# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1905_S112
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

112 Proceedings of the 26th General or

...of 8,000 inhabitants), worth at least $35,000.00. No debts encumber the property. The building was erected in 1894, so it is not yet old.

"2. St. John's College has so far sent its graduates to St. Louis, fifteen in all. (Some others have entered at Springfield.) St. John's College has thus so far fulfilled the function of a full college-preparatory school. This was made possible by the fact that the classes were mostly small and the teachers each took on as many as 40 hours a week, the director 30.

"3. May the Reverend Synod now let St. John's College continue as a full college-preparatory school, or rather expand it. To be sure, full college-preparatory schools already exist, but the time has surely come when, in the large German Synod, which after all branches out over the whole of the United States and even into Canada, a full college-preparatory school with a predominantly English curriculum has become a necessity — so that young men who have lost the German language entirely, or for the most part, or who never had the opportunity to learn it, are given the opportunity to prepare themselves for the holy preaching office. This is not meant to say that as little German as possible, rather that as much German as possible, should be taught at this institution — as is in fact the case, since the graduates are able to follow the German lectures at St. Louis without significant difficulty, and indeed for the most part can preach in both languages. Some of them have taken over German congregations; others could do so.

"4. Were St. John's College to be reduced to a mere lower preparatory school, this would, apart from discouraging the institution's teachers and benefactors (the late founder had hoped to see the institution expanded into a seminary), be a severe blow to its present students. Six of them, five of whom have the preaching office in view, are entering the senior class and, because the curriculum elsewhere is different, could not readily be transferred to another institution.

"5. Furthermore, cutting back the institution would not necessarily mean a reduction in expenditures, unless one or more of the teachers were also to be called away. That would mean starting the institution all over again.

"6. No — when one considers that the immediate territory of this institution includes southern Kansas, Oklahoma, as well as Texas and the Southwest, and further, that this territory would be extended to the whole country should the institution be regarded as the English college-preparatory school of the Reverend Missouri Synod, then the Reverend Synod will surely find the courage to appoint at least one more teacher here.