School for Christian Workers

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The School for Christian Workers was a school established by Rev. David Allen Reed in Springfield, Massachusetts in 1885 to prepare young men for work as Sunday school superintendents, secretaries of Young Men's Christian Associations, pastors, lay assistants, Bible colporteurs, and lay home mission workers.[1]

The school was organized as four departments: a school for YMCA administrators, a French Protestant school, a technical school, and a school for religious pedagogy; by 1890, each department split off into an independent institution.[2]

Main article: Springfield College

The YMCA departments, Secretarial (YMCA management) and Physical (physical education), split off to become the International Young Men's Christian Association Training School in 1890 which later became Springfield College.

Main article: Bible Normal College

The religious education part took the name Bible Normal College in 1897, and relocated to Hartford Seminary. The two institutions remained legally separate, but shared resources[2] until their final merger in 1961.[3]

Main article: Springfield Industrial Institute

The technical school became the Christian Industrial and Technical School in 1890; it trained future missionaries in carpentry, blacksmithing, foundry work, typesetting, and bookbinding; it was renamed to the Springfield Industrial Institute in 1895 and closed in 1898.[4]

Notes[]

  1. ^ "School for Christian Workers", New York Times, November 27, 1884, p. 3 full text
  2. ^ a b Glenn T. Miller, Piety and profession: American Protestant theological education, 1870-1970, 2007. ISBN 0-8028-2946-5, p. 288
  3. ^ "History". Hartford Seminary. Archived from the original on 24 September 2008. Retrieved 24 February 2014.
  4. ^ "Manual School for Missionaries", New York Times, March 9, 1890 (article credited to the Boston Traveller). full text
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