This research guide is a finding aid for Stetson's recordings of the James A. Stewart and Howard Thurman Lecture series, as well as archival materials related to the lectures. Recordings listed in this guide belong to the duPont-Ball Library's Stetson Collection. They are available on DVD and may be used within the library. To access these recordings, contact the Archives & Special Collections department by phone (386-822-7191), email (archives@stetson.edu), or in person. You may also request these items from the circuation desk.
The Stewart Lectures were initiated in 1990 by the Riverside Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Florida, alumni and friends of the University, as an effort to honor the memory of Dr. James A. Stewart, Stetson University's first chaplain. Dr. Stewart served as Dean of the Chapel from 1955-1965 and taught in the Philosophy Department. The Stewart Lectures were administered under the leadership of Dr. Dixon Sutherland, director of the Institute for Christian Ethics. The lecture series sought to bring leading voices of ethical values to campus.
The Howard Thurman Program at Stetson was established in partnership with New Birth Inc., a national board of African-American leaders headed by Reverend Jefferson Rogers. Through the program, Stetson worked to extend the legacy of Dr. Howard Thurman, who led the leaders of the American Civil Rights movement. Thurman, a Daytona Beach native, was a spiritual adviser to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and was hailed as one of the greatest pastors of the twentieth century. He was the first African American Dean of the Marsh Chapel at Boston University and co-founder of The Fellowship Church for All Peoples in San Francisco, the first interracially co-pastored church in America. Through the Howard Thurman Lecture series, Stetson hosted world-class speakers who challenged the University's internal as well as external audiences to seek solutions to social, religious, and ethnic problems both in America and around the world. In addition to public lectures, each speaker would visit classes or hold workshops with Stetson students and faculty, offering them new perspectives on social justice and encouraging them to bridge the intellectual work of the classroom to work in forwarding justice in the world. Thurman speakers included Derrick Bell, Taylor Branch, Angela Davis, John Lewis, Fred Shuttlesworth, Randall Robinson, Andrea Young, and Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael).