Growing up on a farm in Southside Virginia, Cora Anne Davis learned that two things—sunshine and seeds—go together; and until her death on Nov. 9 at age 69, she spread plenty of both everywhere she went. The sunshine came from a huge heart which prompted mile-wide smiles. The seeds were manifested in great ideas and good deeds.
As a young girl, Anne Davis had the chore of chasing the pigs back into their pen. She told her father that surely there was something they could do to keep pigs from rooting out of their pen. He informed her that pigs just naturally root.
One day the new county agent visited and asked if there was anything he could do to help them. “My father, with a twinkle in his eye, responded that we could use some help keeping the pigs from rooting. Without a moment's hesitation, the agent went to his jeep and came back with a bottle of pills. I watched, not knowing who was pulling whose leg. He said that if we would put these pills in the hog food that they would stay in the pen. We did it.”
“Each day I came home from school and ran to check on the pigs. There they were in their pen as content as could be with no evidence of rooting. My father was having an existential crisis. When the agent returned, our first question was what was in the pills. He said that it was simple. The hogs needed minerals; and if we gave them minerals in their food, they would not resort to rooting!
“All of a sudden we had to adjust our understanding of truth. What we thought was true about the nature of hogs was simply a behavior aimed at getting what they needed to survive.”
Ten years ago, when Anne Davis told this story to the Virginia Baptist Women in Ministry, she applied it to the conceptions which some congregations have about women ministers. Like her father's expectations, they were dealing with life experiences which had taught them to think in narrow terms regarding roles open to women in ministry.
She was plowing deep to plant seeds which, bathed in her sunshine, would grow into new truths that women, like herself, could have many useful services in Kingdom work.
Anne Davis had learned some of those truths in a small country church, Ebenezer Baptist Church in Mecklenburg County. Ebenezer Baptists frequently visited with their Methodist neighbors so that at an early age the Baptist girl learned that there were other branches of Christendom. At age 13, she dedicated her life to ministry. As a girl she embraced the world of service as practiced by WMU.
In 1954 she and about five other college hopefuls came to Richmond to be interviewed for a Virginia WMU scholarship. They met in the Jefferson Hotel, and the farm girl was intimidated by the WMU stalwarts, including Mrs. Lester Knight, Mrs. James Laws and Ellen Douglas Oliver, until an oscillating fan scattered the WMU ladies' papers. The sight of those formidable women on their knees retrieving their papers instantly put the girl at ease.
She won the scholarships which helped finance her education at three “Baptist schools,” Averett and Westhampton colleges and, in 1958, the Carver School of Missions and Social Work. Little did the Carver student know, that a scant dozen years later, she would become one of the few women faculty members of Southern Seminary or that 26 years later, at the prime of her career, she would become the founding dean of the Carver School of Church Social Work. She spread sunshine and planted seeds which produced a generation of Christian social workers.
In 1994 Anne Davis returned home to Virginia to spend a long sabbatical with Virginia WMU. “I really came to say ‘thank you,' ” she said, referring to the scholarship which had enabled her career. She expressed her appreciation through a busy speaking calendar of some 20 engagements. She also returned to her alma mater and spoke at the UR Pastors School. She remembered the “remarkable faith dimension” in the education which she had received at the two Virginia Baptist colleges. She recalled that the UR of her student days was populated with numerous young men and women who were destined for gospel ministry.
Everywhere she went during that sabbatical she was spreading sunshine and seeds. When Virginia women wanted to say “thank you” to her, she insisted that they give to a scholarship fund to enable other young leaders to acquire training. She established the fund and wanted it to carry the name of two highly-effective Virginia WMU leaders, Jean Woodward and Margaret Wayland. Once more the farm girl was spreading sunshine and seeds.
In 1995 Anne Davis accepted an early retirement package from Southern Seminary. Two years later, the unkindest cut of all was the closure of the Carver School. It became victim to changes in mindsets and priorities within the SBC and in leadership at Southern Seminary. Her health also deteriorated. But Anne Davis was unsinkable. She headed for Waco, Texas, to serve as a consultant for a new master's program in social work at Baylor and to assist friends at The Advocacy Center for Crime Victims and Children. She was still spreading sunshine and planting seeds until the very last.
A memorial service for Anne Davis will be held at 11:30 a.m. on Saturday, Dec. 2, at Ebenezer Baptist Church at Baskerville near South Hill.
Fred Anderson is executive director of the Virginia Baptist Historical Society and the Center for Baptist Heritage and Studies. He may be contacted at P.O. Box 34, University of Richmond, VA 23173.