Digital Humanities Commons^™

Series Ii(A). Sermons. Folder 4. Sermons, N.D., Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains typescripts of 8 sermons. Titles and texts include “The Old-Fashioned Way” (Jeremiah 6:16), “Family Religion” (Mark 5:19), “Reasons for Missions” (Mark 16:15), and “His Riches—Our Riches” (2 Corinthians 8:9).

Series Ii(A). Sermons. Folder 3. Sermons, N.D., Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains typescripts and handwritten notes for approximately 10 sermons. Titles and texts include “It is Not Good that Man should be Alone” (Gen. 2:18), “A New Commandment I Give unto You” (John 13:34), and a “Commencement Sermon” and “A New Year’s Message” (no texts specified).

Series Ii(A). Sermons. Folder 2. Sermons, N.D., Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains typescripts and handwritten notes for approximately 10 sermons. The texts come from both the Old and New Testaments; titles include “How to Get Saved,” “The Blessing of Suffering,” “The Home,” and “After that the Judgment.”

Series Ii(A). Sermons. Folder 1. Sermons Of M. Homer Cummings, 1937-1960, Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains typescripts of approximately 10 sermons, some of which appear to be unfinished. Most of the ones that are dated were preached in 1937, with others delivered in 1940, 1941, and 1952.

The texts for the sermons come from throughout the Old and New Testaments. Two of the sermons are about the new year; the rest are on such domestic topics as “the home,” “the mother,” “the wife,” “the father,” and “the ideal husband.”

Series I. Personal Materials. Folder 7. Miscellaneous Material Of Rev. M. Homer Cummings, Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains approximately 15 miscellaneous items, including an unfinished sermon on Job; several poems; and ledger pages detailing Cummings’ account with the E. E. White Coal Company of Glen White, WV.

Series I. Personal Materials. Folder 6. Trevecca College Materials, 1959, Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains 4 documents from Cummings’ time at Nashville’s Trevecca College (formerly the Literary and Bible Training School and now Trevecca Nazarene University), from which he graduated in 1909. They are an “examination on theology,” what appear to be two versions of an “examination on homiletics,” a sermon on “the consequences of obedience and disobedience,” and the text of a speech he gave upon his graduation (and which he delivered again at Trevecca fifty years later).

Series I. Personal Materials. Folder 4. Methodist Church Conference Materials, N.D., Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The title of this folder may be somewhat inaccurate. It contains not “church conference materials,” but an essay on hymns, a brief handwritten letter to a Mrs. G. N. Shirey, and typescripts of approximately 10 sermons. Titles and texts include “Taking Offence at Christ” (Luke 7:29), “The Gospel Invitation” (Matthew 11:28-30), and “The Immortality of the Soul” (Job 14:14).

Series I. Personal Materials. Folder 3. Correspondence, 1922-1968, Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains one of Cummings’ “Our Weekly Message” newspaper columns and approximately a dozen letters written to or about him. They were composed between 1922 and 1968; topics include an invitation to become the pastor of a church in New Martinsville and several matters related to his hymnwriting work.

Series I. Personal Materials. Folder 2. Articles About Family Of M. Homer Cummings, 1922-1968, Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains 4 newspaper articles about members of Cummings’ family. There is a photograph of his grandson and great-grandson (Melville Homer Cummings III and IV) at the Cabell County courthouse on an unspecified election night; an article about Dr. Melville H. Cummings); an article about Lt. M. Homer Cummings, Jr’s experiences in Germany, including a visit to the Nuremberg war trials.

Series I. Personal Materials. Folder 1. Articles About Reverend M. Homer Cummings, 1923-1978, Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains approximately 40 newspaper articles about Cummings. The few that include identifying information were published in the Charleston Gazette, the Huntington Herald-Advertiser, and the Coalwood-Caretta News, with dates of publication ranging from 1935 to 1963.

The articles cover such topics as Cummings’ moves from Fayetteville to Williamstown and from Glasgow to Huntington, his 25^th and 50th anniversaries in the ministry, and his work as a composer of hundreds of hymns. The newspapers also published the complete texts of several of his sermons.

Uniting Conference Addresses, David Frederick Wertz

Uniting Conference Addresses

This volume contains 8 addresses by 4 speakers: the bishop of the West Virginia Area, the dean of the Duke Divinity School, the “minister of reconciliation” for the West Virginia Area, and the superintendent of the Buckhannon District.

Trinity Church, Huntington, West Virginia: Something Of Its Story, James Rodgers Haworth

Atkinson, Robert Poland, 1927-2012

This is Chapter XVI of Haworth's history of Trinity Episcopal Church from its beginnings in 1869 through the early 1960s. The book focuses primarily on the rectors who have served the church over the years; there are also chapters with such titles as “The Building of the Church,” “The Vestrymen,” “The Women,” and “The Sunday School.”

Trinity Church, Huntington, West Virginia: Something Of Its Story, James Rodgers Haworth

Tyler, S. Roger, 1878-1963

This is Chapters XI-XIV of Haworth's history of Trinity Episcopal Church from its beginnings in 1869 through the early 1960s. The book focuses primarily on the rectors who have served the church over the years; there are also chapters with such titles as “The Building of the Church,” “The Vestrymen,” “The Women,” and “The Sunday School.”

Thoughts Ii, S. Roger Tyler

Tyler, S. Roger, 1878-1963

According to the Preface, this book was “prepared in response to a number of requests which have come from Dr. Tyler’s friends and from those who have read the first volume, which was published in 1963” (p. v). Like its predecessor, it is a collection of articles published in two newspapers: the Advertiser in Huntington, West Virginia, and the Gazette in Charleston. Those articles were shortened versions of “sermons prepared and delivered by Dr. Tyler over a period of sixty years in the ministry.”

