If Baptists had bishops (and they don’t), the bishop of the Blackwater Baptist Association was Ira D. “Tuck” Hudgins. He filled the role of elder statesman, counselor and pulpit supply until his death on April 28 at age 91. Fred…
HERITAGE: ‘A persistent cuss’
Phil and Bernice Rodgerson are living in one of “the villas,” the posh new quarters at Lakewood Manor, the Baptist retirement community in Richmond. Her baby grand piano anchors one corner of their spacious living room and his study is…
Historical Society to examine diversity among Baptists
RICHMOND — Past and current diversity among Baptists will be examined at the Virginia Baptist Historical Society’s annual meeting, set for Tuesday, May 19, at First Baptist Church in Richmond. “The Swirling Center: The Prospect of Diversity in the Church”…
HERITAGE: Sweet reunions
Ruth and Maynard Guill were twentysomethings when the folks at their church, Weatherford Memorial of Richmond, began helping a young married couple studying at Virginia Union University. A.O. Adeyemi (pronounced Ah-de-ah-me) was 38 when he left his native Nigeria for…
HERITAGE: Sweet reunions
Ruth and Maynard Guill were twentysomethings when the folks at their church, Weatherford Memorial of Richmond, began helping a young married couple studying at Virginia Union University. A.O. Adeyemi (pronounced Ah-de-ah-me) was 38 when he left his native Nigeria for…
HERITAGE: Keep me
‘Keep me a hundred years, and you shall find a use for me.” In 1885 William H. Whitsitt penned this line on the inside front cover of his secret diary. The diarist painstakingly and neatly recorded his activities and his…
Celebrate Baptists’ 400th anniversary with day trips across Virginia
European Baptists are throwing a huge party in July in Amsterdam to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the church founded by John Smyth and Thomas Helwys in 1609. If Amsterdam is not on your summer itinerary, there are places closer…
HERITAGE: Time travel
Jim Slatton had a catchy title in mind for his biography of William Heth Whitsitt. He wanted to call it An Inconvenient Truth, but Al Gore coined it first for his book. It would have been apropos. After all, in…
HERITAGE: A time of beginnings
It was late in the afternoon of March 3, 1989, in the First Baptist Church of Greenville, S.C. Elmer West, long prominent in Baptist life, was there, along with others attending the annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Alliance (now…