Ministry vs. Academia: 52 Ancestors 2026 Prompt “A Turning Point”

 

The Road Not Taken: Ed Jandy’s Choice to Leave the Ministry and Pursue a PhD

Edward Clarence (Jandesek) Jandy: 1899-1980 (Maternal Grandfather)

 

As a young man, and a new husband and father, Edward Jandy stood at the junction of two different paths in life. He needed to make a choice about his long-term career. Should he continue working as a minister, or should he pursue a PhD in the field of sociology with the intent to become a college professor?  

Ed Jandy started his college career at Blackburn College in Carlinville, Illinois. The college only offered two year degrees, so he transferred to Coe College in Iowa to complete his undergraduate degree. He basically started his college career over again, entering as a freshman with only some transferable credits.

Ed in his Blackburn College sweater, with college friends, circa 1922

He began his career in the ministry while at Coe. He became friends with an older student, a Seth Huntington, who was working as a student pastor. Religious discussions turned into true friendship and a job offer. Ed explained in his memoir as follows:

“Somehow an acquaintanceship became a true friendship, perhaps because he learned that I had an interest in religion and the church, as well as in social problems.  He once complimented me by saying that he wished he had my command of language and public speaking, and suggested how important these were for anyone considering the ministry;  peripherally in my mind was the thought that I would perhaps head for the ministry, but the impulse to do so, or the urge, was not a dominating one.

I became a student pastor.  Early in my sophomore year a representative of the Congregational Church contacted me.  He said a small town, Vining, Iowa, 45 miles west of Cedar Rapids, needed an interim pastor.  This man said he had made inquiries around the campus and my name was proposed.  But I am sure it was my good friend Seth Huntington whose recommendation determined the man's visit.  “Why me? And what makes you think I would be interested?”  And so on, he told me to give it some thought.  An English teacher, a woman whose advice I sought, helped me to decide.  “It would be a rich experience for you, help you to sort out some of your religious thinking, and give you invaluable experience as a public speaker,” she pointed out.  “All you do is read some favorite chapters of the Bible, pick out some thought that appealed to you and build your sermon around it.”  By request I went out to Vining one Sunday;  they liked the sermon and me, and invited me to serve until they found a permanent pastor.  This was not a full-time job;  only weekends did I have to go out.

Ed during undergrad years.

Ed remembered his congregation as middle-aged, friendly, and uncomplaining when Ed had no time for pastoral visits. He would drive out on terrible roads on Saturday to a rented room in Vining, where he would prepare notes for his morning’s sermon. In 1925, he married Lorene Smith and they moved to Hillsdale, Michigan where Lorene had a secretarial position. Ed finished his undergraduate degree at Hillsdale. He recalled:

“I was not unhappy to leave the pastorate [in Vining].  Yes, it was a rich experience in interpersonal relations and public speaking.  Too, it helped me to sort out some theological and religious ideas.  I never then or later wrote out a sermon; all was from notes.  Once an outstanding minister from Chicago addressed our student body at Blackburn.  As he spoke, a spring wind blew his notes off the lectern, but he went on as if nothing had happened.  As we left the hall, I determined to myself that the time would come when I too would be able to speak from or without notes.  It did!”

Hillsdale College, Michigan.

He returned to the ministry while at Hillsdale. Ed described his decision as follows:

“A fellow senior about my age was pastor of Congregational Church at North Adams, 8 miles from Hillsdale. He invited me to give a sermon one Sunday during his absence.  I did so and enjoyed the service and the congregation.  This, it turned out, was a "trial" sermon.  Later a committee from this church asked me to take over when my fellow senior left. …I moved to North Adams, house furnished by church, and awaited return of Gram and our daughter. The house was large for our family; cold in winter, heated by a pot-belly stove.”

The Congregational Church in North Adams circa 1920s when Ed was the minister

Ed was first completing his B.A. while working as a minister, and continued once he started graduate school. Hillsdale College was only seven miles or so from North Adams, so he was able to keep up with both endeavors. However, when he started his graduate work at University of Michigan, his balancing act became more difficult. He felt some guilt and regret that he was unable to devote more time and attention to his church congregation. He recalled:

“I had to travel 90 miles from Ann Arbor to Hillsdale every weekend. Fortunately, I did not have a heavy load of pastoral work - visiting members of the congregation, etc. The people of North Adams were good to us, easy to get along with and satisfy. On Saturday afternoons and evenings I would prepare my Sunday messages while in North Adams. Our baby was easy to care for and we used to leave her in the basement alone in her carriage while the service went on, and she generally slept all through the service. After Jimmie Richards came up, things went easier for Gram and released me psychologically from any economic or other worry, to know that Gram now had it much easier in the care of the house and the child.

