The quiet revolutionary: Amelia Morton Bishop: following is the story of a simple Texas housewife, mother, sometime denominational worker (especially in the Woman's Missionary Union-WMU), church volunteer, school teacher, university professor, and free-lance writer. (1) That woman, Amelia Morton Bishop, now lives in Austin, Texas. To our way of thinking, she is a quiet revolutionary.

The Early Years: 1920-1950

On New Year's Eve of 2004, Amelia Bishop ("Millie") celebrated her eighty-fourth birthday. (2) She was born on December 31, 1920, in Dallas, Texas, the only child of middle-aged parents, Walter and Alice Morton. In 1926, her father relocated to El Paso where she lived until her 1942 graduation with a degree in journalism from what is now the University of Texas at El Paso.

Millie grew up in what she describes as a Christian home, but her conversion experience occurred in an unlikely place--geography class. Her teacher pointed out Palestine on a map and indicated that this was the place where Jesus had been born and lived. As an eleven-year-old, Millie remembered being filled with joy. Jesus became real to her in that moment.

As the first woman editor of a college newspaper, Millie began a line of unique and interesting life events. Upon graduation, her father told her that if she wanted to work in journalism, she would have to go to a place where the work was, and that place was El Paso. Prospects for employment, along with an offer of a ride with friends, lured her to Los Angeles. Millie lived in an apartment near downtown Los Angeles and looked for work, which did not come quickly. She went to the city news service and was offered a position. The pay was exactly what she was making without work--nothing. The news services, however, promised to send her out on assignments if a news story broke.

Later, a position at the Hollywood Citizen News became available, and Millie went to work as a journalist. One night, the city editor yelled, "Hey, Tex." He then told her that the paper needed someone to cover the Academy Awards. Being resourceful, Millie invited another girl working at the paper to go with her. The girl had a fur coat of her own. Millie's invitation to the girl, however, was conditioned on her friend borrowing her mother's fur coat and allowing Millie to wear her friend's fur coat. Decked out in furs and star-struck, the girls saw numerous celebrities, including Cary Grant, Greer Garson, and Tyrone Power.

After a year in California, Millie, tired of living in tinsel town and homesick for the South, moved to New Orleans. She had visited New Orleans earlier and liked it very much. Upon arriving in her new town, Millie trained as a riveter, but the need for large planes had diminished by the time she finished her training. So she changed jobs and would change jobs about once a year for the next several years. Her places of employment included the Times-Picayune (working in the New Orleans newspaper's classified advertising department); Eastern Airlines; the Retail Credit Company (doing insurance investigation); and a theater group.

While working in public relations for the theater group, Millie met J. D. Grey, the pastor of First Baptist Church of New Orleans. Grey was on the theater group's board of directors, and he soon began encouraging Millie to attend church. Having been raised a Methodist, she was hesitant but agreed to study the matter. She began reading the New Testament, examining Baptist doctrines based on what she was reading. Soon she determined that Baptist views on the Lord's Supper and baptism were closer to the New Testament than the Methodist views. In 1948, Millie joined First Baptist Church and was baptized. Jumping in full force into church activities, she quickly began involved in Sunday School, Training Union, and Young Women's Auxiliary, and she worked on drama presentations.

At about age of twenty-six, Millie began to think about what she was doing with her life. Her parents had both died, and she was responsible to no one but herself. Was she doing anything to make the world a better place? At this point, Millie began to feel a call to full-time Christian ministry. In the early 1950s, the roles generally reserved for women in the church were director of youth or children's ministry, educational director, missionary, or music director. The question for Millie was what path to take. She soon found her answer when her roommate asked Millie to go to Ridgecrest Baptist Assembly in North Carolina with a group of youth. She agreed on the condition that she be able to spend time in the hills praying and thinking, and she resolved not to ask questions. Instead, Millie decided that she would be quiet and listen.

At Ridgecrest, the Saturday evening service that week featured Baker James Cauthen as preacher and Frank Boggs as musician. Immediately upon arrival in the sanctuary, Millie felt the presence of the Holy Spirit. She knew that it was her responsibility to make a public commitment for Christian service, and not to ask questions, and she realized that she had been so busy demanding details that she had not heard the Lord knocking at the door. While still in the mountains of North Carolina, she realized she needed to open the door first. The details, in time, would work themselves out.

