RENAISSANCE MAN - CIRCLEcircle.adventist.org/files/jae/en/jae201476031208.pdf · 2014. 7. 13. · RENAISSANCE MAN W. W. Prescott: Adventist Education’s. I t’s sometimes tempting

W. W. Prescott: Adventist Education’s

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W. W. Prescott: Adventist Education’s

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It’s sometimes tempting to think that early leaders of theAdventist movement were so sanctified that they servedwithout all the stress and personality conflicts that we nowendure. That would be a mistake. Our pioneers were everybit as human as we are. And the issues they faced, if placed

alongside our modern struggles, seem eerily similar.Finding qualified, competent persons to meet the demands

of leadership in Adventist education continues to be a growingconcern in the North American Division. Academy principalposts stand vacant while search committees vainly winnowthrough lists of names, relying on retired administrators to fillthe gaps in the meantime. Retirees are pulled back into serviceas colleges and universities struggle to find suitable candidateswho will be acceptable to increasingly polarized constituencies.Some overseas divisions face similar dilemmas.

But this challenge is not new. Since the beginning of Ad-ventist education, the denomination has faced the difficulty offinding competent leaders able to help it achieve both spiritualand academic objectives for its schools and colleges. At times,the dearth of leadership has been acute. But somehow leader-ship emerges, and more often than not, such leadership hasbeen transformational. Such was the case with W. W. Prescott,who for more than 50 years was one of the most significantvoices in Seventh-day Adventist education.

Adventist schooling has always been an enterprise of faith.At the end of the first unsteady decade of Adventist education(1872-1882), serious differences over vision and missionemerged at the church’s flagship college in Battle Creek, Michi-gan. The new venture was almost shipwrecked by a lack of lead-ership that failed to unite the faculty and adequately addresssystemic problems.

Then in June 1885, William Warren Prescott of Vermontagreed to take the helm of Battle Creek College.1 He righted theship and piloted it into calmer waters—at least for a while. Thevoyage would not be without its storms and mutinies, butworking closely with Ellen White, Prescott was able to reset thecompass, strengthen the rigging, and chart a new course for thechurch’s education system. The fleet of academies and highereducational institutions operated by the Adventist Church inthe 21st century, distinguished by their shared mission andethos, owe a great deal to its first admiral. Today’s educationalleaders can learn much from his life and work.2

Leadership VacuumIn 1882, just a decade after the denomination had estab-

lished its first college in Battle Creek, church leaders found itnecessary to close the school. During the 1883-1884 academicyear, the college program went into recess, and the campussat deserted. Student discipline had become unmanageable.There had been a physical assault during a scuffle between stu-dents and a teacher, and factions among students, faculty, andtrustees had torn the campus apart. Confusion reigned over theschool’s identity and curriculum. What was it meant to be, aliberal-arts college, a trade school with a manual-labor pro-gram, or both? Following the shutdown, some dislocated fac-ulty travelled east to establish a new venture at South LancasterAcademy in Massachusetts.3

In order to reopen the following year, the trustees of BattleCreek College recruited the educated but blind pastor W. H.Littlejohn to serve as president. He had recently arrived in Bat-tle Creek to care for the local Adventist congregation. Littlejohnmanaged the college temporarily while the trustees looked forsomeone more suitable. They had hoped to persuade a formerpresident, Sydney Brownsberger, to return. Failing that, theytried to recruit Californian W. C. Grainger, who had linked upwith the Healdsburg school established the previous year northof San Francisco.

Neither of the two candidates felt attracted to the uniquechallenges posed by Battle Creek College and its fractious con-stituency in Michigan, and they declined. Not many principalsknew how to design a manual-labor program that would beboth economically profitable in the long term and that func-tioned as part of the formal academic curriculum.4 Thus, theblind pastor filled the gap for two years while the trustees con-tinued to search for a long-term leader.

Twenty-nine-year-old Will Prescott proved to be the answerto the college leadership problem when, in the late summer of1885, he took the helm of the drifting institution. Prescottbrought unusual strengths to the role of leadership. A graduateof Dartmouth College (1877) who had also earned a Master ofArts degree, Prescott had been solidly grounded with an edu-cation in the classics, followed by three years’ experience as apublic school principal in Vermont. At the age of 24, he hadventured into the newspaper business, eventually purchasing aleading publishing establishment in Montpelier, the state cap-

13http:// jae.adventist.org The Journal of Adventist Education • February/March 2014

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ital. For five years, he successfully edited a prominent Republi-can newspaper,5 becoming prosperous through his endeavors.

