Class of 1963 Memory Book

On the eve of Garrett-Evangelical’s 156^th Commencement, the classes of 1963 from Evangelical Theological Seminary (ETS) and Garrett Theological Seminary (GTS) returned to their alma mater.  As they do, memories from a previous era are sure to follow. Such was an era of typewriters, not computers; community phones, not iPhones; and chalkboards, not projection screens. In those days, the Garrett Tower housed a basketball court, ETS was a seminary of the Evangelical United Brethren Church located in Naperville, and Lake Michigan was a stone’s throw from the Garrett dorms. The changes at Garrett-Evangelical are certainly numerable and if you see a 1963 graduate, you’ll be sure to hear about it!

The Class of 1963 connects us to the past, but they also connect us to the future. When they graduated, they entered a world where African Americans and Caucasian Americans were far from equal, where an ordained woman was a rarity, and where the United States was still reeling from the assassination of its president. Although their present seemed bleak, they went into the world as pastors, professors, missionaries, social activists, chaplains, entrepreneurs, and counselors. They ministered to multicultural congregations on the South Side of Chicago, soldiers in the war, hospital patients, and the oppressed citizens of South Korea.  In essence, they did what they could do to change the world around them.

The world in which the class of 2013 has entered is better because of the ministries of those from the class of 1963. When the graduates of 1963 anointed the class of 2013 in Senior Chapel, they passed on on the torch. There is a lot of uncertainty for the Class of 2013, but they too will go out as pastors, professors, missionaries, social activists, chaplains, entrepreneurs, and counselors.  They too will minister to diverse congregations, to the sick and dying, and to the oppressed and hopeless and in their own way, they will change the world around them.