Hi everyone- today we are happy to introduce you to three new small audiovisual collections available from the Spreading the Word project here at the Atlanta University Center Robert W. Woodruff Library!

We have written in a previous blog post about the Levi and Jewell Terrill collection. This couple were longtime workers of the General Missionary Baptist Convention of Georgia (GMBCGA) and the National Baptist Convention USA. These three recordings that accompany this collection contain a GMBCGA meeting and two church meetings. They feature guest speakers, departmental reports, testifying, singing, and call and response between the leader and the congregation- great content that compliments many of the other church collections in the project, no matter what the denomination.

The smallest collection is just one tape, a microcassette to be exact, from the collection with the longest name, the Atlanta-Rome District Christian Methodist Episcopal Church Collection. This cassette features an interview with church worker Reverend L. W. Jay. In the interview he talks of his appointments within the church beginning in the 1950s. He recalls his movement to different churches within the district and the culture of the congregations within. Don’t forget to check out the photographs that compliment this collection- you can find both the recording and the photographs here.

And last but not least are 10 recordings from the James H. Costen Collection. Dr. Costen was the fifth president of the Interdenominational Theological Center (ITC). He was a graduate of Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte, NC, where he was awarded his Bachelors and Divinity Degrees. After serving pastorates in Rocky Mount, NC, and Atlanta, GA, Costen stepped to the forefront of a national movement to prevent the closure of the Johnson C. Smith Seminary when it was threatened with closure because of declining enrollment and financial problems. The seminary survived, but was moved to Atlanta and made part of ITC, where Costen would serve as the Dean. In 1983, Costen was elected president of ITC, a position he held until his retirement in 1998. Under his leadership, ITC’s enrollment grew from 175 students to about 400, and its annual budget shot up from about $1.7 million to almost $6 million. Also during Costen’s tenure, a series of capital improvements (including an endowed education center) were made. The recordings in this collection are of Dr. Costen interviewing predominant members of the Presbyterian Church around the area of the former location of Johnson C. Smith Seminary in Charlotte, North Carolina, where they talk about the state of the church and Black Presbyterianism. An interview of interest here is Dr. Costen interviewing another Presbyterian clergy that is part of the Spreading the Word collections, Reverend Hercules Wilson! Wilson was an early graduate of Biddle University and is in his mid-90s at the time of the interview.

Dr. Costen’s collection is currently being processed, but in the meantime, we hope you enjoy these recordings and the many pictures of him that you can find throughout the Spreading the Word collections. Hint: enter “Costen” in the search box in the upper left side of your screen when you are on the project’s landing page. Looking forward to telling you about more collections soon!