Mennonite Library and Archives

11/27/2023

Anybody need a General Conference Mennonite Church logo lapel pin? I have about 15 of them to give away for a donation. (sometimes referred to as the "pumpkin")

02/22/2023

Mennonite Church USA is seeking a Director of Archives and Records Management to oversee the accessioning, arrangement, description and preservation of permanent records for MC USA as well as collections of individuals or institutions closely associated with MC USA. Degree in history, archival studies, library science or related field and/or equivalent work experience preferred. FTE: 0.75 to 1. Location: Elkhart, Indiana. We are committed to diversity among staff and welcome people of diverse backgrounds and abilities to apply. To request the job description and an application form, contact [email protected] or call 316-281-4257.

10/10/2022

The latest Mennonite Life bibliography (dated 2021, published in 2022) is now available. Mennonite Life has traditionally published an annual Mennonite Bibliography, attempting to apprise readers of recently published material of interest to Mennonite studies, and recent acquisitions by Mennonite libraries. The first bibliography was in the April 1947 issue.

The Mennonite Life annual bibliographies serve as a useful supplement and continuation of Nelson P. Springer and A. J. Klassen, Mennonite Bibliography 1631-1961, 2 vols. (Scottdale, Pa.: Herald Press, 1977).

Mennonite Life has traditionally published an annual Mennonite Bibliography, attempting to apprise readers of recently published material of interest to Mennonite studies, and recent acquisitions by Mennonite libraries. The first bibliography, from the April 1947 issue, comprised a page and a half o...

10/10/2022

https://kauffmanmuseum.org/event/sunday-afternoon-at-the-museum-ina-navazelskis-from-the-united-states-holocaust-memorial-museum/

At 4:00 in Krehbiel Auditorium in the Luyken Fine Arts Center on the Bethel College campus, Ina Navazelskis, an oral historian from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC, will speak about the value of oral history in helping preserve family stories and in helping us understan...

10/10/2022

https://www.bethelks.edu/article/intercollegiate-symposium-look-scholars-relevance-500-years

October 4th, 2022 Organized to honor the Mennonite Library and Archives and other libraries, an intercollegiate symposium Nov. 4-5 will look at rare publications of Desiderius Erasmus, along with his current relevance. When Dale Schrag reached his $1 million fundraising goal for an endowment for the...

10/10/2022

https://www.bethelks.edu/article/reformation-scholar-notre-dame-give-annual-lectures

October 4th, 2022 Brad S. Gregory, a well-known and widely honored historian and Reformation scholar, will give the 70th annual Menno Simons Lectures Oct. 16-17, looking at the Radical Reformation and religious freedom. Both lectures are at 7 p.m. in Krehbiel Auditorium in Luyken Fine Arts Center, w...

09/02/2022

I found this taped up at Keith Sprunger's desk in his secret office in the MLA attic.

08/22/2022

https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/numbered-photos/pholist2.php?num=2009-0076

The papers of H. D. Penner were donated to the MLA and arranged over forty years ago, but additions since that time more than doubled the size of the collection and MLA volunteer David A. Haury has re-described and integrated all of the materials. H. D. Penner was prominent as a teacher, minister, church leader, and writer. He was born on March 9, 1862, in Schardau, South Russia to Daniel and Gertrude Fast Penner. In 1874 he migrated to United States (with mother, stepfather and her four youngest children and his children). After attending various elementary schools in Russia and Kansas, he then attended one year of Peter Balzer’s School in 1878-79 (predecessor of Halstead Seminary/Bethel College - Penner had no college level education) He was baptized, December 4, 1881, by Jacob Buller, Alexanderwohl Mennonite Church. On April 29, 1884, he married Katherina Dalke. They had fourteen children, 1885-1908 (two died as infants).

Penner taught school in various elementary schools around Hillsboro and then in Lehigh. He also taught at Bethel College and at the School of Nursing of Bethel College. His work as an educator is best known for his founding of the Hillsboro Preparatory School. Penner also pastored the First Mennonite Churches of Hillsboro and Beatrice and finally the Geary Mennonite Church (Oklahoma). He also served various roles in the Western District Conference and the General Conference Mennonite Church, but no information on this work is found in the collection. He wrote many dozens of pamphlets and articles. Penner died October 26, 1933.

The papers consist of extensive presentations, writings, and sermons (hundreds of his sermons for roughly twenty-five years of ministry). Some limited correspondence is also preserved, including letters from family in Russia from the 1870s through 1914 and letters in the last years of Penner’s life regarding criticisms of his beliefs generated by some of his writings and a new covenant for the Geary Mennonite Church. Also included are some broader family correspondence and genealogical materials and photographs for the extended Penner and Dalke families. He maintained a very extensive file of clippings on a host of topics for his presentations and sermons. Very little material is available regarding his teaching and management of the Hillsboro Preparatory School (other than photos of each graduating class) and none regarding his teaching at Bethel Hospital and Bethel College.

