First Baptist Church (Knoxville, Tennessee) - Years of Progress 1953-1977

Years of Progress 1953-1977

In January 1953, thirty-three-year-old Charles Arthur Trentham came from his position as Professor of Theology at Southwestern Seminary to become the twenty-fifth pastor of First Baptist Church.

Dr. Trentham grew up in Knoxville and graduated from Carson-Newman College. He earned both the Th.M. and Th.D from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

While at First Baptist, Dr. Trentham was Dean of the School of Religion at the University of Tennessee (for thirteen years) and a trustee at Carson-Newman, as well as a member of the Executive Committee and Chairman of the Christian Life Commission for the Southern Baptist Convention.

The church quickly took on new energy. Two years later property behind the church was purchased for $40,000, and plans got under way to build an education building. In 1958 a $576,000 building and remodeling program was endorsed by the First Baptist congregation. Some $470,000 of this was to construct the education building. The building was to have almost 50,000 square feet (4,600 m2) with space for eighteen departments. The rest of the money was allotted to connect the old and new buildings with an enclosed overpass ($20,000) and to remodel and air-condition the existing building. Johnson and Galyon were contractors with church member W.K. Johnson overseeing the construction. Dr. Trentham recalled that the first gift for the construction of the connecting overpass was given by David Blumberg, Jewish civic leader, who humorously suggested the connector be called "The Baptist Passover."

An open house on March 6, 1960, celebrated the completion of the new building. The largest area was a multipurpose room with a stage. This room could seat 600-700 as a dining area or be used as a basketball court. (For years this dining room was the rallying place for the United Fund and many other civic activities.) A fully equipped kitchen, an elevator and a well equipped baby-bed nursery were other features of the new building. At last First Baptist had adequate Sunday School rooms. This was a far cry from the two army tents that were once pitched behind the Gay Street church for Sunday School classes.

Five years later the remodeling continued with the completion of a handsome chapel beneath the sanctuary which was dedicated in 1965 as the Fred Brown Chapel. During Dr. Trentham's first year as pastor in Knoxville the state Woman's Missionary Meeting was held at First Baptist as well as the Tennessee Baptist Convention. Mary Elizabeth Tyler joined the staff as Dr. Trentham's secretary and elementary worker. Five years later she was relieved of all other duties to serve full-time as Secretary to the Pastor, assisting him also with his many publications and varied ministries. Miss Tyler left First Baptist in 1975, after twenty-three years of service, and became the Administrative Assistant to Dr. Foy Valentine in Nashville.

Sunday School attendance was high: 1,122 recorded one Sunday, 1,243 on another Sunday and an Easter Sunday record of 1,346. In 1954 the church voted to send Dr. Trentham and Rev. Idus V. Owensby, Minister of Education52, to the Baptist World Alliance in London, England. Total church membership was recorded at 3,199 with 2,504 considered resident members and fifteen in the armed forces. Church budget was $197,340 for 1955. In August, First Baptist received a certificate stating that 58% of our collected offering had gone to World Missions through the Cooperative Program. Two years later, in 1957, the Executive Secretary of the Tennessee Baptist Convention announced that First Baptist Church in Knoxville led the entire state in gifts through the Cooperative Program - a total of $93,573.86. Then in 1958 the church broke all records with a gift of over one hundred thousand dollars to the Cooperative Mission Program.

The September 15, 1955, church bulletin urged members to go to the polls and vote in the liquor referendum, Six years later the city approved the sale of liquor and another almost as controversial issue, the fluoridation of the city's water.

The year 1956 marked the beginning of an all-volunteer choir at First Baptist. Up to this time there had been a paid quartet of soloists. 1956 also saw the beginning of graded Sunday School classes.

That same year Dr. George Schweitzer, outstanding University of Tennessee Professor and well-known church member, spoke to the Southern Baptist Convention in Kansas City. As early as 1956 several Baptist ministers in town were suggesting that a new church be established in West Hills. But it was left to First Baptist Church to finance and organize in 1959 the Sunday School that led quickly to the establishment of West Hills Baptist Church".

J.O. Archer was asked to be Superintendent of this new West Hills Mission and held the first service on October 4, 1959, at the West Hills Elementary School. Rev. James A. Ivey, then Associate Pastor at First Baptist, preached the first sermon. The following year Rev. Andrew Jackson Prince was called as pastor.