Beginning Ministry: Working with Youth, 1951-1956

Following her experience at Ridgecrest, Millie, in 1951, caught a ride to Texas with two friends, one of whom was going to Fort Worth. She cried all the way to the Texas border, for she had no idea what specific course her life would take. Millie did know that she needed to receive additional training.

Interested in the drama emphasis at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Millie settled in Fort Worth and enrolled in the Master of Religious Education program. She stayed in the women's building (dorm), later named for Floy Barnard (3) who wrote "the book" about church drama. (4) Millie became active in all aspects of dorm life, which included a dormwide Young Woman's Auxiliary (YWA) that had ten circles (groups). In her second year at the seminary, she was elected YWA president. While at Southwestern, Millie enjoyed her studies and was greatly influenced by professors such as Floy Barnard; J. M. Price and W. L. House in the school of religious education; Ray Summers (whose course on the book of Revelation was particularly interesting to Millie); Cal Guy in missions (one of his test questions was to name the boat Adoniram Judson had sailed on); and R. T. Daniel in Old Testament.

In the summer of 1951, Millie worked at the Sunday School Board in Nashville, Tennessee, and updated Baptist Student Union (BSU) materials at the request of the BSU national director Kearney Keegan. During her second year in seminary, Millie served as Barnard's graduate assistant and secretary. One of her assignments was to contact J. Ivyloy Bishop in Birmingham, Alabama, and check on his schedule for seminary class visits. When Barnard made this request, Millie responded: "Ivyloy? What kind of name is Ivyloy?" Ivyloy Bishop was employed by the WMU in Birmingham and was serving as the first national Royal Ambassador leader. He did not yet know Millie, but she knew about him. Bishop apparently also had trouble with the name Ivyloy, and at an early age, he had adopted the nickname Jack.

While in seminary, Millie wrote and directed the seminary's 1952 Community Missions play, "Master, Let Me walk With Thee." She also directed the tableaux used at the beginning of each session of the WMU convention. In 1953, she worked with Barnard and wrote the play "Robert and Mary Moffatt." (5)

In 1953, Millie graduated from seminary and soon began writing articles for Home Life magazine and Open Windows. She also gained employment. Eula Mae Henderson at the Texas WMU hired Millie. Henderson became Millie's roommate, her maid of honor, and the subject of a biography that Millie eventually would write. The women had met at a Baptist General Convention of Texas (BGCT) meeting in Fort Worth. Millie was YWA president that year and had participated in the opening calls for worship leaders who would present devotionals at the WMU convention to be held at the Will Rogers Auditorium. Millie became interested in the WMU at that convention. She considered committing her life to be a foreign missionary, but "the door slammed." (6) At this point, another stellar Baptist woman entered the picture, Marie Mathis. Mathis was the Texas WMU president, and would later serve as the president of the national WMU and as president of the women's department of the Baptist World Alliance. Mathis contacted Millie and told her that the young people's secretary of the Texas WMU was getting married and moving to Japan, so that job was now open. With Millie's YWA background, Mathis asked Mille is she would like to be considered for the position. Millie was stunned.

Since the position involved missions, Millie decided to check it out. At the interview, she felt right about the position, and in three or four months, the arrangement was made. She became the young people's secretary for the Texas WMU. An early history of the Texas WMU described her as "new, uncertain, and a little distrustful of herself." (7) However, the hymn-phrase that sustained her (and still does) was, "Hither by thy help I'm come." (8)

While working at the Texas WMU, Millie once again met "Jack" Bishop at various camps and meetings. He had already accepted a position at Wayland Baptist College (now University) when they were married on December 18, 1955, at First Baptist Church of New Orleans in what Eula Mae Henderson called a "denominational wedding." Millie's former pastor, J. D. Grey, performed the ceremony; Mathis served as the mother of the bride; and Henderson was the maid of honor.

Blended Ministry: Teaching in West Texas, 1957-1988

A person's initial reaction to Plainview, Texas, is always telling. Millie had moved from Dallas to E1 Paso to Los Angeles to New Orleans to Fort Worth to Dallas, and in 1955, she moved to Plainview, a small town in the Texas panhandle. Of Plainview, a former Wayland student and friend of Millie once wrote that she felt God was sending her to a place that he did not go with her. For Millie, living in Plainview "was hard at first." (9) She had no doubt that she was in the right place at the right time, because her new husband, Jack, was to have a long and distinguished teaching career there. (10) After several years, Millie realized the strengths of the area and discovered that it was a particularly good place to raise children. She came to love the wide open spaces, the magnificent sunsets, and the ability to look out and see forever.

Following the December wedding, Millie did not immediately join Jack in Plainview. She stayed on part-time with WMU for several months, commuting back and forth to Plainview from Dallas. In 1957, Mille taught her first class at Wayland Baptist College, when the dean asked her to lead a church drama class. She eventually taught religious education courses, freshman English, and journalism.

In 1957, the Bishops' son, Danny, was born, and in 1959, they had a daughter, Judi. (11) Eula Mae Henderson became the official and unofficial godmother to Millie's children, which meant that "all roads led through Plainview for Eula Mae." (12) In 1963, Millie began teaching at Plainview High School. Her courses included English, journalism, and photography. She retired in 1980. (13)

One highlight during those Wayland years was travel. The Bishop family made a deliberate choice to live in a modest home and use their extra money for three big family trips, two years apart. This family pattern was well-known among their friends. The Bishops lived on one salary and saved the other one for travel. In 1967, Jack and his brother-in-law who lived in Hawaii exchanged pulpits for seven weeks, and the Bishop family spent that time on the Hawaiian islands. In the summer of 1970, the Bishops went on a three-month camp trip in Europe, which included visits with missionaries. In 1972, the family went on an archaeological expedition to Tel Aphek (Antipatris) in Israel with George Kelm and his wife. Kelm reported that that both parents and their teenage children enthusiastically participated in the expedition. This trip included a week's stay on the Greek islands and two weeks of touring Israel. The daily schedule at camp began at 5:00 a.m., with an 8:00 a.m. breakfast, refreshments at 11:00 a.m. (Vacation Bible School Kool-Aid, according to Millie), and conclusion to the work at 1:00 p.m. When Millie returned home and caught up on her sleep, she wrote about her family's experiences for the Biblical Illustrator. (14)

Beginning in the 1960s and 1970s, Millie began writing material for the Sunday School Board. In 1963, she wrote with Jack Missions and Me, which explained missions to the intermediate young people. (15) She also participated with Marge Caldwell in writing Speak Out with Marge, and You'll be Gladder that You're Alive. (16) In 1984, Broadman Press published The Gift and the Giver, a book of devotions for women. The dedicatory page reads like Romans 16:

   In Gratitude to God
   For the formative influences of earlier years:
   Childhood-My parents,
   Alice and Walter R Malone
   Young Adulthood-Mary Lee Vines Miller (17)
   The J. D. Greys
   Jinks Mahnker (18)
   Floy Bernard
   For the sustaining influence of a thirty-year friendship:
   Eula May Henderson, sister in Christ and co-laborer;
   For loving influences-my family,
   Ivyloy, Dan, and Judi Lee;
   My Friends. (19)

Three years later, Broadman published Millie's The Flame and the Candle, which included twenty-four meditations. The book was dedicated to Eula Mae Henderson. (20) Millie also wrote a play, Annie Armstrong: Daughter of Destiny, and a biography, Lengthening Legacy, which dealt with Eula Mae Henderson's early life, showing some of the factors that made her the leader she was.

