wfn.org | Richard S. Rust, a minister with a mission

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Oct. 3, 2000 News media contact: Thomas S. McAnally·(615)742-5470·Nashville,
Tenn.     10-31-71BP{449}

NOTE: Photographs are available for use with this story.

A UMNS Feature
By W. Michael Born*

In 1866, only a year after the cannons of the Civil War had been silenced, a
small group of dedicated Methodist missionaries traveled from Cincinnati to
Holly Springs, Miss. Their goal was to educate former slaves and their
children. Members of the Freedmen's Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, they started a school in Asbury Methodist Episcopal Church in Holly
Springs. 
 
The new little school accepted adults as well as children for instruction in
elementary subjects. In 1867, it moved from the church to its present-day
campus, and in 1870 was chartered by the state of Mississippi. Twelve years
later, the college was named in honor of the Rev. Richard S. Rust of the
Freedmen's Aid Society.  

Located in Holly Springs, a town with a population of 7,261, Rust College is
now an accredited four-year, co-educational liberal arts college, the oldest
of 11 historically black United Methodist-related colleges and universities.

Rust was the founder of the Freedmen's Aid Society and its sole
administrator during the organization's early years. He selected the sites
and secured the lands for a number of African-American colleges and
seminaries in the South. He and his fellow Methodist missionaries put their
lives in danger by teaching former slaves how to read and write.

But just what do we know about this Methodist minister for whom Rust College
is named? 

Research indicates three major interests in Richard Rust's life: education,
helping African Americans and preaching. Born in 1815 in Ipswich, Mass., he
was a descendant of English settlers who had come to the Massachusetts Bay
Colony in 1635. At age 9, he was orphaned and went to live on an uncle's
farm. After a few years, he left the farm to take an apprenticeship in
cabinetmaking. In those days, apprenticeships were generally for seven
years, and any unused portion could be bought from the master craftsman if
desired. Eager for an education, young Richard saved his earnings and
purchased the unused portion of his contract so he could attend school.  

He enrolled in Phillips Academy, a non-denominational school in Andover,
Mass. His active interest in anti-slavery can be traced to his academy days.
It was there he attended a lecture given by George Thompson, an anti-slavery
leader from England. In 1834, Thompson conducted a lecture tour in the
northern states, where he is credited with the formation of more than 150
anti-slavery societies. Following Thompson's visit to Andover, Rust took
part in forming an anti-slavery group on campus. The students' activities so
upset the faculty that a call was issued for the group to disband. Refusing
to do so, Rust and two other students were expelled in 1834. 

Rust then journeyed to Canaan, N.H., to enroll in Noyes Academy, a new
school open to African Americans as well as white students. Local
abolitionists, who sponsored the school, believed all youth should be
educated with no regard to race. But there was growing fear among many
Canaan residents that the presence of African Americans would lead to
interracial dating and that African huts would soon be built along the main
street of the community. 

Although the school did open, opposition grew. In August 1835, a committee
of local citizens, encouraged by outside agitators, closed the school. With
a large number of oxen, an angry mob pulled the school building off its
foundation and carried it down to the town common. The building was then
burned. Rust and the other students were fortunate to have escaped with
their lives. 

Still determined to receive an education at an institution sympathetic to
his anti-slavery views, he went south along the Connecticut River to
Wilbraham, Mass., to enroll in Wesleyan Academy. The school, operated by the
New England Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, was home to a
number of faculty and students opposed to slavery. Some years later, the
campus became a station on the Underground Railroad for fugitive slaves on
their way to Canada. At the academy, Rust became an active Methodist.    

Upon completing his studies at the academy, he traveled south to Middletown,
Conn., to enroll in Wesleyan University, the first Methodist institution of
higher education to begin classroom work. While a student, Rust earned money
giving anti-slavery lectures. And in his junior year, he compiled a book
entitled Freedom's Gift or Sentiments of the Free, which contained verse and
prose by William Lloyd Garrison and other anti-slavery writers. 

The book also included a lecture by Rust to a Connecticut anti-slavery
group, which he urged, "When the history of the anti-slavery reform is
written, I ardently desire that there may be, as in the New Testament, a
large book of Acts. Let the abolitionists of Connecticut see to it that they
are well represented there."  

After graduation in 1841, he obtained a trial ordination in the New England
Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church and served Massachusetts
pastorates in Springfield and Worcester. During this time, he gained a
reputation as a powerful preacher. He also founded and edited an annual
publication, The American Pulpit, which published sermons by Christian
ministers.
 