West Hills Baptis‘Church celebrated its second anniversary in a handsome new building on Winston Road, where it is today. Eight acres of land for the new church were given by Mr. and Mrs. H.A. Schubert, Mr. and Mrs. Morgan Schubert, and Mr. and Mrs. Breck Ellison.

In October 1957 the church approved the rotation of deacons plan that had first been discussed in 1949. Current life-deacons were to continue to serve "under their call," but deacons elected in the future would serve a seven-year term. This plan was to apply to all officers, teachers, directors and leaders in the church and would allow a greater number of people to be active in leadership positions.

After a seven-year active term deacons were expected to remain off the board for one year before they were eligible for re-election. This plan was later modified to a five-year active term for deacons with two years off before reelection.

Mrs. A.C. Bruner was recognized for her skillful arrangement of sanctuary flowers over the past fifteen years, and with deep appreciation the church accepted her request to be relieved of the responsibility.

A downtown mission class was organized in the Knox County Baptist Association Building on Market Street in April 1959. Young mission pastors served this group which grew from 23 to 80. The Market Street Mission was dissolved when TVA towers were built at the end of Market Street. Dr. Trentham was beginning his sixth year when television first became a part of the program. VI/ATE televised the services on the second Sunday of each month for several years. It was eighteen years later (1976) that First Baptist began televising its own service each Sunday.

The state Sunday School Convention was held at First Baptist in March 1959 and the Baptist Student Union Convention in April. A year later the annual meeting of the Woman's Missionary Union of Tennessee was also at the church.

This same year saw the closing of the Red Cross Sewing Room. For eighteen years ladies of the church had met twice each month to sew for the Red Cross. As Dr. Trentham began his ninth year, First Baptist recounted its progress: gifts to the Cooperative program had grown to more than one hundred thousand dollars a year. The largest church budget (1961) had been over subscribed, and pledges to missions surpassed that of any previous year. The construction of the education building, which more than doubled the educational space of the church, was completed. Sunday School and Training Union were setting new attendance records. The graded choir program now had an enrollment of 274. � In 1962 with WNOX, and in 1968 with WATE, the First Baptist worship service was broadcast over radio for a period of months.

It was in 1962 that Knoxville held its first Dogwood Arts Festival. What started as primarily a tour of gardens and neighborhood trails (Sequoyah Hills trail in1955 was the first) has developed into a two-week celebration of spring. The Festival today still has lovely marked trails and open gardens, but also hundreds of family-oriented activities which are 85% free to the public. Gerald Ballard became church organist in 1954, and now after almost ten years, the church accepted his resignation with regret. Mrs. Charles C. Hutson became organist in 1963. Newspaper accounts in 1964 state that the number of Baptist churches in America had increased to 91,500 with a membership of more than 22,300,000. Baptists at this time constituted the second largest religious group in America, exceeded only by Roman Catholics.

The following year local papers reported that there were 400 churches in Knoxville, and the largest was First Baptist with 3,470 members. �1964 records show that sixty-five babies, ages birth through three years, were being cared for in the church's nursery during Sunday School and fifteen during Training Union. The First Baptist Church bulletin congratulated "our own" Mary Costa on her debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Mary Costa grew up in First Baptist Church and, as an adult, whenever she was in Knoxville, sat with the First Baptist choir and sang a solo at the morning service.

During the 1960s and for a dozen years or more, a remarkably vibrant College Department was part of the First Baptist Sunday School. Its success was evident in that some 200 students attended. At the start of each school term the line of shoulder-to-shoulder students joining the church would reach from one side of the sanctuary across to the other.

Jane Powell, Gibbs Prevost and Clyde Carpenter, with Dr. Trentham's encouragement, organized the department on a seminar plan. Choosing an area of study, Dr. George Schweitzer would talk for 20 minutes. Then the students would break into discussion groups. The groups were led by church couples who had undergone a full year of training and preparation. The group leaders met monthly for dinner in a home and at summertime retreats where they studied material organized by Dr. Wade Boswell.

In 1967 Dave Lipscomb and Dixie Lipscomb (Petrey) were co-directors of the College Department, and while Dr Schweitzer continued to be the major speaker, others occasionally talked on a variety of subjects. Pete Beard, Luther Turner, Dave Lipscomb, Nancy Siler, George Doebler and Dr. Vivian Gibbs spoke on subjects which ranged from "History of the Bible" to "Marriage and the Family."