Description: Heinrich D. Penner family; left to right, Heinrich D. Penner, Katharine (Dalke) Penner, Rachel Rebecca Penner, Anna Gertrude Penner, Daniel David Penner, Christine Cathrine Penner, Clara Louise Penner, Ernest Walter Penner, Albert Hirschler Penner, Linda Ella Penner, Ruth Viola Penner,....

07/29/2022

The Bethel Deaconess Home and Hospital Society, Newton, Kansas, was incorporated in 1903. Reverend David Goerz was the prime mover of the effort to create a Mennonite hospital in Newton and a supporter of the work of deaconesses, which were common in several denominations, mostly of German background, and whose work was similar to several Catholic orders in operating hospitals and nursing. The end result was four significant institutions in the history of the Newton area and the General Conference Mennonite Church: 1) Bethel Hospital, one of two hospitals serving Newton through most of the twentieth century, 2) Bethel Home for the Aged, another significant caring institution in the community for many decades; 3) the Bethel Deaconesses, hundreds of women who provided leadership and service through their lives dedicated to nursing; and 4) the Bethel School of Nursing, which in addition to training the deaconesses likewise educated many hundreds of nurses. The substantial collections of all four institutions, and those of several individual deaconesses, have been arranged and described by MLA volunteer, David A. Haury.

In 1903 after some discussion of forming the Hospital and Home Society within the Bethel College Corporation, the decision was made to create a separate institution. Goerz set about to recruit and train deaconesses (at other deaconess hospitals around the country) and to raise funds for the hospital building. His extensive correspondence while doing so is found in the collection (mostly in German). He recruited Frieda Kaufman to be the first deaconess and she became superintendent of the new hospital, and Catherine Voth oversaw the nursing school. In 1908 the first three deaconesses were consecrated and the new hospital opened. It was at the corner of south 2nd Street and Pine in Newton. The files even include the records for equipping and constructing the facility.

In addition to correspondence and annual reports, the hospital records include information on numerous expansions of the facility and the fundraising to support them. The original home for the deaconesses and a later addition were entirely funded by Mrs. Bernhard Warkentin. She and her children were also the primary donors to the hospital building, additions to it, and the home for the aged. One can also learn a great deal about the nature of hospital patients and their care in addition to details about managing a hospital. Large ledgers have basic information covering several decades about each person admitted to the hospital, surgical patients (tonsillectomies were by far the most common surgery), and deliveries.

Initially Sister Frieda and the deaconesses quite literally ran the hospital, the deaconesses program, and the nursing school. The records document one of the few but quite significant instances of female leadership in the church in the first half of the twentieth century. The deaconesses also served in other hospitals (i. e. Mountain Lake, Minnesota, and Beatrice, Nebraska), as public health and school nurses in Newton, and even as home health care providers. They did this for a small allowance and a promise of medical and retirement care. Until the 1950s it is quite remarkable how little administrative overhead and red tape were involved in medicine and hospitals. Ironically, the paperwork required to register nurses was immense from the beginning (in Kansas in 1913).

In the post World War II era the number of young women interested in nursing exploded and came to completely dominate the nursing school, especially as fewer and fewer women entered deaconess service. Anyone visiting Bethel Hospital or Clinic in the 1950s and early 1960s will remember first hand the work of the deaconesses, and the collection documents the winding down of the program and efforts to keep it going. The nursing school faced financial difficulties and the last class graduated in 1974 (the program was soon revived under the auspices of Bethel College).

In the early 1980s the viability of two hospitals in Newton also came into question and after six or so years of study and negotiation (minutes and reports of the One Hospital Committee working on this are also found in the MLA) Axtell and Bethel merged into one entity and constructed Newton Medical Center in the mid-1990s. Bethel Hospital and Home were demolished (the deaconess home, nurses dormitory and chapel survive). Few MLA collections have as many untapped resources for such a breadth of research as these provide.

06/09/2022

Here's an entertaining video from the Reformed Church in America archives, explaining what an archives does.

A lighthearted look at the work of the RCA Archives for staff. There are ten allusions to popular TV shows and films. See if you can find them all.

06/02/2022

It looked like a fairly ordinary 3-ring binder, but I wondered why the spine was so thick.
I pulled open a flap on one end of the spine and found an old earphone.
And a receptacle for a 9 volt battery.
And on the other side, there were "Volume" and "Station" wheels.
There's an AM radio built into the spine of this 3 ring binder! Why??
I put in a new battery and it still works.
(This came in as part of the Carlsbad (New Mexico) Mennonite Church records, which has closed. I didn't find any manufacturer name on the binder.)

05/02/2022

Note the boy in this photo holding a crossbow, apparently being prepared to migrate to Menno Colony in Paraguay.

Description: "This Picture was taken the 21st of September 1922, and represents Bishops and Elders representing about 5000 members of the Independent Church Mennonites in Manitoba and Saskatchewan who intend to move to Paraguay, S.A." The boy in this photo has what appears to be a crossbow!; see 202...