Drawn by his love of education, Rust moved in 1846 to Northfield, N.H., to
become principal of the New Hampshire Conference Seminary of the Methodist
Episcopal Church. (Known today as Tilton School, the seminary moved in 1864
from Northfield across the Winnepesaukee River to the town of Tilton.)
According to school records, Rust was remembered by alumni as having seen to
it that all his students became abolitionists. 

While serving as principal of the seminary, he was appointed by the state of
New Hampshire as commissioner of common schools. In 1847, he was credited
with the passage of a state law requiring all towns to pay the tuition of
students who had to attend school in another community in order to receive
an education. 

Also at this time, Rust met a young woman who was destined to become one of
the most famous women of the day. She was Mary Baker Glover, who became Mary
Baker Eddy, the founder of the Church of Christ, Scientist. She was living
with her family in nearby Sanbornton Bridge. Her husband had died in North
Carolina, and she had returned to her parent's home without financial
resources.

Soon after Rust, his wife and two sons moved to the area, they became
friends of the Baker family. Mary's father, Mark Baker, was a staunch
Congregationalist. Although he and Rust differed greatly on religious
principles, Baker extended the hand of Christian fellowship to the new
principal and his family.  

Rust asked Mary Glover to substitute for one of his teachers. He was so
pleased with her teaching abilities that he encouraged her to start a school
for infants, an early version of today's pre-schools. Rust complimented her
for "the high moral and religious instruction" that she gave his son,
Richard, who attended the little school. That son later followed in his
father's footsteps as a minister and a leader in the Methodist Episcopal
Church. 

Years later, in 1875, Eddy sent Rust a copy of her newly published book,
Science and Health that explained the teachings of Christian Science. She
received a friendly reply from Rust. She also met with him in 1902 at her
home, Pleasant View, in Concord, N.H.  The meeting was warm and friendly,
ending with them singing together a number of old gospel hymns, including
"He Leadeth Me" and "I Love to Tell the Story." 

During this time, he became friends with a Christian Scientist in
Cincinnati, Mrs. Rachel Marshall, who recalled what he said about the
meeting with Eddy: "She was so dignified, yet so gracious. She seated
herself beside me and I saw it was the same dear Mary whom I had known in
former years. I tried to impress the thought that having so much influence
in the world, she ought in some way to state definitely in her writings that
she was still clinging to the good old faith of her forefathers and the
Bible. And she answered me in the kindest tones, 'Why, that is exactly what
I am doing!'  I feel so lifted up since I saw her and rejoiced in the
comfort we were receiving through Christian Science."

As a Methodist, Rust most likely felt comfortable with Eddy's interest in
spiritual healing, given John Wesley's frequent mention in his writings of
the spiritual roots of sickness. 

After Rust completed his term as principal of the seminary, he returned to
the pastoral ministry serving churches in New Hampshire and northern
Massachusetts. But his concern for African Americans eventually won out over
his preaching assignments.  

He asked to be transferred to the Church's Cincinnati Conference in1858 and
soon played a major role in founding Wilberforce University, an institution
whose purpose was to educate former slaves. The university, named after the
18th century English statesman and abolitionist William Wilberforce, was
jointly sponsored by the Methodist Episcopal Church and African Methodist
Episcopal (A.M.E.) Church. Before becoming its first president, Rust served
as chairman of the new university's board of trustees.  

In what was to become his approach of inclusiveness as he helped former
slaves and their children, Rust worked closely with African-American leaders
including Bishop Daniel A. Payne of the A.M.E. Church and Ashland Keith of
the Negro Baptist denomination. Rust stepped down as president in 1863 when
the A.M.E. Church bought the university. Wilberforce continues today as the
nation's oldest private African-American university.  It is also interesting
to note that Rust's two sons attended the school from 1859 to 1860.

Rust devoted his life to helping former slaves in the South. In establishing
Rust College, he worked closely with the African-American minister there,
the Rev. Moses Adams. And believing that schoolteachers should evangelize as
well as educate, he took a leadership role in establishing as many as 14
colleges for teachers throughout the South.  In 1882, it was estimated that
three-quarters of a million African-American children had been or were being
taught by teachers sent out by these schools.
 
#  #  #

*Born, a researcher with the Mary Baker Eddy Collections and Library of The
First Church of Christ, Scientist in Boston, has had a long communications
career in higher education as well as for the church. He is also a former
reporter with The Christian Science Monitor. This feature article resulted
from some of his recent research on Mary Baker Eddy's contact with Christian
ministers.    

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United Methodist News Service
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