Director of the Archives Glen Pierce ’70 has overseen the day-to-day operations of both the Archives of Messiah College and the Brethren in Christ Historical Library and Archives since 2007. With the help of 3-4 students and community volunteers, he is responsible for securing new acquisitions, cataloging and preserving materials, and conducting research related to Messiah College and the Brethren in Christ Church. Prior to working at Messiah, Pierce worked with Brethren in Christ Missions, the Brethren in Christ Publishing House and the Theological College of Zimbabwe. We sat down with Glen to learn about life as an archivist.
What is a typical day like?
Pierce: Each day is a mix of checking and responding to emails, fulfilling various research requests, finding background information, assigning work to work-study students and volunteers, and cataloging new items into the archives. There is always something to do, and if I get bored with one thing, there are seven other things waiting for me to complete!
What is your favorite part of the job?
Pierce: I am helping to preserve the various aspects of church and college history for the use of current and future researchers. I try my best to help preserve, interpret and make available what has been happening with the Brethren in Christ Church and Messiah College throughout the years.
Do you have a favorite artifact?
Pierce: One of my favorites is a table that was at the front of the Bethel, Kansas, church. In 1894, the Brethren in Christ held their General Conference at Bethel. On the last day Rhoda Lee, a recent convert to the church, was allowed to read a paper urging the church to get involved in foreign missions. At first there was no response to her impassioned plea. But later that day, a man walked to the front of the church and put a $5 bill on this table. As a result, a foreign mission fund was established and three years later, a group of five missionaries were sent to southern Africa, thus beginning the denomination’s first overseas missions venture. Now the BIC church overseas has more members than the North America church.
We also have the diaries of Frances Davidson, one of those first five missionaries. They start when she was in college and continue throughout her missionary service in Africa, including her founding of Macha Mission in Zambia – site of the Malaria Institute at Macha, founded by Messiah alumnus Dr. Phil Thuma ’70.
The oldest items in the archives are two Bibles that are more than 450 years old. Published in Switzerland by Christoph Froschauer, they were known as Anabaptist Bibles and were often confiscated. They are fairly rare, and we have two copies.