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 HE Cleveland Association of Oberlin Alumni invited the American Missionary Association, on the 
 occasion of its annual meeting in Cleveland, October 20-22, 1891, to visit Oberlin. This invitation was 
 most heartily responded to by the Association. The special train provided by the Cleveland Alumni left 
 the city at 8:45 A. M., Friday, October 23. Upon its arrival at Oberlin, the visitors proceeded to the 
 College Chapel to join with the faculty and students in listening to the following exercises. 
 
 ©rcjer of? Q^erci^>c/i> af ffte Goffecje d>fiaraef. 
 
 11 A. M. 
 
 Hymn Congregation. Music — Remember thy Creator Rhode. 
 
 Prayer. . College Glee Club. 
 
 Introduction of Guests . . Gen. M. D. Leggett. 
 
 Address President Fairchild. 
 
 Response President Baulantine. 
 
 „.,_ _ _ - . T ■ t Address .... Rev. Wm. Hayes Ward, D. D., 
 
 Music— O salutaris Liszt. „,. ' ' 
 
 Editor N. Y. Independent. 
 Ladies' Voices. 
 
 „„«.,. , .. . ... Hymn Congregation. 
 
 Address — Oberlin and the American Missionary 
 
 Association .... Rev. M. K. Strieby, D. D. Benediction. 
 
 After the exercises the visitors inspected the buildings, and at 1 P. M. they were the guests of the College for 
 lunch at Talcott Hall. At 2 P. M. a reception was given by the faculty and officers of the College, and at 4 P. M. 
 the train returned to the city. 
 
OBERLIN 
 
 AND THE 
 
 American Missionary Association. 
 
 REV. M. E. STRIEBY, D. D., Secretary of the A. M. A. 
 
 An Address delivered in the College Chapel, Oberlin, on the occasion of the visit of the A. M. A.] 
 
 BERLIN and the American Missionary 
 Association are brothers. There is a 
 difference of thirteen years in their 
 ages, and the younger comes to-day to greet 
 the elder with grateful remembrances of the 
 past, with rejoicing in successes attained and 
 with assurances of continued sympathy. 
 
 The liberal and progressive spirit of Oberlin 
 encouraged peculiar people to come hither to 
 propagate their views. If any such man had 
 " a psalm, a doctrine, a revelation or an inter- 
 
 pretation " he had no rest in his bones until he 
 secured a hearing in Oberlin. Perhaps Oberlin 
 spent a little too much time with some of these 
 people, for while some of them had a special 
 gift for " reproof," they were not all profitable 
 for " instruction in righteousness." But a few 
 of these intruders did bring in something 
 vastly important, and among these none was 
 more so than what was at the time the most 
 unpopular — the anti-slavery discussion. The 
 fathers — Shipherd and Stewart — had, at the 
 
 — 1 — 
 
outset, no thought of it, and the famous " Ober- 
 lin Covenant" was silent about it. When 
 Father Shipherd was moved by the spirit to go 
 to Cincinnati, and there caught the infection 
 from the agitation in Lane Seminary, and after- 
 wards from conferences in New York with Mr. 
 Finney and the Tappans, and wrote to the 
 Trustees in Oberlin urging them to pass a vote 
 to admit students irrespective of color, what a 
 •commotion it created ! Some of the young 
 ladies, who were students from New England, 
 said that if colored people were admitted they 
 would go home at once, if they had to wade 
 Lake Erie to get there. But the vote was' 
 passed. Blessings on the memory of Father 
 Keep, who carried it by giving the casting vote 
 as Chairman of the Board of Trustees. Little 
 didst thou know, John Keep, how far-reaching 
 this matter was, for after all discussions, moral 
 and political, and all the bloodshed of the war, 
 this word " irrespective of color " is still the piv- 
 otal pointin one of the live questions of the day. 
 
 Oberlin soon swung fully into line. The com- 
 ing of Finney, Mahan, Morgan and the Lane 
 Seminary boys, and the stirring eloquence of 
 Theodore D. Weld settled the matter ; and 
 through evil report and good report, through 
 mobs, imprisonment and the sending of volun- 
 teers to the army, Oberlin was faithful to the 
 colored man. 
 