When Prescott accepted the presidency of Battle Creek Col-lege, money was not the motivating factor. At $700 per year, hisbeginning denominational pay as president was only a littlemore than half the salary he had earned six years previously asa fledgling public school principal. More importantly, as theson of a prominent New England Millerite family who hadjoined the sabbatarians in 1858, Prescott was a committed Ad-ventist. A further plus was his professional background, whichhad enabled him to move easily among the cultured and dis-tinguished political class in New England.

Prescott wanted to serve the church. His 1885 decisionbegan a 52-year stretch of distinguished contribution to Ad-ventism. During that time, “the Professor” (the common, re-spectful term by which he was usually addressed) not onlyhelped shape the distinctive contours of Adventist education,but also became one of the most prominent architects of mod-ern Adventism.

From the moment he walked onto the two-building campuswith its 300 school desks in September 1885, Prescott’s handswere full. His first tasks involved stabilizing the shaky institu-tion, establishing discipline, clarifying its primary purpose, andensuring credibility and rigor in its educational program, whichembraced elementary, secondary, and college-level work. Hefocused particularly on strengthening programs for the upper-level students in the college, emphasizing the need for better-educated workers for church service. It took four years to de-velop programs, a library, and a staff to the point where he feltcertain that the school could confidently launch courses thatwould qualify for academic degrees.

In the meantime, Prescott vigorously promoted the need foreducated church workers. He recruited students at camp meet-ings and church events during his repeated visits across theMidwest and New England. Through his constant preaching,articles in The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, and his agi-tation on the subject, he became the Adventist icon for qualityChristian education. By the time he concluded his presidencyat Battle Creek College nine years later (in mid-1894), enroll-ment had doubled, the physical capacity of the institution hadtripled, and the campus boasted a large student residence that,to a significant extent, had been made possible by Prescott’spersonal financial resources.

Andrews University’s historian, Emmett K. Vande Vere, refersto the Prescott era as the college’s “golden age.”6 In addition tostrong academics, a formal student residence program had alsobeen established, replete with a “preceptor” and a “preceptress”(similar to today’s residence-hall deans). Prescott’s concept of astudent residence hall functioning as a “school home” with a pre-ceptor and a preceptress modeling Christian values and a cultureof dignified refinement lasted for decades. The professor and hiswife, Sarah, personally set the early pattern at Battle Creek Col-lege by living with the students in the residence hall and sharingmealtimes with them in the dining hall.7

Implementing a sustainable work-study program proved dif-ficult. Prescott was too busy to get into the printing plant him-self, but he understood the dignity of labor. He had grown up in

a family with a cottageindustry that utilized thelabor of every familymember. Farming par-ents, however, resistedthe idea of sending theiryoung people off to col-lege to learn a trade or towork with their hands.Students themselves man -ifested the same lack ofinterest, and the ruralsetting for the institutionalso worked against theconcept, frustrating thepresident and trustees.Success with the manual-training program eludedPrescott, even though hetried several approaches.He found to his chagrinthat introducing sportsand physical education asan alternative was notwithout its difficulties,either.8

The biggest challengefor Prescott, however, wasthe launching of “re-quired” Bible classes through a restructuring of the degree cur-ricula. In this, he achieved a major breakthrough. Although theterm “integration of faith and learning” was not then in vogue,Prescott certainly comprehended the idea and labored diligentlyto implement it.

By 1894, the college was at last offering, albeit shakily andimperfectly, what Prescott believed could genuinely be called“Christian education.”9 But it had not been without a struggle,and it still needed further development. The offering of Biblecourses as a required part of the degree curriculum had beenstrongly opposed by a faction of his faculty and was still some-what tenuous. Prescott’s battles with his teachers over imple-menting these reforms had, in fact, involved painful confronta-tions. He had to call on his board of trustees to strong-arm thefaculty in a final push to get the plan adopted. The episode lefthim rather bruised.10

Leading From the CenterWhen Prescott handed over the presidency of Battle Creek

College to his successor, George Caviness, he did not do so togo into greener pastures, but so that he could devote his full-time energy to the oversight of an emerging church-wide net-work of Adventist schools and colleges that he had been nur-turing on a part-time basis for the previous seven years.

