The religion has been "hallowed by preceding generations."[5]

Again by contrast, conversion is not rooted in traditional religion, but rather in prophetic religion. According to this type of religious lifeway, at some point in the past, an individual received a non-mediated message from the deity. Because it is the deity who has spoken to him, the deity then speaks through him, for now the prophet "has a message which he feels an inward and instant impulse to deliver."[6] And conversion is "the positive response of a man to the choice set before him" through the claims of evangelists representing a prophetic religion."[7] Such a changeover, said Nock, depended on a common cultural matrix, one that enabled hearers to make sense of the truth claims they were called upon to accept and the commands they were expected to obey. Human beings are not likely to accept what to them is entirely new. Prophetic religion truly succeeds only where it "finds men's minds in a measure prepared," which is a critical distinction.[8]

As the subtitle of his book indicates, Nock used the lens of his theory in order to examine distinctions between paganism of the ancient world as compared to Judaism and Christianity. In short, to the extent that ancient paganism reached newcomers, the new condition was the result of adhesion. But Judaism and Christianity, with their claims issued by the only true and living God, claims communicated by the prophetic figures known as Moses and Jesus, demanded conversion.

My guess is that Nock's distinction between adhesion and conversion might go a long way in explaining the religious interface between the first peoples of North America and later Euro-Americans. More about that later.

Notes

[1] Arthur Darby Nock, Conversion: The Old and the New in Religion from Alexander the Great to Augustine of Hippo (London and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1933), 7.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid., 5.

[4] Ibid., 2.

[5] Ibid., 3.

[6] Ibid. Here, many passages from the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament come to mind. In Amos 3:8, for example, the prophet asked, "The lion has roared-- who will not fear? The Sovereign LORD has spoken-- who can but prophesy?" (New International Version).

[7] Ibid., 7.

[8] Ibid., 9.

Taking the Land It Claimed

1929 U.S. postage stamp
marking the 135th anniversary
of the Battle of Fallen Timbers

After winning its War for Independence, the new United States of America claimed all of the land between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River.[1] But claiming land is not the same thing as controlling it. So, how did the nation take charge of the territories west of the Appalachians, then inhabited by tens of thousands of Indians?

According to archivist and author Carl Waldman, American citizens and the U.S. government tended to follow a pattern that ultimately achieved the displacement of many indigenous peoples. Typically, the cycle began with trade and the making of treaties. These often provided for Indian land cessions in exchange for money or goods, or the promise of such. Sometime after the new boundaries were established, white settlers, new to an area, would appropriate land on the native side of the line. When one or more tribes retaliated, Americans issued dire warnings about "savages" along the frontier. Not accidentally, the Declaration of Independence had complained that King George III of Great Britain had "endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions."[2] Fear, resentment, and the prospect of acquiring land generated military action against Indians. These campaigns often led to the establishment of wilderness forts whose presence offered security for prospective settlers. Overwhelmed, native peoples would sue for peace, negotiate a new treaty--which routinely included a new land cession--and move.[3]

The American conquest of the Ohio Valley region matches the pattern Waldman describes. In 1785, U.S. negotiators demanded and won treaty concessions from several tribal leaders gathered at Fort McIntosh on the western edge of Pennsylvania. The westward push by American settlers, encouraged by their government, inevitably led to clashes. In 1787, Delawares, Mingos, Miamis, Wyandots, and Shawnees sometimes fought pioneers in present-day West Virginia and Kentucky. As the 1790s unfolded, the United States, under the leadership of President George Washington, increased the size and strength of its army. In August 1794, at the Battle of Fallen Timbers in far northern Ohio near the western end of Lake Erie, federal troops proved they were able to defeat the Indians of the Old Northwest. The next year, representatives of several tribal groups signed the Treaty of Greenville by which they ceded much of present-day Ohio as well as parts of Indiana, Illinois, and Michigan.[4]

Monument to the Battle of Fallen Timbers in Ohio

As white pioneers entered the Old Southwest, news of the Battle of Fallen Timbers signaled to Indian leaders that the United States was both determined and able to defeat native resistance. This led to a number of new treaties like the one signed by thirty-nine Cherokee leaders at Tellico, Tennessee, in 1798. Due to anxieties about warfare, and by means of tough deliberations, the U.S. and southern Indians were able to avoid major battles like those fought in the Ohio Valley.[5]

Finally, during the decade that followed the War of 1812, as white settlers continued to pour into the western frontier, some Indians simply moved further west. Others, assuming that they were or would be accepted by the United States, continued to acculturate.[6] By that point, the United States had come to truly dominate the land between the Appalachians and the Mississippi.[7] It was also around this time that Americans began to adopt the view that Indians were both unchanged and unchangeable. In the eyes of many U.S. citizens, the first Americans had not sufficiently conformed, and it was not likely they ever would.