 The time came that Christian men who loved 
 the cause of missions felt themselves troubled 
 in conscience about giving money to Mission 
 Boards that, in spite of all entreaty and remon- 
 strance, continued to sustain slave-holding 
 churches. Oberlin was in the front rank of 
 those who began missionary efforts free from 
 such complications. It was an Oberlin student 
 — Hiram Wilson— who led the way in missions 
 among the fugitive slaves in Canada. It was 
 an Oberlin student— David S. Ingrahain — who 
 went on an independent self-supporting mis- 
 sion to the emancipated slaves in the West 
 Indies, to be followed ere long by many other 
 
 2 — 
 
Oberlin students. It was Oberlin's ready re- 
 sponse that in 1841 sent two of its students as 
 missionaries with the Amistad captives to their 
 home in Africa ; and it was from Oberlin in 
 after years that noble men and women toiled 
 and died in that deadly climate. It was largely 
 an Oberlin movement that organized the 
 " Western Evangelical Missionary Society " in 
 1843, under whose auspices a score of Oberlin 
 students went on the self-denying mission 
 among the Ojibway Indians. 
 
 All these movements preceded and led up to 
 the formation of the American Missionary 
 Association, and, when it was formed, Oberlin 
 was its firmest and best friend. 
 
 The first need of the Association after its 
 organization was a competent Secretary. It 
 came to Oberlin and Oberlin furnished the 
 man — yes, a man, every inch of him — eminently 
 prudent and judicious, with business training 
 and administrative gifts, and to crown all, a 
 man of the soundest integrity and Christian 
 
 character. He came to his post three months 
 after the society was formed, held it for nearly 
 thirty years, and died in the harness. Here is 
 a fitting place and this is a fitting time to bear 
 this tribute to the memory of that first Secre- 
 tary, George Whipple. 
 
 The Association having obtained its com- 
 manding officer, the next thing to do was to 
 secure the " sinews of war," and then to enlist 
 the soldiers. Both these it acquired to some ex- 
 tent by receiving the assets and the mission- 
 aries of the societies which had been merged 
 into it. But much more — increasingly much 
 more — was needed of both. 
 
 The people of Oberlin were not rich, but an 
 Apostle has well described them : " Their deep 
 poverty abounded unto the riches of their lib- 
 erality," and, more than that, they " first gave 
 their own selves to the Lord," and then to 
 mission service. In other words, they gave 
 both men and money. 
 
 As to the monev : Our books show that 
 
Oberlin has given the Association $36,270 in 
 direct contributions. The Master once sat over 
 against the treasury and beheld how the people 
 cast in their money; and seeing one person put 
 in a certain sum, he at once placed an astonish- 
 ingly high estimate upon it. He has watched 
 these Oberlin collections, and I imagine that 
 he has estimated them — especially those given 
 in the earlier days — at a much higher figure 
 than I have named. Besides all this, I may 
 fairly assume that the 25,000 students that have 
 gone forth from Oberlin have generally been 
 contributors to the Association, and that the 
 more than 400 Oberlin men that have become 
 pastors have led their churches to take collec- 
 tions for it. Putting these together with Ober- 
 lin's direct contributions, I think that Oberlin 
 and Oberlin students have given to the Associ- 
 ation — in the current coin of the realm — about 
 $100,000. 
 
 As to the furnishing of workers : Oberlin 
 was rapidly drilling soldiers for the Lord's 
 
 service, but they were not invited into the ranks 
 of the army corps then in the field. The large 
 churches did not call for them as pastors, and 
 the great Missionary Boards sent no recruiting 
 sergeants here. This was strange. These 
 soldiers were of full military stature, in body, 
 mind and heart. They were well drilled, well 
 equipped and ready for action. Nobody 
 doubted their courage or their loyalty to the 
 Master. But still they were not wanted. The 
 reason was not then far to seek. These men 
 were tinctured with the suspicion of abolition- 
 ism. They actually believed in the Declaration 
 of Independence and in the New Testament 
 doctrine, that in Christ Jesus all are one, and 
 they put this into practice, for students were 
 admitted " irrespective of color." Moreover 
 the)- were charged with heresy — in that they 
 were new school and not old school men, and 
 that on one point they were more Methodistic 
 than Calvinistic. 
 