The students were encouraged to think for themselves, to reason with one another and to ask all manner of questions. The Department became a model from which many others were patterned.

In 1977 the church added a Context Class led by Don and Betty Mirts to give college students the option of more structured study.

In 1967 the church purchased properties near the church for parking space, investing $210,000 in land on Walnut, Main, Hill and Market

That same year the church recognized the first-year anniversary of the Deaf Department's program for younger children from the Tennessee School for the Deaf, The Deaf Department now had an enrollment of 336 and was organized into five groups: Adults, Young People, Intermediates, Juniors and Primaries. Dr. J. Wayne Waller was Coordinator of the program. A church bulletin was dedicated to Mrs. Willie D. Smith who retired after sixteen years as church hostess.

On September 21, 1969, First Baptist recognized the 125th Anniversary of the church with a homecoming celebration and reception in Fellowship Hall. A pamphlet was published picturing the three church buildings with a brief history.

�Church membership in that anniversary year was 3,540 with 2,508 listed as resident members. Additions to the membership that year numbered 217. 1970 saw the beginning of Knoxville Inner City Churches United for People (KICCUP) in which First Baptist became actively involved with nine other downtown churches. The purpose was to coordinate the mission work of all the downtown churches.

The first organizational meetings were held in Dr. Trentham's study. Attending were: Ralph Frost (representing religious activities at If!), Dixie Petrey (who named the new organization), John McKinnon (First Presbyterian Church), David Matthews (St. John's Episcopal Church), E.K. Reagan (First Cumberland Presbyterian), Bob Landry (First Christian Church), Henry Horton (First Methodist Church), Joseph Copeland (Second Presbyterian Church) along with Dr. Trentham and Mary Elizabeth Tyler, as secretary. Church Street United Methodist Church and St. John's Lutheran Church were also involved.

The plan was for each church to take one area of interest and draw workers from all churches. First Baptist assumed the Deaf Ministry. Church Street United Methodist sponsored a day-care nursery school for working mothers. St. John's organized around "Meals on Wheels" and the others had equally important areas. KICCUP, in recent years, has been under the direction of Rev. Julian Spitzer, former pastor of Sequoyah Hills Presbyterian Church. The organization is now also active in the Interfaith Health Clinic, Volunteer Ministry Center, the city's Good Friday and Sunrise Easter Services as well as the Thanksgiving Service, which is an outgrowth of Ralph Frost's Student Christian Association Thanksgiving services first held on campus at the University of Tennessee in the 1920s.

Nick Foster, currently First Baptist Youth Minister, is an active member of the Executive Council of KICCUP.

The year 1973 saw a week-long celebration for the Golden Anniversary of the church's Ministry to the Deaf. Rev. Carter Bearden from the Home Mission Board spoke in the Chapel for two Sunday services. Faye Ianham, niece of Laura Formwalt, spoke at a banquet, and James D. Fain, of Houston, led Bible �study. The deaf program at First Baptist was started by Mrs. Laura Formwalt and was under her caring leadership for forty-four years. Since 1967 Rev. William E. Davis had been First Baptist Minister to the Deaf.

During this period Mrs. Helen Trentham (Duncan) gave many years of inspiring assistance for the deaf in the community. She was often signing the sermons, assisting the deaf in finding employment, accompanying them to hospitals, to doctor's and lawyer's offices and to court when necessary. Her Christian concern endeared her to all the silent people of Knoxville and helped to make the Deaf Department of First Baptist Church a model for others. The concept of Knoxville's expressway system was developing about this time, and with the completion of the Downtown Loop in 1973 traffic patterns around the church changed dramatically.

An exceptional new organ was installed in 1973 and dedicated with a month of recitals and special programs. The organ was built by Schantz Organ Company of Orrville, Ohio, and constructed with 3,153 pipes, the largest being 32 feet (9.8 m) long and the smallest 3/8 of one inch.

In November 1973, the church accepted Dr. Trentham's resignation and he, after almost 21 years at First Baptist, left to become pastor of the First Baptist Church of Washington, D.C. President Jimmy Carter was one of the Sunday School teachers in Dr. Trentham's Washington congregation.