In the fall of 1887, just two years after Prescott arrived inBattle Creek, the General Conference persuaded him to add tohis college president responsibilities the newly created positionof education secretary for the General Conference. He reluc-

14 The Journal of Adventist Education • February/March 2014 http:// jae.adventist.org

William Prescott, along

with his wife, Sarah,

son Louis, and other

church workers, visit the

Coliseum in Rome on

May 6, 1907. This photo-

graph is the only one

extant of the

three members of the

Prescott family together.

Three years later, Sarah

died of cancer, and in

1914, Louis went missing

in action in France during

the early months of

World War I. The photo-

graph shows how for-

mally tourists dressed at

the turn of the century.

tantly agreed.11 Two years later, feeling the excessive weight ofcarrying both offices, he requested release from the collegepresidency part of his duties. The request was denied. It wasjust as well: He had a large capacity for work, and as an experi-enced leader, he knew how to delegate.12

It was in this role as the first secretary of education for therapidly expanding church from 1887 to 1897 that Prescott wasable to shape the educational system we have inherited. Hedid this in several ways. Working closely with Ellen White asshe articulated the broad ideals of Christian education, theprofessor worked at the cutting edge of implementation, thusestablishing a basic “mold” for Adventist colleges. A Christ-centered biblical studies sequence comprised the core of thecurriculum. Strong student-residence and student-life pro-grams with a spiritual and service emphasis (daily chapel serv-ices and regular “missionary” meetings) supported the cur-riculum, helping to integrate faith and learning. The primaryfocus of the institution was to train workers for the church. Ageographic location where a strong student work programcould be incorporated was also a feature of the “mold.” Grad-uates of Battle Creek College and the two other collegesPrescott helped establish in the 1890s reproduced the patternand the ethos at Adventist colleges all over the world as theyfanned out in mission service.13

As General Conference education secretary, Prescott super-vised and coordinated plans for establishing both Union Col-lege in Nebraska (1891) and Walla Walla College in Washingtonstate (1892). Getting both institutions established as morewidely based regional enterprises (in the days before unionconference structures) rather than as local conference opera-tions required the exercise of considerable political skill. Over-coming intense sectional interests proved a challenge. Compe-tition by new schools for available teachers became intense andrepeatedly depleted staff resources at Battle Creek College. Theshortage of skilled and “spiritually minded” college leadershipposed significant challenges.14

But because Prescott had the trust of leadership and repre-sented the desired “spiritual” approach to administration, he waspressured into serving as the founding president for the first twoyears at both Union College and Walla Walla College, in additionto his other duties. Through frequent visits and constant corre-spondence, he mentored the principals who served under him.No one alleged that he was simply on an ego trip. College trusteeswere insistent that he establish a right mold.15

Birthing Theological EducationThe spiritual and theological renewal that Prescott person-

ally experienced as a result of the 1888 General Conference ses-


(Left to Right) Back: Bus driver, Louis Prescott, Alfred Vaucher (tour guide). Front: Sarah and W. W. Prescott, J. Schelb, Nettie and George A. Irwin, G. A. Thompson,Mrs. and Charles T. Everson, V. Orlando. Seated: H. H. Weller.

sion in Minneapolis, Minnesota, led to a paradigm shift bothin his way of understanding Bible doctrines and in the missionof the Advent movement and its educational program. Prescottcame to see that doctrines should be understood Christocen-trically and that the preaching of the gospel, rather than lawand prophecy, should be the focus and heartbeat of all evan-gelistic endeavors. He was convinced that every college andschool program should reflect this. This new paradigm under-girded his determination to ensure that the formal study ofScripture formed part of each college student’s curricula loadevery year in an Adventist college.

The fallout Prescott saw and experienced from the theolog-ical struggles within the church during the late 1880s and early1890s as the Advent movement readjusted its focus from a pre-occupation with law to an emphasis on righteousness by faithconvinced the professor of the need for better theologicalpreparation for the ministry.Deeply concerned over the issue,he raised it with his colleagues inchurch leadership in late 1888 andwas promptly assigned the task ofdevising and heading up an appro-priate program of theologicalstudy.16 He consequently organ-ized and secured financing for aseries of 20-week fall-winter insti-tutes at headquarters, attended bymore than 150 ministers.

