This book is published by a conservative Baptist press and authored by two conservative Baptist seminary professors, products of the movement they cover. The book is based on rigorous scholarship, complemented by the authors' inside knowledge of their subjects. Even when discussing theological liberals and other opponents of Baptist fundamentalism, they are for the most part balanced in their assessment. They acknowledge that at times they tell what they know without adequate documentation. “[H]ere and there,” they write, “we have told the story as we know it to be, even if we cannot quite prove it” (10). Other scholars will need to proceed with caution in those places. Still, this book is significant, as it contributes to our knowledge of fundamentalism in at least the following ways.
First, Bauder and Delnay have brought to the fore a couple of historical actors who have been overlooked previously. One in particular is Oliver Van Osdel of the Wealthy Street Baptist Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. In the development of fundamentalism within the old Northern Baptist Convention (NBC) and the formation of the Baptist Bible Union (BBU), Van Osdel was probably more significant than the early fundamentalist stars—William Bell Riley, T.T. Shields, and J. Frank Norris. While those three crisscrossed the country rallying and energizing fundamentalists, Van Osdel worked diligently behind the scenes to build an actual fundamentalist movement in Michigan that became a core part of the BBU. When the BBU fell apart in the early 1930s, and the big three went on to other things, Van Osdel and some of his even lesser known compatriots founded the General Association of Regular Baptist Churches (GARBC).
The GARBC is one of the four denominations or movements covered in this book. The other three are Norris's World Baptist Fellowship (WBF), the much larger Baptist Bible Fellowship (BBF) that broke off from Norris's movement in 1950, John R. Rice's Sword of the Lord (Sword Movement), and, last chronologically, the Conservative Baptist Association of America. All continue to this day.
A second contribution is not original but rather reinforces and demonstrates something nearly all scholars of fundamentalism have accepted since George Marsden's Fundamentalism and American Culture (1980). Simply put, separatism and militancy were central to fundamentalism. Here, Bauder and Delnay provide a new twist. While fundamentalists led by Riley squared off with liberals in the NBC from the 1920s to the 1940s, they fought with each other in the BBU over whether it was necessary to separate from mainline denominations. At the end of the book Bauder and Delnay call this “purge out versus come out separation” (386), a catchy and helpful phrase. Riley represented the purge out, as he fought a losing, and often quixotic, battle to drive liberals out of the NBC. Beginning with Van Osdel and continuing with Robert T. Ketchum and his allies, the GARBC in 1938 required participating churches to come out of liberal denominations, whether the NBC or any other. In one sense, this is merely an example of secondary separation: a refusal to associate with fundamentalists who refuse to separate from liberalism. But tracking this battle between “purge out” and “come out” is instructive, as is documenting once again that fundamentalism was more than adhering to conservative doctrine. It also entailed militancy and separatism.
Third, Bauder and Delnay do an excellent job of connecting the fundamentalist stars with each other, then demonstrating how local networks of churches led by ordinary pastors became more important. Here, they identify another fault line within Baptist fundamentalism. On one side there developed the “Great Man” school, which consisted of denominations formed around, and then dominated by, a powerful personality. On the other were groups that intentionally resisted the dominance of personalities. Taking this distinction further, the authors show that the Great Man approach came from the South, Norris and Rice being the prime examples, and it manifested itself in church polity. In short, southern style fundamentalist congregations tended to be led by a preacher who controlled the church. This southern, Great Man style had influence in the North, with Jack Hyles moving from the Dallas area to Hammond, Indiana; Norris spending fifteen years at Temple Baptist in Detroit; and Rice moving from Dallas to Wheaton, Illinois then to Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Even Riley, who spent nearly his entire career in the North, grew up in Kentucky and attended Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Northern style fundamentalism, by contrast, had little influence in the South.
Fourth, Bauder and Delnay go beyond previous scholars in showing both the influence and destruction wreaked by J. Frank Norris (disclosure: this reviewer is a Norris biographer). Norris appears all over the first several chapters of the book, but chapter eight is titled, “The Norris Legacy,” and it is not pretty. Norris's rhetorical violence, bullying, and unethical behavior among Southern Baptists has been documented before, but not his same activities in the Midwest. There is no surprise here, of course, except that the authors make a fairly strong case that Norris was a serial sexual harasser and possibly engaged in sexual assault in at least one instance. If the fundamentalist heirs of Norris believe their founder has been maligned by non-fundamentalist scholars, they've seen nothing yet. This book documents heavily the extent to which Norris sought to destroy, not just moderates and liberals in the South, but true fundamentalists in the Midwest with whom he had disagreements. As the authors write in their preface, “[Fundamentalism] features fools, predators, toadies, hypocrites, power grabbers, and character assassins as well as humble servants, insightful leaders, and heroic warriors” (14). Norris is the prime example of the bad actors; Van Osdel and Ketchum are among the humble servants. Thankfully, there were far more of the latter.
Scholars of fundamentalism will find this book interesting and useful, as will lay readers and pastors whose Christian identity comes from Baptist fundamentalism—the GARBC, especially, but also the other denominations or movements mentioned above. And, there is more to come, as the authors plan a second volume to bring the story of Baptist fundamentalism from 1950 forward.