 Now, while the rich churches and the great 
 
Mission Boards had no nse for these men, they I 
 were, by their anti-slavery zeal, just the soldiers 
 that the Association wanted, and here for the 
 first time it could make some return for all the 
 favors it had received from Oberlin. It brought 
 the men and women into the ranks. It is a 
 fair estimate, I think, to say, that for the first 
 sixteen years of the life of the Association, or 
 up to i860, nine-tenths of all its workers, at 
 home and abroad, were Oberlin students ; and 
 their service was no parade drill. In the home 
 field they went, as a rule, where the work was 
 the hardest and the pay the poorest. Such 
 was the prejudice against them that often 
 the most they could look for was the privilege 
 of working in some need}- field without 
 molestation. They found no Home Mis- 
 sionary Society to recommend or to aid 
 them. But Oberlin has won its victor}', and 
 most courteously was it acknowledged in the 
 National Council which met here in 1871, , 
 when its moderator, Dr. Budington, said: "We I 
 
 stand here on the grave of buried prejudices." 
 In the foreign field they endured hardness as 
 good soldiers of Christ, and some of them died 
 on the battle-field. Some, broken in health, 
 returned and are still with us. We honor those 
 that are here, while angels watch over the graves 
 of those that have died. 
 
 In 1861 a new world came up. The old strug- 
 gle with slaver\- took on the dreadful aspect of 
 war. But the beginnings were then made of 
 the great end. The slaves began to come forth 
 from their prison house, and at length it could 
 be said, " A slave can not breathe in America." 
 The Association was prepared for this new work 
 and entered upon it as the sequel of the first — 
 a work whose importance can not be overstated 
 and whose end is yet afar off. Here, again, 
 Oberlin stood by its side and gave it help. 
 There was not now a call upon Oberlin for its 
 exclusive assistance. The taint of abolitionism 
 was gone, and everywhere in the North, East 
 and West, there were willing hands and conse- 
 
crated hearts ready to enter this new service. 
 But Oberlin did her full share. 
 
 In this new and expanded work, the Associ- 
 ation needed another Secretary, and Oberlin 
 again supplied the man. Of him it suffices to 
 say that he is alive and remains unto this pres- 
 ent. It also furnished the first Field Secretary 
 through whose untiring efforts the foundations 
 were laid for some of the best work done in 
 the South. In nearly all the larger institutions 
 founded or sustained by the Association, such 
 as Berea, Fisk, Atlanta, Talladega, Tougaloo. 
 Straight and Howard, Oberlin students have- 
 been useful and, in many cases, prominent 
 workers ; and, speaking in a general way, we 
 have had no more valuable teachers and preach- 
 ers than those that have come to us from 
 Oberlin. 
 
 Thus in all these years and ways, Oberlin and 
 the Association have stood shoulder to 
 shoulder in the struggle for the slave, and in 
 lifting up the Freedmen. But we know that 
 
 these people are still borne down by ignorance 
 and vice and are crushed under the weight of 
 race prejudice. They must not be abandoned, 
 and may I not here and now pledge for Oberlin 
 and the Association that they will stand by them 
 till the rights of all men in this laud shall be 
 recognized, irrespective of color ? 
 
 We who represent the Association to-day 
 come with gratitude to God for all He has done 
 for us and with thankfulness to Oberlin for the 
 help it has rendered in the years past, and 
 especially in the days of weakness and danger. 
 But we come still more to congratulate Oberlin 
 upon its great success, upon the enlargements 
 already reached and upon the prospects that 
 open out so bright before it. 
 
 I may speak of the contrast of the present 
 with the earlier times. I remember Slab Hall, 
 Walton Hall, Colonial Hall, and, what in those 
 days was our pride, Tappan Hall. We are 
 soon to walk about this Zion, and to consider 
 well her palaces, and none who do not remein- 
 
 — 6 
 
ber the early days can fully appreciate the con- 
 trast made by the twelve buildings now on the 
 ground — the Chapel, Council Hall, Cabinet, 
 French and Society Halls, Stewart Hall and 
 Sturges Hall, and then those more extensive, 
 Peters Hall, the Spear Library, Talcott Hall, 
 Baldwin Cottage, and last but not least, the 
 grand Music Hall, the gift of our honored 
 brother, Dr. Warner. 
 
 I remember the men who, in all these years, 
 have been the leaders in this grand enterprise 
 — Pres. Mahan, Pres. Finney, Prof. Morgan, 
 Prof. Cowles, Dr. Dascomb — but I get lost in 
 the multitude of these noble names. Yet I 
 must not be hindered from referring to one 
 other, Pres. Fairchild — student, tutor and pro- 
 fessor, teaching in almost every study in every 
 department, and crowning all with a Presi- 
 dency so wisely administered as to lead up, in 
 a large measure, to the present success of the 
 college. I count it my greatest college honor 
 that I was the classmate of James H. Fairchild. 
 
