History
Methodists have had a long history in Zimbabwe, formerly Southern Rhodesia. In 1896, Joseph Crane Hartzell was elected missionary bishop of Africa. In 1898 as Bishop Hartzell stood atop Mt. Chiremba overlooking Old Mutare (formerly Old Umtali), looking down into the valley below he envisioned hundreds of African youth with books in their hands running to school. Hartzell shared his vision with Cecil John Rhodes, the British imperialist. Rhodes then grants to Hartzell the former site of the Town of Mutare, including 13,000 acres (53 km2) for a Methodist Mission. The Old Mutare Mission is established and Hartzell’s dream of training African teachers to educate Africa children takes root. That year, a primary school opened at Old Mutare Mission. The Mission now supports and manages Hartzell School, an institution for students in grades 1-13. Adjacent to the school are a small 60-bed hospital, an orphanage, and an agricultural program.
In 1984, two African bishops, with the support of thousands of African Methodists, issued the call to create Africa University. Bishop Emilio J. M. de Carvalho of Angola and Bishop Arthur F. Kulah of Liberia challenged their colleagues at the General Board of Higher Education and Ministry to support the establishment of a university in Africa. A committee then worked for nearly three years on feasibility studies and conversed with African church leaders about educational and vocational needs. A plan for the United Methodist-related university was presented to the General Board of Higher Education and Ministry in October 1987. Prompted by United Methodist plans to establish a continent-wide university in Zimbabwe where no private universities existed, President Robert Mugabe formed a government commission in 1987 to study the country's higher education needs and make recommendations about the role of private universities in the nation's overall education scheme.
At the 1988 General Conference, United Methodists overwhelmingly accepted the General Board of Higher Education and Ministry's proposal to begin the university. On April 6, 1991, thousands of people from throughout Zimbabwe watched as the groundbreaking ceremony took place and one acacia tree was planted at the Old Mutare Mission site of Africa University. In January 1992, President Robert Mugabe granted Africa University’s Charter by official proclamation. This is an African initiative, with African Methodists serving with United Methodists from all over the world to develop an institution for all of Africa.
Read more about this topic: Africa University
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“History is not what you thought. It is what you can remember. All other history defeats itself.
In Beverly Hills ... they don’t throw their garbage away. They make it into television shows.
Idealism is the despot of thought, just as politics is the despot of will.”
—Mikhail Bakunin (1814–1876)
“Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only the history of pinheads.”
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)
“Let it suffice that in the light of these two facts, namely, that the mind is One, and that nature is its correlative, history is to be read and written.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)