Notes

[1] Roger L. Nichols, American Indians in U.S. History (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2003), 81.

[2] "Declaration of Independence: A Transcription," National Archives, accessed May 9, 2020, https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/declaration-transcript.

[3] Carl Waldman, Atlas of the North American Indian, 3rd ed. (New York: Facts on File, 2009), 213. Waldman's assertion that relations between U.S. citizens and American Indians began with trade finds corroboration in Robert M. Utley, The Indian Frontier 1846-1890, Rev. ed. (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2003), 15-18. Utley indicates that in the mid-nineteenth century, the first white person an Indian ever saw was likely a trader. For a good discussion of Indian "voluntary removal," see Nichols, American Indians in U.S. History, 102-104.

[4] Nichols, American Indians in U.S. History, 82-86.

[5] Ibid., 86-88. For the treaty between the United States and the Cherokee Indians signed at Tellico, Tennessee, in 1798, see Public Statutes at Large of the United States of America, ed. Richard Peters, vol 7, Treaties between the United States and the Indian Tribes (Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown, 1846), 62-65.

[6] Nichols, American Indians in U.S. History, 102-104.

[7] Daniel K. Richter, Facing East from Indian Country: A Native History of Early America (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001), 7.

Amarillo, Texas Gets Religion

In its early days, the settlement that came to be called Amarillo was an irreligious place. Saloons were busy, Sundays were like any other day, and churches were unknown. The town was populated by young people, those who were healthy and strong enough to travel to a new settlement. This meant that death rarely came by natural causes. When someone was killed, H. H. Wallace, a local judge, would read the burial service from the Episcopal Prayer Book.[1]

But in 1888, Isaac Mills, a Methodist circuit-riding preacher who lived in Clarendon, came to Amarillo. His teaching and influence led to the establishment of a congregation of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. In 1889, the congregation built the first church structure in Amarillo. As other religious groups established congregations in Amarillo, the Methodists, to their credit, allowed the other churches to worship in their facility. [2]

Notes

[1] G. A. F. Parker, "Incipient Trade and Religion in Amarillo," Panhandle-Plains Historical Review 2 (1929), 141-44.

[2] Ibid. Stephen Daniel Eckstein Jr., History of Churches of Christ in Texas, 1824-1950 (Austin, TX: Firm Foundation Publishing House, 1963), 173; "Methodist Circuit-Riding Preacher Founded Church," Childress Index, Wednesday, July 14, 1948; "Polk Street United Methodist Church," Texas Historical Commission marker, Amarillo, TX. Viewed March 27, 2020.

S. E. Kennedy's Designs on Meta Chestnutt's Christian School at Minco, Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory, 1894

In some previous posts here at Frankly Speaking, I've discussed the two main characters in the story that follows here: Meta Chestnutt and Silas Kennedy. To read more of their stories, use the search window at the top left of this blog. Especially during these days of COVID-19, may you be healthy and happy. --Frank Bellizzi

Apparently, sometime during the year 1894, Disciples minister Silas Kennedy developed a plan to gain control of Meta Chestnutt's school, to seize what she had built up over the previous five years. In a report on the Indian Territory dated March 10, 1894, Kennedy commended Chestnutt as "the tall sycamore of North Carolina and the giant teacher and true missionary of the West."[1] At the time, Kennedy and his family were new arrivals, having come to Indian Territory from New Mexico just three months prior.[2] And Meta Chestnutt made a favorable impression. She was a well-educated, articulate, and attractive daughter of the South, thirty years old and at least six feet tall. Even in dusty Indian Territory, though never showy, she always managed to dress immaculately. Yet this would be the last time Kennedy would say anything in print about Chestnutt, the founder of the school he later sought to promote and lead.

One can only imagine what Kennedy's motives and justifications might have been. Perhaps he simply reasoned that this was his moment, that taking Meta Chestnutt's school to the next level was a task for which he was specially qualified. Kennedy was born in 1849, in Wetumpka, Alabama, the third son of a blacksmith.[3] At age twelve, he was drafted into the Confederate Army. He soon saw action, and just a few weeks beyond his thirteenth birthday was wounded at the Battle of Shiloh in southwest Tennessee, April 6-7, 1862.[4]

In 1866, the year he turned seventeen, he moved to Fannin County, Texas, where he met Charlcy Dockary, who was also from Alabama. The two were married in Texas in 1868 and soon started a family. According to the federal census of 1880, the couple had three sons, all born in Texas, and Silas worked as an "itinerant minister."[5] But in 1885, for financial reasons and for the sake of his family, he "quit the regular work of the ministry and went to merchandising." Two years later, in 1887, he moved his family to New Mexico where he "engaged extensively in the mercantile business." In 1893, looking back on his previous eight years, Kennedy said that he regretted how going into business meant that he had to "harden" himself and "partake of the ways of the world." His never-ending desire to preach, and what he perceived as his loss of sympathy for others, brought him to a life-changing decision:

On the fifth day of last December I cut loose from all my business relations with the full determination and with a vow to Almighty God to devote the reminder of my life to building up the cause of Christ. I have selected the Chickasaw Indian Nation, which is now rapidly settling up with white people from every state in the Union. I got here, at Chickasha, on December 8, 1893.[6]

Having lived the previous twenty-five years in Texas and New Mexico, Kennedy had come to Indian Territory looking for a new start. He found it. In the spring of 1894, when he reported to J. H. Garrison, editor of the Christian-Evangelist, Kennedy sounded like a promotional agent for the future State of Oklahoma. The potential of the place was nearly boundless. Indian Territory was, he wrote,

situated almost in the very geographical center of the United States, embracing the five civilized tribes of Indians, with the Kiowa, Comanche, Osage, Kickapoo, Cheyenne and other small tribes as well as that of Oklahoma, a scope of country larger than three of the average States of the Union, with soil, water, climate, timber, grass and many other advantages equal if not superior to any spot on earth, . . . [7]

Kennedy had found more than that in Indian Territory. He had also found at Minco, just eighteen miles north of his new home in Chickasha, a growing school, a five year old Christian academy poised to become a college. It was true that in Meta Chestnutt the school had an adequate leader. But the designs Kennedy had for the school--which were really no different than what Miss Chestnutt had in mind--would require his leadership. He was different. As tall as Meta Chestnutt was, Kennedy, who stood about six feet, five inches, was even taller.[8] And, he was fourteen years older. But most importantly by far, he was a man, a preacher, and not merely "a Bible teacher," the phrase Chestnutt was most likely to use when referring to her role in the Sunny South Christian Church at Minco. By contrast, Kennedy explicitly led congregations, baptized new believers, and published articles in brotherhood journals. And he dreamed of making more of Meta Chestnutt's school at Minco. Why have a local Christian school, when you could have a regional Christian college? So it was that by the early fall of 1894, Kennedy sent word to the Christian-Evangelist:

We are now building a college at Minco . . . I have raised up to date $6,400 in the Territory alone, nearly all of which is a clear gain of wealth to our church, as five-sixths of it has been raised from parties who are not members of the church. Of the above mentioned $6,400, $3,600 has been raised at Minco to build the college. . . . I promised the people of Minco that . . . I would undertake the building of a ten thousand dollar college. I further told them that I would have rooms open and ready to accommodate one hundred children by Oct. 1, 1894, and that by Jan. 1, 1895, I would try to have it ready to accomodate [sic] three hundred pupils. I began this work July 1, and on Oct 1, we will open this school.[9]

Kennedy's report nowhere mentions Meta Chestnutt, or that five years earlier, in 1889, she had arrived in I.T. and started the school that had been thriving ever since. Judging from what Kennedy published in the second half of 1894, one would never guess that Minco already had a Christian academy still led by its founding teacher. The stage was set for a struggle.

Notes

[1] S. E. Kennedy, "Letter from the Indian Territory," Gospel Advocate (April 26, 1894), 253.

[2] Ibid.

[3] "Gone to His Reward. Rev. S. E. Kennedy," Davis  (Oklahoma) News (April 25, 1918); 1850 U.S. Census, Coosa County, Alabama, population schedule, 1st Ward City of Wetumpka, p. 4 (stamped), dwelling 59, family 59, Aotho and Jane Kennedy, digital image, Ancestry.com, accessed March 21, 2020, http://ancestry.com.

[4] Jay S. Hoar, Callow, Brave and True: A Gospel of Civil War Youth (Gettysburg, PA: Thomas Publications, 1999), 230. On June 2, 2018, the writer visited Silas E. Kennedy's grave in the Greenhill Cemetery, in Davis, Oklahoma, and found the C.S.A. Cross of Honor attached to the gravestone.

[5] 1880 U.S. Census, Bell County, Texas, population schedule, Enumeration District No. 7, p. 8, dwelling 58, family 58, Silas and Charlsy [sic] Kenedy [sic], digital image, Ancestry.com, accessed March 22, 2020, http://ancestry.com.

[6] Kennedy, "Letter from the Indian Territory."

[7] S. E. Kennedy, "The Indian Territory," Christian-Evangelist (June 14, 1894), 381.

[8] Note how Kennedy is taller than every other person, including Meta Chestnutt, in Photo 23196.2, Photograph Box 1, Meta Chestnutt Sager Collection, Special Collections, Oklahoma History Center, Oklahoma City, Okla. To see the photo online, click on the link that follows here. Then, click on Archives Catalog. In the search window, type "Meta Chestnutt Rev. Kennedy."  http://okhistory.cuadra.com/star/public.html

[9] S. E. Kennedy, "A College in the Indian Territory," Christian-Evangelist (October 4, 1894), 636.