 I call to mind the early days of poverty, 
 when the prayer, " Give us this day our daily 
 bread," meant something very literal, for often- 
 times we knew not where the next barrel of 
 flour was to come from. But now, with a vastly 
 enlarged corps of teachers and greatly in- 
 creased expenses, we have something a little 
 ahead from day to day. We have the nucleus of 
 an endowment, and I may tell j^ou a little secret 
 that the alumni and former students have a 
 plan in hand to aid in meeting current ex- 
 penses for five years, by which time it is hoped 
 that an endowment will be secured. 
 
 I can look back to the days of ostracism 
 and reproach, of which I have spoken, when 
 Oberlin was branded as fanatic and heretic — 
 when the churches and the great Mission 
 Boards rejected the ministry of her students. 
 But now I can rejoice with you that what was 
 once a reproach is a glory. The churches seek 
 pastors from Oberlin, and our grand Mission 
 Boards, which once looked at us " through a 
 
glass darkly," now meet us face to face, and 
 not only welcome our students to mission 
 fields, but come hither for Secretaries and cor- 
 porate members. And strangest of all the 
 changes is that the Oberlin, once esteemed as 
 heretical, is now held to be the champion of 
 orthodoxy. 
 
 Oberlin has overcome its early difficulties 
 and has seated itself in fine buildings, but it 
 must not rest in the past or present. It must 
 not, like Goldsmith's old soldier, " Shoulder 
 the crutch and show how fields were won." 
 The word is still : Onward — more apparatus,- 
 
 more teachers, more buildings, more endow- 
 ment. 
 
 Nor is this all. There lies before it the final 
 victory over race prejudice, the grapple with 
 the great problems of labor, capital, crime and 
 home evangelization and the spread of the 
 Gospel over the world. 
 
 And, last of all, in the realm of Biblical 
 truth, Oberliu's strength is not to sit still, but 
 with unfailing and reverent trust in God, it 
 must strike out in all fields of research and 
 stop only when earth's twilight shall give place 
 to the light and glory. 
 
 — 8 
 
NAMES OF OBERLIN STUDENTS 
 
 Who were Missionaries of the American Missionary Association before 1861 
 
 INDIAN MISSIONS. 
 
 Rev. S. G. Wright and Mrs. Wright before 1846 
 
 Rev. Alonzo Barnard and Mrs. Barnard . " 1846 
 Rev. J. P. Bardwell and Mrs. Bardwell . . " 1846 
 William Lewis, M. D., and Mrs. Lewis . . " 1846 
 Mr. 0. A. Coe and Mrs. Coe " 1846 
 
 Mr. D. B. Spencer and Mrs. Spencer . . . before 1846 
 
 Mr. Joseph S. Fisher and Mrs. Fisher 1849 
 
 Mr. Francis Spees and Mrs. Spees 1850 
 
 Rev. George N. Smith i860 
 
 Rev. A. B. Adams from 1843 to l8 5° 
 
 MENDI MISSION 
 
 Rev. William Raymond before 1846 
 
 Rev. George Thompson and Mrs. Thompson . . 1848 
 
 Mr. Anson J. Carter 1848 
 
 Sarah Kinson, native African 1848 
 
 Miss Mahala McGuire 1852 
 
 Miss Jane Winters 1852 
 
 Mr. Matthew Mair and Mrs. Mair 1857 
 
 Rev. F. S. Arnold and Mrs. Arnold 1850 
 
 Rev. J. C. Tefft and Mrs. Tefft 1850 
 
 Mr. Samuel Gray 1850 
 
 Mr. Richard Miles and Mrs. Miles i860 
 
JAMAICA MISSIONS. 
 
 Rev. David C. Ingraham and Mrs. Ingraham 
 
 before 1846 
 
 Rev. W, H. Evarts and Mrs. Evarts ... " 1846 
 Rev. Lorin Thompson and Mrs. Thompson " 1846 
 Rev. S. T. Wolcott and Mrs. Wolcott . . " 1846 
 Rev. C. S. Renshaw and Mrs. Renshaw . " 1846 
 Rev. Ralph Tyler and Mrs. Tyler .... " 1846 
 Rev. George L. Hovey and Mrs. Hovey . . " 1846 
 Rev. Julius O. Beardslee & Mrs. Beardslee " 1846 
 Rev. James A. Preston and Mrs. Preston . " 1846 
 Rev. A. D. Olds and Mrs. Olds 1849 
 
