pbell College
Despite* numerous difficulties
and hai ucl leaps. Dr. Janies
Л.
Campbell never gave up his
dream of establishing a first-
class school. His work still goes
on.
By II. C. LAWRENCE
IT is quiio often said (bat some
institution is but the “lengthened
shadow" of some individual, a
statement usually more rhetorical than
real. But there arc at least four insti¬
tutions within our Commonwealth,
each of which is really and truly the
handiwork of one individual: the
great school for the Deaf and Dumb
at Morgan ton, whose father was Dr.
K. McK. Goodwin, a true "Doctor of
Humanities”; the Baptist Orphan¬
age at Thoinnsvillc, the handiwork of
John Hymns Mills; the North Caro¬
lina College for Negroes at Durham,
whose sire was Dr. James K. Shepard ;
and Campbell College, child of the
Moved Dr. James A. Campbell.
Born in Harnett County
From the red hills of Harnett came
Campbell, who was not born to the
purple but who, like the great Sam¬
uel Johnson, was “by poverty op¬
pressed.” But the Prophet truly said:
"Your young men shall dream
dreams," and young Campbell was
born with a yearning in his heart for
an education, not only for himself hut
for others. By a supreme struggle ho
was able to stay at Wake Forest two
years, but the cruel necessities of
dire distress forced him to leave with¬
out a degree — a .degree which he did
not receive until many years later,
when ho took it at the
ваше
time with
Loth of his own sons. Yet later there
came to him honorary degree», some
mead of recognition of the great life
he had lived, and the great monu¬
ment he had built.
“Great oaks from little acorns
grow,” and this is many time? true in
the field- of education. The one-room
log cabin of David Caldwell was at
once “an academy, a college and a
theological seminary,” but from its
walls camo forth fifty Presbyterian
preachers, two Governors and a num¬
ber of leaders both in church and
•tate; and the germ of the great Uni¬
versity at Durham was concealed in
the tiny cabin school of Brantley
Yorke. It was Garfield who said that
a University could consist of Mark
Hopkins on one end of a log and
a pupil on the other.
Church and state, the two pillars
upon which our civilization rests,
wore both the objects of the devotion
of Dr. Campbell, for he was a preach¬
er of power as well as an educator of
eminence. His school had its incep¬
tion 'way hack in 1S87 in a small
one-room building at Buie’s Creek,
and here its founder toiled day and
night for J2 long years, laying broad
and deep the foundation of the insti¬
tution upon which the later superstruc¬
ture was to he reared. Then one day
there was proved tho truth of the
Scriptures: "Whom God loveth he
ehnsteneth," for the cracklo and roar
of the flames reduced the labor of the
years to ashes. But its founder was
neither disheartened nor discouraged.
Laboriously, here a little and there a
little, he again built tho institution
which now Wars his name; and be¬
fore he passed to his great reward he
had built a school whose physical as¬
sets were valued at more than half a
million, and whoso moral worth to the
state cannot !><• measured.
An Active Life
Moreover «luring all his life he
served at least four country churches,
some of his pastorates extending more
than forty years, and he baptized
more than six thousand people, includ¬
ing twelve hundred of his own stu¬
dents. He managed to find time for
yet other activities, serving ns Su-
Eerintendcnl of Public Instruction in
lamctt; he was the able head of the
State Anti-Saloon League; he was for
years the beloved Chairman of the
Board of Trustees of Wake Forest
College. In the intervals Iwtwccn other
tasks, he served as president of a bank,
and ran a fivc-hundred-acre farm. He
also found the time to serve as men¬
tor, friend and counsellor to all
Front of the Administration Build
ing, Campbell College.
Cape Fear, und those who had prob¬
lems on their hands or perplexing
troubles with which to contend,
trod the beaten path which led to
Campbell's door, and he was to all
that section as the shadow of a great
rock. What a man! What a life! He
took for his motto:
"Ho builds ton low who builds be¬
low the .stars."
In the fall of 1026 the institution
added a year of college work, and in
that same year the Baptist State Con¬
vention authorized the advancement
of the institution to the rank of a
Junior College, and the change of its
name to CainpMl College so that a
great name might be forever pre¬
served as a cherished memorial in tin-
hearts of Carolina Baptists. During
his lifetime Dr. Campbell conveyed
the property to Carolina Baptists,
and vested in his Lord the work of hi>
life.
Today the college is fully accredit¬
ed by and is a member of the South¬
ern Association of Colleges; the
North Carolina College Conference;
the American Association of Junior
Colleges; and it cooperates fully with
the Senior Baptist Colleges of Wake
Forest and Meredith.
The philanthropist, Bowman Grey
of Winston-Salem, was not the only-
citizen of the twin city whose generous
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