The study programs werebirthed in the midst of highlycharged controversies and disputesabout who should and should notteach, and about what should andshould not be taught. FormerGeneral Conference presidentGeorge I. Butler protested the newteachings vigorously, but the denominational leaders held theirground. The program continued until 1896, by which time re-gional colleges had been able to implement a full-scale bibli-cal-studies curriculum for theological education. Prescott thusserved not only as the architect of the earliest “seminary” train-ing for the church’s ministry, but also as the sponsor and patronof broad theological and biblical-studies education in thechurch.17

The church’s college in Australia was another institution es-tablished in the Prescott mold as a “model” for other churchcolleges. During a 10-month stay “down under” from August1895 to May 1896, Prescott was able to work in close partner-ship again with Ellen White, a mutually beneficial relationshipthat helped clarify the church’s educational philosophy andways it might be implemented. Again he led out in designingthe layout of the campus and the structure of the curriculum.The name adopted for the institution, “Avondale School forChristian Workers,” explicitly described the purpose of the in-stitution and the distinctive nature of the curriculum.18

Although legal disputes over land titles delayed constructionof the buildings, beginning in April of 1896, Prescott spent six

weeks with the teachers, trustees, and other constituents intents on campus establishing the program the school wouldfollow. During this same Australian sojourn, through his campmeeting preaching, his writing, and his literary work with EllenWhite’s editorial staff, Prescott was able to help facilitate themovement of the denomination to a more carefully stated andmore orthodox understanding of its doctrine of the person ofChrist and the Trinity.19

Ellen White had hoped Prescott would be elected GeneralConference president after his return to the United States fromAustralia in early 1896, but it was not to be. At the 1897 GeneralConference session, he was assigned to the leadership of theAdventist Church in England. For the next quarter century(starting in 1901), he was involved in a wider arena of admin-istration back at headquarters as a General Conference vicepresident, editor of The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald,

founder of the church’s new publishing house in Washington,D.C., and in establishing the new role of field secretary of theGeneral Conference in 1916. This latter role was designed toassist A. G. Daniells as his load became more demanding in thelater years of his General Conference presidency.

Prescott’s most notable contribution during this administra-tive period of his career was his support of Daniells and his lead-ership in helping to steer the church through the troubled watersof the Kellogg crisis during the first decade of the 20th century.This turbulent period saw Prescott being viewed in quite con-trasting ways. John Harvey Kellogg, for example, saw Prescott asan opponent who was “the wildest and most unsafe man that hasever undertaken to pose as a leader of this denomination.”20

However, according to Daniells, a long-serving General Confer-ence president, the professor had “some of the rarest gifts pos-sessed by any man in our ranks,” and he was thankful for the pro-fessor’s “large executive ability.” He felt confident that “theinterests of the cause” were “safe” in the professor’s hands.21

While colleagues in General Conference administrationwarmed to the professor, his personal style could seem irksome,even offensive to others. His preoccupation with his own


uring a 10-month stay “down under”from August 1895 to May 1896, Pres cott

was able to work in close partnership again withEllen White, a mutually beneficial relationshipthat helped clarify the church’s educational phi-losophy and ways it might be implemented.

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thoughts, his scholarly bent, and his consuming passion for ac-curacy of detail could communicate an air of cold, distant su-periority. Irishman Percy Magan had at times clashed with “thebig voice,” and Southern Publishing House Editor ArthurSpalding, quoting a famous line from Tennyson, found the pro-fessor’s “stony British stare” off putting.22

Prescott’s style was intense, and his capacity for work exac-erbated this. In late 1906, following a long period of carryingmultiple responsibilities during the Kellogg crisis and re-estab-lishing the work in Washington under highly stressful circum-stances, Prescott suffered something close to a nervous break-down. The General Conference officers arranged for him to getaway from the pressure at headquarters. Although he retainedduties as Review editor, he spent almost eight-and-a-halfmonths overseas in Asia and Europe fostering the work andmission of the church there (see photo on page 15).