I sometimes felt guilty over the fact that I put in so little time at the church in North Adams, but the congregation never complained about this. Moreover, my situation now was such that benign neglect was inevitable; my grad work was now the important assignment and necessitated the bulk of my time and energy. Fortunately, our family never had any doubt or conflict over all this. Gram was as happily occupied in her teaching as I was in my University of Michigan work.”

Ed wrote about his choice between two careers: the ministry and academia. He recalled that his faith was formed from regular Sunday School attendance in Chicago. But, he noted, he never felt a true calling to become a minister.

“Let me emphasize that I never was a burning religionist. Though I was mildly intent on going into the ministry in my Blackburn days, even such intent as I still had, began to erode as a freshman at Coe. But my interest in the church and its activities did not diminish. My subsequently becoming a student pastor at Coe and later at Hillsdale eroded rapidly any drift toward the ministry as a career. Further, as church converts might put it, "Many are called but few are chosen”.  My interest in religion became more refined and rational as a result of my growing interest in history, psychology, and philosophy. To sum up this phase of my life experience as a student pastor: it helped me earn a living; it gave me an opportunity to become a good public speaker, to think on my feet, and to speak only from notes, a practice I continued as a university instructor and later professor, all my academic life. Lastly but not least, my interest in religion and the church had a profound and lasting effect upon my moral and social ideals.”

Ed went on to note that religion remained an important influence in his and Lorene’s lives, stating:

“Though I could not pretend to be the quintessence of the church goer, we have supported the church financially for years, and in the past several years I was in charge of an adult Sunday School class and courses in Comparative Religion, The Role of Religion in Life, and even now The Bible and You. Let me emphasize that Gram always had a role in all these decisions and activities, from my early Blackburn days up to now; too, that we grew together in our marriage, both in religion and in socio-political, economic enlightenment.”

Ed and Lorene, early in marriage

Ed’s memoir is an incredible resource that few families have. Most genealogists have only the bare facts that point to job choices and career changes, such as census records showing a new job. The reasons and motivations that led to career decisions remain a mystery. We are fortunate to have this window into Ed’s feelings about the ministry, and why he chose to seek his doctorate and embark on an academic career. It is an especially important resource since my husband, Ed’s grandson, had no idea that his grandfather had ever served as a minister or seriously considered the ministry as a career. It was never discussed during my husband’s lifetime. He even believed his grandfather had never been a religious person. This is a reminder that our understanding of even our living relatives’ lives can be very limited.

Sources:

Edward Jandy Memoir, pgs. 6-8. Held by family.

Family photos, held by family.

Wikipedia photo of Hillsdale College.

Vintage postcard of North Adams Church.

Fifth Avenue Apartments: 52 Ancestors Prompt “An Address with a Story”

 

Our First Home in Texas and Our Daughter’s First-Ever Home: 11530 Vance Jackson Road in San Antonio

 

In response to the prompt “An Address with a Story”, I originally planned to write about my ninth-great-grandfather’s home in New Hampshire, which is now an inn. But after reading Amy Johnson Crow’s email about the prompt, I changed my mind. She wrote, “So many stories are tied to a place. (For me, it would be my Grandma’s house.) What is a place that has special meaning for your family?” Suddenly, I started thinking about how my children won’t remember the first homes they lived in, since they were toddlers when we moved away. I decided they should know about the places that were their first-ever homes when they were born. I decided to start with my daughter, our eldest child, who was born in San Antonio, Texas.

In 1987, Bruce completed his PhD and got a post-doctoral position at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio—more succinctly known as UTHSCSA. We moved from the University of Chicago’s Married Student Housing in Hyde Park to an apartment complex in northwest San Antonio. The complex was known as Fifth Avenue, and it was an attractive collection of two- and three-story tan buildings with white trim set on rolling, wooded terrain.

Our apartment was the second story on the right. Drainage basin visible to right, big trees made the grounds attractive and homey.