 Rev. Heman B. Hall and Mrs. Hall 1850 
 
 Rev. A. M. Richardson and Mrs. Richardson . . 185 1 
 
 Rev. Amos B. Hills and Mrs. Hills 1853 
 
 Rev. C. C. Starbuck 1855 
 
 Mr. Thaddeus Hoppin and Mrs. Hoppin .... 1856 
 
 Miss Lucy Woodcock 1856 
 
 Rev. T. B. Penfield and Mrs. Sarah Ingraham 
 
 Penfield 185S 
 
 Miss Sarah Treat and Miss Julia Treat . 1859 and 1861 
 
 Mr. Joseph S. Fisher and Mrs. Fisher i860 
 
 SIAM MISSION. 
 
 Mrs. Sarah B. Bradley 1849 I Rev. L. B. Lane and Mrs. Lane 1850 
 
 Rev. David Wirt . . . 
 
 . 1849 
 
 Rev. J. H. Byrd 
 
 . 1848 
 
 Rev. W. W. Blanchard . . 
 
 • 1850 
 
 Rev. Lewis Bridgman . . 
 
 • 1850 
 
 Rev. Warren Cochran . . 
 
 • 1850 
 
 HOME MISSIONS. 
 
 Rev. Nelson Cook 1850 
 
 Rev. Benjamin Foltz .... 1850 
 
 Rev. Calvin Steele 1850 
 
 Rev. Daniel Chapman .... 1851 
 Rev. S. L. Adair 1852 
 
 Rev. Henry Bates 1852 
 
 Rev. Lucius Parker 1852 
 
 Rev. Lucius Smith 1852 
 
 Rev. James Steele 1852 
 
 Rev. B. M. Amsden 1853 
 
 10- 
 
HOME MISSIONS- Continued. 
 
 Rev. George Clark . . 
 Rev. William Dewey • 
 Rev. David Jones . . 
 Rev. M. M. Longley . . 
 Rev. Samuel Penfield . 
 Rev. S. H. Thompson . 
 Rev. John Todd .... 
 Rev. Willard Burr . . . 
 Rev. U. T. Chamberlain 
 Rev. W. R. Clemons . . 
 Rev. S. D. Helms . . . 
 Rev. E. P. Ingersoll . . 
 Rev. Harvey Jones . . 
 Rev. Israel Mattison 
 Rev. Daniel K. Miller . 
 Rev. Horatio N. Norton 
 Rev. J. H. Payne . . . 
 Rev. David Todd . . . 
 Rev. E. E. Wells . . . 
 Rev. W. B. Williams . . 
 
 1853 
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 1854 
 
 Rev. M. N. Adams . . 
 Rev. Charles E. Bailey 
 Rev. George Candee 
 Rev. J. S. Davis . 
 Rev. A. J. Drake . . 
 Rev. Aimer Harper 
 Rev. W. A. Nichols 
 Rev. G. W. Stinson 
 Rev. 0. W. White . 
 Rev. A. A. Whitmore 
 Rev. L. W. Brintnall 
 Rev. R. Burgess . 
 Rev. C. S. Cady . 
 Rev. D. L. Eaton 
 Rev. J. P. Hills . 
 Rev. T. W. Jones 
 Rev. L. B. Lane . 
 Rev. J. W. White 
 Rev. A. B. Frazier 
 Rev. David Williams 
 
 -11— 
 
 1855 
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 Rev. C. C. Breed 1856 
 
 Rev. John Copeland 1857 
 
 Rev. W. E. Lincoln 1856 
 
 Rev. O. B. Waters 1856 
 
 Rev. H. W. Cobb 1858 
 
 Rev. J. A. R. Rogers 1857 
 
 Rev. J. T. Cook 1857 
 
 Rev. George Juchan 1858 
 
 Rev. Samuel Porter J 859 
 
 Rev. J. Silsby 1858 
 
 Miss Z. P. Weed 1859 
 
 Rev. C. H. Eaton 1858 
 
 Rev. L. B. Fifield i860 
 
 Rev. C. C. Foote i860 
 
 Rev. L. H. Jones i860 
 
 Rev. C. H. Pierce i860 
 
 Rev. W. B. Dada i860 
 
 Rev. Eben Tucker i860 
 
 Rev. W. A. Westervelt . . . .i860 
 
*s 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 028 356 688 2 
 
 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 028 356 688