Trouble swirled around Prescott in 1909 when vicious at-tacks against his writing and preaching led to his being askedto relinquish the editorship of The Advent Review and SabbathHerald and take up city evangelism. Traditionalist Adventistssuch as S. N. Haskell and J. S. Washburn, who held to an iner -rantist view of both Scripture and Ellen White’s writings,charged that Prescott was leading the denomination astray be-cause he advocated a new interpretation of the expression “thedaily” in Daniel 8. To Prescott’s mind, he was simply applyinghis 1888 Christocentric principle. Traditionalist critics also ac-cused him of undermining the authority of the Spirit ofProphecy. But Prescott had on many occasions worked closelywith Ellen White. He was familiar with the way her books hadbeen written, and was convinced that he had an accurate andrealistic view of the nature of her work. Both W. A. Spicer, thenew Review editor, and Daniells also knew this. Prescott’s warn-ings to W. C. White about the dangers of S. N. Haskell’s unreal -istic view proved to be soundly based.23 Prescott’s approach tointerpreting Daniel 8 eventually became regarded as orthodox.

While he was being mercilessly attacked, Prescott lost hiswife to cancer. It was a dark period for him, and he felt it keenly.It took an extended period of leave to enable him to recover hisshattered health and bounce back, but bounce back he did. Al-ternative roles were found that enabled the church to continueto benefit from his skills.

Such is sometimes the lot of leadership. Submission is anessential part of servant leadership. In 1916, the professor wasdrawn back into the leadership team at the General Conferenceto assist A. G. Daniells and to provide professional developmentfor the church’s ministers.

Crisis Management InterventionIn 1921, at the age of 66, Prescott returned again to the role

of educational leadership. Avondale College in Australia was incrisis and needed an experienced hand in the wheelhouse.Chronic indebtedness, conflict over curriculum issues, and pres-sure from state authorities to improve education standards, to-gether with a sudden increase in tuition fees, had led to a loss ofconfidence by the constituency and a 43 percent drop in enroll-ment. Henry Kirk, the incumbent president, had been pressedinto duty and stayed on only because no one else could be

found.24 Prescott had been billed by the South Pacific church’spress as one of the “foremost educational leaders in our ranks.”25

With radical cost-cutting adjustments and staff retrenchments,he succeeded in stabilizing affairs and realigning college pro-grams to better meet local church and mission needs.

After a year in the role, however, Prescott located a qualifiedpermanent replacement for himself in the person of Lynn H.Wood and moved into teaching, helping to restore staff andstudent morale and visiting local conferences, conducting min-isterial institutes, and recruiting students. His re-imposition ofeducational policies and ideals from the late 1890s satisfied thegoverning board, but at the cost of postponing troublesomegovernment examination and accreditation issues for anothertwo decades. The aging Prescott was not very flexible when itcame to these kinds of adjustments.26

When Prescott returned from Australia in mid-1924, it wasUnion College’s turn to benefit from his crisis-management ex-pertise. The school had been in trouble for several years, withdeclining enrollments and ballooning deficits. College trusteeshad actually placed the college on the market in 1923, but noone wanted to buy it—at least not for the price the boardwanted.27 The following March, trustees considered simplyclosing it, but that did not seem a viable option, either. Prescottwas called in to try to save the institution. It needed a strong,charismatic leader to help it through what proved to be thegreatest crisis in its history. The severest of economies were theorder of the day, including staff retrenchments and sale of thedairy herd, along with the securing of loans to keep the campusoperating. But deficits still mounted, and before the school yearwas half over, the school was again placed on the market. Butfor Prescott, without a buyer in sight, it was simply a matter oftightening belts even further, all the while rebuilding studentmorale and constituency confidence. By year’s end, the collegefelt it had succeeded in turning the corner, and again the wea-ried Prescott urged that a younger, more able-bodied leader besecured.28

At the conclusion of his time behind the president’s desk, theprofessor stayed on for another two years to head up Union Col-lege’s theology department. It was important that the confidenceof the constituency be retained. And as at Avondale, Prescott’srole seemed to be to re-establish older, familiar standards thatprovided breathing space as church constituencies regrouped tocope with further, inevitable change. The teaching and chairman-ship assignment gave Prescott time to restructure the ministerialcurriculum, using a new textbook, The Doctrine of Christ, whichhe had developed specifically for that purpose.