Fifth Avenue was quite the change from our apartment in Chicago. We’d been living on the third floor of a brick walk-up at 56^th and Maryland Avenues in Hyde Park, a location at the very edge of the white area surrounding the University of Chicago. Crime was high—the building’s exterior wall had a white emergency phone attached to it, and all you had to do to alert the University Police Department (which was a huge force for a college police department) was to knock the receiver off the hook as you ran by if you were being pursued, which actually happened to students while we lived there. The apartment was old—probably built in the 1920s, with hardwood floors and huge windows. Roaches were a problem. Appliances were ancient.

In contrast, Fifth Avenue was a newer complex with new appliances, including in-unit washer and driers—a huge plus. Our second-floor unit had two bedrooms, one of which was in the third-floor loft area with a view down into the living room. Our cats loved to romp up and down the staircase. We loved the fireplace and the balcony, which looked out on trees and a grassy drainage basin that wandered along the edge of the complex. There were only eight apartments in the building, which kept it quiet, especially since we were at the rear of the building away from the parking lot.

Fifth Avenue Balcony similar to ours. This is a current photo. Complex now called the Henry B. 

The area felt safe and walkable, and I took advantage of that. I would walk along Wall Road, which led downhill to a neighboring complex. Huge live oaks and pecan trees lined the street. Fifth Avenue was conveniently located near a branch of the public library, so I would walk there once a week to find books. The commute to UTHSCSA wasn’t bad, and there was easy access by car to a bank, a drugstore, a supermarket and a church I sometimes attended.

Wall Road and the neighboring complex, Sutton Place. I walked here while pregnant and with the baby.

Here are some of the little stories about our nearly two years there:

When we first moved in, it rained every day for two straight weeks. The drainage area next to our building became a raging stream. My former co-workers in Chicago had talked enviously of my move to “sunny San Antonio”. I started to wonder if we needed to build an ark.

The lot across the street from Fifth Avenue was vacant, but far from empty. The house that was once there had been torn down, but stone and low walls remained, and the land was lushly covered in trees and underbrush. I found an old arbor on the property with a blooming maypop or passion flower climbing it. I had never seen passion flower before, and was delighted. There was also an amazingly fragrant wisteria in bloom there.

Fifth Avenue was the home of the players from the local minor league baseball team, the San Antonio Missions. They were the Double A affiliate of the Los Angeles Dodgers pro team. Most of the players were young and single, and spent a lot of time in the pool area when they weren’t playing ball. They were pretty nice guys—I never heard about any problems from them.

Pool area at Fifth Avenue, favorite hangout for the San Antonio Missions ball players.

There were huge pecan trees growing along the drainage basin, and I couldn’t believe that the nuts would fall and just lay there, uncollected. Pecans were an expensive luxury back in Minnesota, while here they littered the ground and were ignored. I was hugely pregnant with Amanda, but would waddle around in the drainage area with a paper grocery sack, collecting nuts. I’d shell them to eat and to cook with, and sent boxes of them to relatives as Christmas gifts. I also discovered, to my chagrin, that fresh nuts would go rancid in less than a year.  

When Amanda was born, we had the crib upstairs, along with the baby swing. I had a c-section, so shouldn’t have been running up and down the stairs, but I did anyway. When she had colic, I would walk with her in the Snugli, a front-facing baby-carrier, out to Wall Street, and around the outer parking areas of Fifth Avenue. Bruce could hear us returning—the poor little baby would still be crying. I’d put her in her carseat on the dryer as it ran—the vibration from the motor and rotating drum would put her to sleep.

Amanda in her crib in the loft bedroom at Fifth Avenue

Our cats loved Fifth Avenue, although they tried frequently to escape. We bought a harness for Schmutz so we could walk him, but he went berserk every time we put it on him and would flail and contort himself until he somehow managed to wriggle free. He was a regular Houdini. Once he made it to the bottom of the stairs from our front door, and then froze, confused about where to go. He started circling the building, pressed so tightly to the exterior wall, but still streaking faster than our legs could carry us. I think he was even more relieved than we were when we caught him partway through his second circuit around the building and dragged him inside.

The two-story apartment felt more like a house than any other apartment we lived in. It was a good place to start our lives as parents.

Sources:

Family photos.