Amarillo, Texas: Early Beginnings

Amarillo, Texas, c. 1889

Today, Amarillo, Texas straddles the line that divides Randall and Potter Counties. A brief look at the federal census of 1880 provides a glimpse of just how stark and simple the place used to be. That year, the two counties, not much more than squares on a map, had a grand total of twenty-seven residents. Almost all of them were young, unmarried men who, according to the census taker, were "Herding Cattle" and "Hunting Mustangs." For several years, then, the only residents of two counties were a few lonely cowboys.[1] But all of that was about to change.

In 1887, a construction crew was laying track across Potter County for the Fort Worth and Denver City Railroad. A new settlement grew up around their campsite and a post office was established. By 1890, the town next to a brand new railroad was one of the busiest cattle shipping points in the world. But busy does not mean large, and as late as 1900, the city that had come to be known as Amarillo had fewer than 1,500 residents.[2]

Fast forward more than a century, and the contrasts could not be more striking. Today, Randall and Potter Counties are home to well over a quarter million people, and the city of Amarillo continues to grow.

Notes

[1] Ernest R. Archambeau, "The First Federal Census in the Panhandle--1880," Panhandle-Plains Historical Review 23 (1950): 22-132.

[2] Handbook of Texas Online, H. Allen Anderson, "AMARILLO, TX," accessed February 23, 2020, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/hda02.

Coleman Grigsby "C. G." Witherspoon (1856-1916) and Early Deaf Smith County Texas

Born on Christmas Eve 1856 in Waxahachie, Texas, C. G. Witherspoon would go on during the 1880s and 90s to become an early settler in Deaf Smith County and a founding father of the town of Hereford.

His early years must have been difficult. His mother, Ann Elizabeth Garvin Witherspoon, died in 1862. Coleman was only five, and his little sister, Anna Elizabeth Rachel, was not yet four months old. Their father, William Anderson "W. A." Witherspoon, married again in 1871. Less than a year later, his new bride, the former Milinda "Linnie" Garvin, gave birth to the first of her nine children, five boys and four girls. The youngest, Mary Leona, was born in 1887, the year her mother turned forty.[1]

In 1888, the year he turned thirty-two, C. G., his wife, Fannie Armstrong Jackson Witherspoon, and their young son Claude moved to Amarillo. C. G. taught the first full term of school in Amarillo. Sometime later that year, the family moved to Deaf Smith County where C. G. "filed on land near the center section of the county"[2] It must have looked very promising. In 1889, C. G.'s half brother, Anderson, visited the county. The next year, Anderson, his brother Remmie, and their father, W. A., set out driving a herd of cattle and horses from somewhere around Waxahachie toward Deaf Smith County. By the Fourth of July 1890, the three men had made it to a campsite in Randall County, near present-day Canyon, Texas, just thirty miles from their destination.[3]

The Witherspoon men, C. G., his half-brothers, their father, W. A., and their families were some of the first residents of an early settlement in Deaf Smith County called La Plata. In fact, Alvie William Wilson, a grandson of W. A. Witherspoon, was the first child born in La Plata in 1892.[4] The town is no longer there. Around 1898, it moved, courthouse and all, to be close to the railroad that was coming through the county. The first attempt to rename the town had to be given up. The residents of what they called Blue Water, named for the Tierra Blanca Creek just south of town, soon learned that another community in Texas had already taken that name. So they changed it to Hereford, the name of the sturdy breed of beef cattle that men like L. R. Bradley and G. R. "Rat" Jowell had brought to the area.[5] In time, residents of Hereford came to call old W. A. Witherspoon "Uncle Billy."

According to the U.S. Census of 1910, Coleman G. Witherspoon was 54 years old and was engaged in the real estate business.[6] By then, he had established himself as a businessman and civic leader in Hereford. He was one of nine co-founders of Hereford College and Industrial School in 1902.

C. G. Witherspoon died in the summer of 1916 in Corpus Christi, Texas. He was only 59 years old. His widow, Fannie Armstrong Jackson Witherspoon, survived until 1947, when she died in Dallas at the age of 84. The two lie buried next to each other in the Waxahachie City Cemetery in Ellis County.[7]

Notes

[1] Information via ancestry.com, accessed January 2, 2020.

[2] Bessie Patterson, A History of Deaf Smith County (Hereford, TX: Pioneer Publishers, 1964), 60.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Handbook of Texas Online, H. Allen Anderson, "HEREFORD, TX," accessed January 2, 2020, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/heh02.

[6] Information via ancestry.com, accessed January 2, 2020.

[7] See the Find A Grave memorial for Fannie Jackson Witherspoon, with links to members of her family, at the following URL, accessed January 2, 2020: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/30091413/fannie-armstrong-witherspoon