The Christocentric emphasis Prescott gave to his classes andhis preaching, according to Leroy Edwin Froom, founding editorof Ministrymagazine, was for many teachers and administrators“like a great breath of fresh air”; but other, more traditionalistthinkers derided it as “new theology.” Prescott was “ahead of histime,” according to Froom. His teaching and writing bore a richharvest later, although the professor did not live to see it.29

Prescott made his last formal contribution to Adventisthigher education at Berrien Springs, where in 1933 in the midstof the severe economic depression, Emmanuel Missionary Col-lege (EMC) was struggling to meet both its budgets and accred-


itation requirements. Prescott, even at age 77, was a valuableasset to have on campus because of his M.A. degree from Dart-mouth. Master’s degrees were still very scarce in the denomi-nation, and the professor’s old friend, Lynn H. Wood, thenpresident at EMC, pressed him to come. Prescott seems to haveeventually come to terms with the realities of accreditation de-mands. But it was a dangerous time to be teaching at an Ad-ventist campus, for there was a decidedly chilly attitude in thechurch toward enquiring, independent scholars like Prescott.The aging teacher responded to the call for help, but he maynot have perceived just how hostile the climate had become.

According to W. H. Holden, the Lake Union Conference pres-ident who served as chair of the EMC board, it had been difficultto get good teachers to come to EMC because of the atmosphereof suspicion and distrust that permeated the church. The “lackof confidence” in Bible teachers during the 1930s was “a terriblething” in Holden’s view, and he was“alarmed” because each year theproblem got worse.30

Ministry editor Froom sharedHolden’s anxiety about the atmos-phere of suspicion and “reaction-ism” that had swept the church. Helamented the policy of evading“fundamental questions.” “Menwho think, no matter how rever-ently and loyal,” were feared, he ob-served. Such a policy, Froomlamented, was “unworthy of thisremnant movement.” Positions thathad to be protected “by ecclesiasti-cal legislation and popular senti-ment . . . are weak indeed.” He wasalarmed at the trend to “codify andcreedalize” church teachings.31

Although Prescott had notraised the matter in any of his classes at EMC, he had discussedwith colleagues both at the college and at the General Confer-ence the need for the church to develop a much more coherentanswer to the criticisms that dissidents such as A. F. Ballengerand W. W. Fletcher had made against the church’s traditionalunderstanding of the two-apartment heavenly sanctuary teach-ing. The conversations led to suspicions that Prescott himselfheld variant views on the subject. W. H. Branson, General Con-ference vice president, did not want Prescott teaching at BerrienSprings if he was not in “full harmony” with the church on cer-tain “vital points.”32 Branson subsequently attempted to engi-neer Prescott’s removal from EMC, along with President LynnH. Wood, whom he had suspected for some time.33

But Prescott, an aged and battle-hardened warrior by now,fully persuaded of his moral high ground, refused to go qui-etly simply at the whim of an administrator. What had hap-pened to the concept of due process? How could such proce-dures be “proper” or “fair”? He refused to move in responseto the “unethical” proceedings and demanded that charges beplaced in writing.34

When the board of trustees heard about the maneuverings,

Prescott discovered that he had the support not only of hisboard chairman, but also of the full board. An embarrassedlong-time GC colleague who had been caught up in the engi-neering privately apologized for his part in the affair andsought a compromise. But Prescott stood his ground.

Nevertheless, the lack of confidence hurt Prescott badly,coming at the end of more than 50 years of committed andloyal service. He made this known to the wider General Con-ference leadership in his request for a full hearing.35 Reluctantto now proceed in granting a hearing, nine months later, Gen-eral Conference officers conceded their error, apologized forthe way they had proceeded, and withdrew the letter initiatingthe attempt to remove him.

At year’s end, back in Washington, Prescott celebrated his80th birthday. As a sign of reconciliation, he agreed to delivera devotional sermon at the upcoming Annual Council. Even if

Branson was uncomfortable, others in the officer group wereeager to restore fellowship and good relations.

Prescott continued to serve his church even in retirement asa popular favorite on the camp meeting circuit. In 1937, hislungpower diminished, and he found it increasingly difficultto make himself heard in large, poorly amplified canvas pavil-ions. The Indiana camp meeting that year was his last officialappointment. He died at home seven years later in 1944.