From 1980 to 1984, Millie served as the Texas WMU promotional vice president. She was one of three vice presidents. In 1984, she was selected as the state's president and served until 1988. (21) WMU at the state level is unique in that it has dual leadership: it has a volunteer president elected by the WMU constituency with a tenure limitation, and it has an employed executive director-treasurer selected by the state convention's executive board. During Millie's tenure as president, Joy Phillips Fenner served as the executive director. Upon her election as president, Millie immediately began to say "Joy and I" or "we are considering." Fenner noted, "To Millie it was very important that we not only be perceived as a team, but that we be a team; with her, that was easy to do.... In similar situations, some have enjoyed the 'power' of having certain information and withholding it; we did not play those games. Instead, we trusted each other with confidential information that impacted WMU and missions." (22) Fenner said of this time: "The amazing thing was that often we could not remember whose idea something was ... and it really didn't matter." (23)

During the 1980s, Millie was also a south-wide vice-president of national WMU and a member of the BGCT executive board (1984-1988) and the BGCT resolutions committee (1988). She chaired the south-wide national WMU personnel committee in 1986-1988. In 1985, Millie for the first time presided over the WMU House Party (Texas Leadership Conference). Her friend Eula Mae Henderson was too ill to attend the conference, so the sessions were taped so that this long-time friend and co-worker could observe Millie carrying out her responsibilities.

Millie's years as president included a wide range of activities. She led conferences in Texas, Minnesota/Wisconsin, Utah, and Arizona. She traveled overseas and led conferences in France, Germany, Holland, and Mexico. She worked with Joy Fenner in writing and preparing dramatic presentations. One presentation was a pageant at the Texas Galaxy in San Antonio in 1962, which celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of the Girls' Auxiliary. The stage facilities in the old municipal auditorium were more limited than the visiting leaders had expected. The plan was to have three scene areas, each with a curtain drop at the appropriate time to change a scene. Yet, there were no electronic or even hand-pull curtains, and thus, sandbags had to be used to manipulate the curtains. A stagehand removed a sandbag at the appropriate time to fly the curtain up. Another stagehand on the catwalk dropped a sandbag to lower the curtain. The experience was challenging, frustrating, and much slower than desired. Yet, Millie rose to the occasion with great professionalism and adaptability. (24)

Pseudo-Retirement: 1988 to the Present

Millie taught journalism at Wayland from 1981 until 1985. When Jack retired from Wayland in 1987, the Bishops knew they would eventually move, but Jack was still playing and enjoying golf. Austin, however, became more attractive when their first granddaughter was born there in 1992. The Bishops spent so much time traveling to see her that they decided to relocate to Austin in 1993. They now have four grandchildren.

In 1989, Millie received the BGCT's Elder Statesman Award. The brief biography included in the award program stated, "Simultaneously, she was a member of the Executive Board of the BGCT, served on the Order of Business committee, the Constitution Revision committee, the Long Range Planning committee, and chaired the Resolutions Committee at the BGCT state convention." (25)

In retirement, Millie continues to be active. She participates in both her local church WMU (26) and in the Texas WMU. She is an active member of her church and also serves on the advisory board of the George W. Truett Seminary at Baylor University in Waco. She has served on the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF) of Texas coordinating council and worked with the CBF Global Ministry and Missions Committee. (27) She also served as vice chair of the Baptist Distinctives Committee for the BGCT and as a board member for the Texas Baptist Laity Institute. In 2001, the Amelia Bishop Women's Ministerial Scholarship was created in her honor at Wayland University. (28) The scholarship is awarded to the top female student intending to enter full-time Christian ministry. In 2003, Millie received an award presented by the Baptist Distinctives Committee and Texas Baptist Heritage Center of the BGCT named in honor of Mary Hill Davis for contributions in missions. (29)

Conclusion

Amelia Morton Bishop started out an independent thinker and has remained that. As in her decision to become a Baptist, Millie does not take anyone else's word but instead does her own research and comes to her own conclusions. She started her career in a denominational environment when women's roles were limited. Now she accepts and encourages women in any role, including pastoral roles. She stated, "I believe that if a person is called, that God doesn't ask what gender. He calls you and that's it." She raised her daughter in such an environment, and since the denomination may be even more limiting for women today, she accepts the decision her daughter made to associate with another denomination. (30) In her typical style, Millie hesitates to take credit for the contributions she has made to Baptist life. "The older I get, the more convinced I am that anything and everything we do of merit is because God gave us the capability. He gave us the opportunity, and He took it and went where He wanted with it." (31) In fact, in our interviews with her, she stated more than once that she was not sure that all this attention was appropriate. Ever the teacher, she often turned the questions back to us to get our thoughts and opinions. She said, "I am just an ordinary Joe... maybe it's Jo Ann." (32) Millie became a "traditional Baptist" in the 1950s and has remained so, changing her denominational role and affiliation as denominationalism has changed. She continues to employ the same methods of determining what God expects of her. She reads the Bible and prays. While some eighty-four-year-olds are content to look back on their lives, Millie Bishop is continually growing and learning. (33)

(1.) This paper is respectfully dedicated to two Kent family heroes, Dr. and Mrs. J. Ivyloy Bishop, who have served as parents and grandparents to the family, as examples, and as true friends.