A five-member Pulpit Supply Committee, with Carl F. Maples as chairman, worked with an eighty-one-member Pulpit Replacement Committee in the search for a new pastor. For a year First Baptist Church functioned without a pastor, but with an able staff: Dave Ward, Associate Minister; Carl Perry, Music Minister; Mary Hutson, Education Coordinator; 0.E. Turner, Minister of Visitation; Mrs. Marion Pickle, Jr., organist. In this interim year the congregation gave 122% of the annual budget. At the same time another eight-member committee chaired by Andrew Edmondson was searching for a Minister to the Deaf since Rev. Davis had resigned to become Superintendent of,the Tennessee School for the Deaf. For a year Jerry Heflin, from the faculty at Harrison-Chilhowee Baptist Academy, served as Interim Minister to the Deaf. Then in 1975, Rev. Jerry M. Seale came from Texas to join the staff as Associate Minister for the Deaf.

�An exhibit of paintings by Elaine Herrin, artist from South America, prompted the talented members of First Baptist Church to have a Springtime Christian Art Festival. Over sixteen members, both men and women, exhibited their art in Fellowship Hall.

In 1974, Mrs. Helen Mosely presented a beautiful three-octave set of Schulmerick handbells to the church in memory of her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Walter B. Hudson. An additional octave of handbells was added ten years later to honor the memory of Hannah Frances Stone, for many years a soloist in the choir and song director for one of the Adult Sunday School Departments. The bulletin congratulated Mrs. H.D. Tittsworth on her "first hundred years." Mrs. Tittsworth had been a member of First Baptist Church for seventy of those years. Then in February 1975, the church called as pastor Dr, Jesse C. Fletcher, who was at that time the Director of Mission Support Division for the Foreign Mission Board. Dr. Fletcher instigated a schedule for two Sunday morning services and expressed new interest in a television ministry.

Live television broadcast of the eleven o'clock service was started at a cost of $785 each Sunday. A survey eight months later showed the church service was being watched by one-third of the viewing audience in this area, The church also began having a children's sermon at the eleven o'clock service as well as the early service.

The 1976 figures show a new enthusiasm at First Baptist. A $565,150 budget was adopted. The Lottie Moon Offering reached a new high of $26,000. Sunday School attendance averaged 821. The morning worship service attendance was 1,268, and evening worship was 340.

�Mrs. Dixie Lipscomb (Petrey) approached the church with the suggestion that they give "prayerful consideration of qualified women" in the selection of new Deacons. The church voted to buy property on the southeast corner of Hill and Locust meaning First Baptist now owned the entire block and could develop long-range plans for parking improvement. Funds became available, because property had been sold to the city for construction of the new City-County Building.

With Shirley Henson as Director, the church for the first time organized a Sunday School Department for Singles. The first meeting welcomed fifty men and women. Within six years this department had grown and divided into three regular classes.

The JOY Group was organized by Carl Perry in 1975 for older members of First Baptist Church. In 1980, Dave Ward, as Minister to Senior Adults, became the leader. One fourth of the members of First Baptist fall in this over sixty-five category.

Today the JOY Group meets monthly. Average attendance is 45. It is both a social gathering and a study group. As typical activities they study books, missionaries, nutrition and travel to the Cumberland Playhouse, Ijams Nature Park and even shopping malls in Atlanta.

In September 1977, First Baptist began a new downtown mission ministry with the opening of the Share and Care Center. One night each week church members staffed the center in the basement of the church to distribute clothes and food to the needy. For the most part, clothes were donated by church members.

Every Monday morning women of the church met to sort, clean, size and prepare the donated clothes for the Thursday distribution. The Share and Care Center continues today to be a much-needed mission project and is staffed by the Adult Sunday School classes.

Mrs. Leonard Butler served as the original Director for the Share and Care Center. Directors since that time have been: Mr. and Mrs. Spencer Hudson, Mr. �and Mrs. Richter Wigall, Mr. and Mrs. Cliff Shirley and Mr. and Mrs. Wade Boswell.

1977 saw many changes. Rev. O.E. Turner resigned. Mrs. H.D. Tittsworth, the oldest member of First Baptist, died at age 103. Rev. Robert Money joined the staff as Minister of Counseling. For the first year or two First Baptist members were cautious about the Counseling Ministry, Dr. Fletcher had offered on the television broadcast, "Call if you need help." And there were many calls. At first participants in the counseling program were 30% church members and 70% from the community. Fifteen years later the ratio is 75% church members and 25% from the community.

The counseling is largely marital counseling, but also includes individual and family therapy. An average of forty persons each week now call on Rev. Money for help. In October 1977 Dr. Fletcher resigned to become President of Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene, Texas.