As a leader, Prescott made a critically important contribu-tion in the establishment of Adventist “Christian education.”Arthur Spalding praised the professor’s leadership, saying it hadresulted in “much progress.”36 Prescott was both a visionaryleader and a change agent. He exercised his influence in theclassroom, in the pulpit, from the editor’s chair, and behind nu-merous executive desks. His efforts to give a distinctive shapeto the church’s educational system and to its teaching were notin vain because to a large degree, that shape still endures. How-ever, the often intense polemics that surrounded the professor’slife made it inevitable that the significance of his work and theissues he addressed would be obscured.

As the church went through a conservative period during the


rescott was both a visionary leader

and a change agent. He exercised his

influence in the classroom, in the pulpit,

from the editor’s chair, and behind numer-

ous executive desks.

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1940s and 1950s, for some church leaders, the sooner theprovocative Prescott was forgotten, the better. Documentarysources available in more recent decades, however, clearly revealthat for those who worked closely with him and to those whowere his colleagues, the professor’s influence was profound. Ed-ucational leaders today would greatly benefit from developing anacquaintance with the life and work of this remarkable collegepresident and first General Conference education leader. His lifeand leadership provide valuable insights into the challenges Ad-ventist education continues to face in the 21st century.

More importantly, the life of W. W. Prescott is a reminderthat those in leadership positions have to dedicate significanttime and effort in training and mentoring the next generationof educational leaders. In today’s volatile, changing climate,they must be proactive in order to meet the economic, social,and spiritual challenges of the future. �

Gilbert M. Valentine, Ph.D., is Professor andChair of the Department of Leadership andAdministration at La Sierra University inRiverside, California. He has both taught andserved as a senior administrator in Adventisthigher education in Pakistan, England, Thai-land, and Australia as well as in his homecountry, New Zealand. He has written exten-

sively in the area of Adventist history. His previous publications in-clude W. W. Prescott; Forgotten Giant of Adventism’s SecondGeneration (Review and Herald, 2005), The Struggle for theProphetic Heritage (Mission College Press, Thailand, 2006), andThe Prophet and the Presidents (Pacific Press, 2011).


it was decades before the church realized that colleges could not be run on tu-ition alone (Union: College of the Golden Cords [Lincoln Neb.: Union CollegePress, 1967], pp. 89, 97). See also Valentine, W. W. Prescott, op. cit., pp. 50, 51.

8. Vande Vere, “William Warren Prescott” in Early Adventist Educators, op.cit., pp. 120, 121.

9. According to Percy Magan, the term was first used in Adventist circles asa result of the groundbreaking Harbor Springs Educational Convention or-ganized by Prescott in late 1891 (The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald [Au-gust 6, 1903], p. 10).

10. W. W. Prescott to Ellen G. White, November 8, 1893; W. W. Prescott toO. A. Olsen, November 8, 1893. For a more detailed account of the episode, seeValentine, “William W. Prescott: Architect of a Bible-Centered Curriculum,”Adventist Heritage 8:1 (Spring 1983), pages 18 to 24.

11. GC Bulletin,November 27, 1887; W. C. White to W. W. Prescott, Febru-ary 8, 1888.

12. General Conference Minutes, March 25, 1889.13. See Richard W. Schwarz and Floyd Greenleaf, Light Bearers: A History

of the Seventh-day Adventist Church (Nampa, Idaho: Pacific Press Publ. Assn.,2000), pages 175 to 188 for an account of institutional expansion in the late19th century.

14. The critical issue of getting the right kind of teachers and leaders wassuch a major problem that it even appeared in the local newspaper in Lincoln,Nebraska (see Topeka Daily Capital, May 26 and 28, 1889). See also O. A. Olsento W. W. Prescott, January 31, 1890.

15. Valentine, W. W. Prescott, op. cit., pp. 68-76.16. General Conference Bulletin, October 21, 1889, p. 30.17. General Conference Committee Minutes, March 25, 1889; The Advent

Review and Sabbath Herald (September 17, 1889), p. 592; Gilbert Valentine,“Controversy: A Stimulus for Theological Education,” Adventist Review (No-vember 3, 1988), pp. 11, 12.

18. Australasian Union Conference Session Minutes, November 11, 1895.19. H. Camden Lacey to A. W. Spalding, June 2, 1945; H. Camden Lacey to

L. E. Froom, August 30, 1947; L. E. Froom to H. Camden Lacey, August 8 andSeptember 26, 1947. See also Valentine, W. W. Prescott, op. cit., pp. 119-130.

20. Cited in R. W. Schwarz, “John Harvey Kellogg: American Health Re-former” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Michigan, 1964), p. 394.

21. John Harvey Kellogg, 1904, cited in ibid., p. 394; A. G. Daniells to W. C.White, June 25, 1908; A. G. Daniells to W. W. Prescott, November 12, 1916.

22. Percy T. Magan to A. W. Spalding, November 29, 1920; A. W. Spaldingto Percy T. Magan, November 20, 1920.

23. Bert Haloviak, “In the Shadow of the Daily: Background and Aftermathof the 1919 Bible and History Teachers’ Conference” (unpublished paper, 1979)accessible at http://docs.adventistarchives.org/doc_info.asp?DocID=30.

24. Milton Hook, Avondale: Experiment on the Dora (Cooranbong, N.S.W.:Avondale Academic Press, 1998), pp. 110, 111.

25. Australasian Record (June 27, 1921), p. 8; W. W. Prescott to J. L. Shaw,December 18, 1922.

26. Upgrading to meet state examination requirements had been recom-mended by General Conference Education Director Frederick Griggs in 1916(Hook, Avondale, Experiment on the Dora, op. cit., pp. 113, 107).

27. Union College Board Minutes, March 4-6, 1924.28. J. L. Shaw to W. W. Prescott, August 20, 1924; W. W. Prescott to J. L.

Shaw, August 25, 1924; Union College Board Minutes, January 26, 1925. Edu-cational Messenger (January 1925), p. 17; (February 1925), p. 15.

29. L. E. Froom, Movement of Destiny (Washington, D.C.; Review and Her-ald Publ. Assn., 1971), pp. 380-391.

30. W. H. Holden to M. E. Kern, March 6, 1932. 31. L. E. Froom to L. H. Wood, July 3, 1931; L. H. Wood to L. E. Froom, Au-

gust 5, 1932.32. W. H. Branson to L. H. Wood, February 29, 1932; M. E. Kern to W. H.

Holden, March 3, 1932; W. H. Branson to W. H. Holden, January 4, 1934.33. W. H. Branson and I. H. Evans to W. W. Prescott, January 29, 1934.34. W. W. Prescott to W. H. Branson and I. H. Evans, February 9 and 13, 1934. 35. W. W. Prescott, “Statement Made to the Officers of the General Con-

ference,” September 14, 1934.36. Arthur Whitefield Spalding, Origin and History of Seventh-day Ad -

ventists (Washington, D.C.: Review and Herald Publ. Assn., 1962), vol. 2, p. 127.

NOTES AND REFERENCES1. Battle Creek College Board Minutes, June 17 and July 12, 1885; The Ad-

vent Review and Sabbath Herald (March 10, 1903), p. 7.2. A comprehensive analysis of Prescott’s contribution to Adventist educa-

tion can be found in the author’s W. W. Prescott: Forgotten Giant of Adventism’sSecond Generation (Hagerstown, Md.: Review and Herald Publ. Assn., 2005)on which this article is based. An earlier version of the biography was publishedas The Shaping of Adventism by Andrews University Press in 1992.

3. Allan Lindsay, “Goodloe Harper Bell” in Early Adventist Educators,George R. Knight, ed. (Berrien Springs, Andrews University Press, 1983), pages59 to 65, offers a helpful discussion of the problems that led to the closure andthe short troubled tenure of President Alexander McLearn, a Baptist ministerrecently attracted to Adventism.

4. W. C. White to S. N. Haskell, July 3, 1885. According to White, the diffi-culty of implementing a manual-training and work-study program deterredthe men.

5. The Vermont Watchman and State Journal, Vermont’s oldest and mostinfluential Republican newspaper, was widely read even outside the state.

6. Emmett K. Vande Vere, The Wisdom Seekers (Nashville, Tenn.: SouthernPubl. Assn., 1972), p. 53.

7. Vande Vere concludes from the increased debt at Battle Creek Collegethat Prescott was not a sound financial manager and that tuition fees were toolow (“William Warren Prescott,” Early Adventist Educators, op. cit., p. 117). Thisassessment, however, fails to note that this was a period in Adventist educationprior to regular denominational appropriations. As Everett N. Dick points out,

This article has been peer reviewed.

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