(2.) The information for article was obtained primarily from a personal interview by the authors on November 29, 2004.

(3.) The dorm was named for Dr. Barnard in 1960 when he retired.

(4.) Amelia Bishop, interview with Barrett Kent Border and Dan Gentry Kent, February 7, 2005.

(5.) Roberta Turner Patterson, Candle By Night: A History of Women's Missionary Union, Auxiliary to The Baptist General of Texas 1800-1955 (Dallas: Woman's Missionary Union of Texas, 1955), 132.

(6.) "Oral Memoirs of Amelia Bishop," interview with Judy Barnett, Baylor University Institute for Oral History, July 24, 2001, 8

(7.) Patterson, Candle By Night, 131.

(8.) Amelia Bishop, interview with Barrett Kent Border and Dan Gentry Kent, October 29-30, 2004.

(9.) Ibid.

(10.) Bishop served at Wayland from 1955 to 1980. He was department chairman from 1959 to 1980.

(11.) Judi Lee Bishop was named for Eula Mae Henderson (a family name) and Mary Lee Vines.

(12.) Joy Fenner, e-mail to Dan Gentry Kent, January 5, 2004.

(13.) Dan's son served as Millie's photographer in 1980. They have a mutual admiration society. "Nothing ever slows her down.... Nothing will ever slow that woman down." Lieutenant Commander Blake Warren Kent, telephone interview with Dan Gentry Kent, November 11, 2004.

(14.) Amelia Bishop, personal correspondence with George L. Kelm, December 13, 2004.

(15.) Ivyloy and Amelia Bishop, Missions and Me (Nashville: Convention Press, 1963).

(16.) Marge Caldwell and Ameila Bishop, Speak Out with Marge, and You'll be Gladder that You're Alive (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1976).

(17.) Mary Lee Vines Miller was Millie's roommate in New Orleans and was the city-wide director of the Baptist Student Union there.

(18.) Genevive (Jinks) Mankher was Dr: Grey's secretary at First Baptist Church of New Orleans.

(19.) Amelia Bishop, The Gift and the Giver (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1984), 5.

(20.) Amelia Bishop, The Flame and the Candle (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1987).

(21.) Amelia Bishop, "Presidential Years, 1984-1988," paper presented to the Texas WMU, 2905.

(22.) Fenner, e-mail to Dan Gentry Kent, January 5, 2004.

(23.) Ibid.

(24.) Ibid.

(25.) Brief Biography from 1989 Baptist Statesman Award program.

(26.) Amelia Bishop in 2005 was a member of her church's Archives Committee and Stewardship Committee. She also served as missions support director and was responsible for the five special missions emphases each year.

(27.) R. Keith Parks, e-mail to Dan Gentry Kent, January 31, 2005.

(28.) J. Ivyloy Bishop died in 1999 after an extended battle with Alzheimer disease.

(29.) Ken Camp, "Texas Heritage Awards Honor Bishop, Colton, Craft and Leavell," Baptist Standard, September 5, 2003, http://www.baptiststandard.com/postnuke/index.php?module=html pages&func=display&pid=606&print = 1, accessed November 28, 2004.

(30.) Bishop, interview, October 29-30, 2004.

(31.) "New Ministerial Scholarship Honors Bishop's Leadership, Wayland Baptist University Press Release, May 10, 2001, http://www.wbu.edu/a/a05c/bishop.htm, accessed February 6, 2005. (32.) Bishop, interview, February 7, 2005.

(33.) Millie had bypass surgery on April 19, 2004.

Barrett Kent Border is a former catalog librarian at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Fort Worth, Texas. Dan Gentry Kent is retired professor of Old Testament and Hebrew Studies at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Fort Worth, Texas.