Tehuacana, Waxahachie, San Antonio, James Laurie, John Silber, Jack Stotts, Paul Baker, Chuck McKinley, Raymond Judd, Donna Stockton, JoAnne Russell. Those are just a few names and places associated with Trinity University in San Antonio.
Doug Brackenridge has written a wonderful history of that school, titled Trinity University: A Tale of Three Cities (Trinity University Press, 2004). Founded by Cumberland Presbyterians in 1869, the school’s first location was in the rural community of Tehuacana, Texas, located west of Mexia and southeast of Waxahachie. Its first president was William E. Beeson, formerly president of Chapel Hill College. According to Brackenridge, the name “Trinity University” was an unusual one for 19th century Presbyterians who had traditionally chosen “names for institutions of higher education based on region (Princeton, Wooster, Missouri Valley), individual (Calvin, Lafayette, Macalester, Washington and Jefferson), or historical (Geneva, Westminster).” “Trinity” was chosen because it was “founded by three synods in the name of the Holy Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) and designed to train students in body, mind, and spirit” (p. 18).
Seeking a larger and more transportation-connected location, in 1902 the University moved to Waxahachie, Texas. Because there was a major reunion effort between the northern Presbyterian Church (PCUSA) and the Cumberland Presbyterian Church in 1906 (not all Cumberlands joined in that reunion), Trinity became an institution of the PCUSA. In 1942 Trinity University relocated to San Antonio. Among other reasons, one was the debilitating effect of the Depression with another being the desire to be in a larger metropolitan location. One fascinating aspect to this decision, as Brackenridge records it, was that in 1941 there were serious discussions held regarding the possible merger of Trinity with Austin College, located in Sherman and an institution of the (southern) Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUS). While a majority of those on the joint Synod committee favored such a merger, it was not unanimous. Because the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor created “uncertain wartime conditions” (p. 142), the PCUS withdrew from that conversation.
The PCUSA Synod moved forward with the move to San Antonio with the San Antonio Chamber of Commerce and the University of San Antonio, a Methodist school, agreeing to turn over land and cash amounting to $575,000. The initial location of the University was on Woodlawn Street. Im 1951 James Woodin Laurie, pastor of Central Presbyterian Church in Buffalo, New York, became president and early on presided over the move of the University to its current location on Trinity Hill in 1952. Incidentally, Brackenridge has written a biography of Laurie – Beckoning Frontiers: A Biography of James Woodin Laurie (Trinity University Press, 1976). Laurie served as president from 1951-1970.
The chief designer of the Trinity Hill campus was a local architect by the name of O’Neil Ford (1905-1982). Born in Pink Hill, Texas and raised in Sherman and Denton, Ford graduated from North Texas State Teachers College (now the University of North Texas). According to Brackenridge, Ford “devised a master campus plan that featured integrated architecture and use of the land only for academic, student housing, and recreational purposes…. (A)nd the creation of small, informal, circuitous roads that discouraged public use” (p.186). Laurie and Ford worked well together in the design and construction of 42 buildings by 1968. Incidentally, O’Neil Ford also designed several of the buildings on the campus of the Presbyterian Pan American School in Kingsville. He also designed the HemisFair Plaza in San Antonio as well as buildings on the campus of Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York. He has been called “the most influential Texas architect of the twentieth century” (in David Dillon’s The Architecture of O’Neil Ford: Celebrating Place).
Trinity has had many distinguished faculty members, one of whom was the dramatist Paul Baker. When Laurie recruited Trinity alumnus Baker to come to join the Trinity faculty in 1963, “he promised him a new theater with three states, a set shop, dressing rooms, and production offices” (p. 205, 207), thus elevating the drama department to national recognition.
Other distinguished Trinity alumni include Jack Stotts who went on to become president of McCormick Theological Seminary and Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary; John Silber who became professor of philosophy and dean of the School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin before leaving to become president of Boston University; Chuck McKinley who was ranked the #1 tennis player in the country in 1962 and won the Wimbledon singles title in 1963; Donna Stockton and JoAnne Russell won the U.S. Tennis Association doubles and team championships in 1973; Raymond Judd (Class of 1957) who became the campus chaplain in 1967 and served there for 32 years.
Today more than 2,500 students are enrolled at Trinity.
The Presbyterian Historical Society of the Southwest exists to “stimulate and encourage interest in the collection, preservation, and presentation of the Presbyterian and Reformed heritage” in the Southwest. If you are not a participating member of the Society and would like to become one, the annual dues are $20 per individual and $25 per couple. Annual institutional and church membership dues are $100. Checks may be made out to PHSSW and sent to:
PHSSW – 5525 Traviston Ct., Austin, TX 78738.
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