Thoughts, S. Roger Tyler

Tyler, S. Roger, 1878-1963

According to the title page, the book is a collection of articles published in two newspapers: the Advertiser in Huntington, West Virginia, and the Gazette in Charleston. Those articles were “based on sermons prepared and delivered by Dr. Tyler over a period of sixty years in the ministry.”

Sermons For Special Sundays, John Agee Holt

Holt, John Agee, 1920-2012

The 14 sermons in this collection “were first preached to…the Luther Rice Memorial Baptist Church of Silver Spring, Maryland” (Preface). They were thus delivered outside Appalachia; they are included in the Library to help illustrate the full range of Holt's preaching.

Seven Words, John Agee Holt

Holt, John Agee, 1920-2012

According to the Preface, “This book is based on a series of pre-Easter messages first delivered to…the Luther Rice Memorial Baptist Church of Washington, D. C.” They were thus preached outside Appalachia; they are included in the Library to help illustrate the full range of Holt's preaching.

Children's Sermons In Stories, Julius Fischbach

Fischbach, Julius, 1894-

The Preface states that “The stories presented in this collection were given to the children of the First Baptist Church, Lansing, Michigan, during the morning worship programs” (p. 7). They were intended to be “always in harmony with the theme of the morning sermon,” and to add “color and attractiveness” to the messages delivered to the adults (p. 8).

The sermons were delivered outside Appalachia, but Fischbach has significant ties to the region, so they can be included in the Library.

Sermonettes For Boys And Girls, Julius Fischbach

Fischbach, Julius, 1894-

According to a newspaper article included in Marshall’s copy of the book, Sermonettes is the “third of Dr. Fischbach’s books to be published in the field of religious teaching for boys and girls.” As he writes in the Foreword, “It is hoped that many of the boys and girls themselves will honor the book by reading its pages. It has been a labor of love, because there is no finer audience than the children of our churches and our firesides.”

It is likely that the sermons were delivered outside Appalachia. Fischbach, however, has significant ties to the region, so they …

Squaring Up: Fifty Talks To Juniors, Julius Fischbach

Fischbach, Julius, 1894-

In the Foreword, the editors describe this collection as a “series of simple and interesting talks” that shows how much Fischbach “understands and likes boys and girls.” A newspaper clipping pasted into the inside back cover ends with “We congratulate him upon this contribution of his to the children’s work not alone in our church but throughout the denomination as well.”

It is likely that the sermons were delivered outside Appalachia. Fischbach, however, has significant ties to the region, so they can be included in the Library.

God’S Marvelous Grace To Me, John Franklin Woods

Woods, John Franklin, 1865-

According to the Preface, the idea for this volume came about in 1935, when Woods shared his “life history” at a meeting in Dover, Delaware. In his Introduction, W. L. Surbrook declared it a success, writing that “Rev. Woods’ clear enunciations, positive interpretations and pointed declarations of rugged Gospel Truth make this volume a valuable asset to anyone’s library.”

The book contains 7 sermons and 5 chapters of autobiography/memoir. Information about the sermons is provided in the User Guides.

Address Of Dr. J. Layton Mauzé To Congregation Of First Presbyterian Church, Huntington, West Virginia, Sunday Morning, Sept. 9, 1928 / Farewell Sermon, Dr. J. Layton Mauzé To Congregation Of First Presbyterian Church, Huntington, West Virginia, Sunday Evening, Sept. 9, 1928, Joseph Layton Mauze

Mauzé, Joseph Layton, 1873-1937

As the title indicates, this privately-published book contains what are probably the last two sermons Mauzé preached as the pastor of the First Presbyterian Church.

Voices From Templed Hills: Selected Sermons, G. E. Bartlett

Voices from Templed Hills: Selected Sermons

The 14 pastors in this collection were chosen by votes collected over a period of 6 weeks by The Baptist Banner, a weekly newspaper based in Parkersburg, West Virginia (Bartlett edited the paper for a time, and the Banner Company was the publisher of the book).

Two of the pastors were from Parkersburg; other cities represented include Beckley, Charleston, Fairmont, Grafton, Huntington, Logan, Salem, and West Union.

Men And Religion To-Day And Fifty Years Ago, Wiley Winton Smith

Smith, Wiley Winton, 1855-

This book contains 10 of Smith’s sermons, along with “A Sketch of Towns” where he conducted revival services and statements from pastors familiar with his preaching.

Sermons And Discourses Delivered By Rev. H. B. Altmeyer Principally On The Gospels, Feasts Of The Church And The Lives Of The Saints During The Last Ten Years, Henry B. Altmeyer

Altmeyer, Henry B., 1870-1930

Altmeyer published his first collection, Sermons Delivered Before Mixed Congregations, in 1911. In the Preface to this volume, Henry A. Brann, Rector of St. Agnes' Church in New York, notes that this one had been printed at the request of many of his fellow clergy. Brann goes on to describe the sermons as "correct...clear, terse, and plain," effectively combining "the study of the dogmatic with the ethical teaching of the church."

John William Carter, D.D.: Sketches Of His Life, Estimates Of His Character And Work, Selections From His Sermons, T. C. Johnson

Carter, John William, 1836-1907

Carter married Johnson’s sister Elizabeth in 1869. This “memorial volume” is divided into 3 parts: a “sketch of Dr. Carter’s life,” 6 “estimates of his character and work,” and 7 “selections from his written sermons.” Information about the sermons is provided in the User Guide.