Seeking to add a liberal arts education to his Bible College background, Billy Graham enrolled in Wheaton College for the fall of 1940. With previous credits from Florida Bible Institute and Bob Jones University, Graham came to Wheaton as a Sophomore, graduating in the spring of 1943.

In 2010, the staff of the Evangelism & Missions Archives at Wheaton College contacted dozens of Graham’s surviving classmates, asking them to fill out questionnaires about their memories of Wheaton in the 1940s and especially their memories of Billy Graham. The staff also taped and transcribed oral history interviews with more than twenty-eight of these classmates. The interviews are all online in the guide to Collection 74 and can be accessed there. Below are excerpts from the interviews, documents, and questionnaires. The excerpts have been edited for length and clarity.

Arrival at Wheaton

Excerpts from a 1953 letter by W. Lloyd Fesmire, class of ’42, Graham’s college roommate:

During the second semester of my junior year (I should say at the outset of the semester) a young fellow named Billy Graham came to Wheaton from the south, a transfer I think from Bob Jones.  He didn’t know anybody at Wheaton and got a room by himself at the home of Dr. Fred Gerstung, the professor of German at Wheaton.  I don’t remember how Billy and I got acquainted, but I do remember he was a rather lonely figure the first month at Wheaton.  We got to be good friends and since Art Melvin (one of the Attic gang) was graduating, I invited Billy to room with me the following year….

Appearance

Jane Stam Miner, Class of ‘46, Collection 74, Tape T62:

The next year, when I was living in North Hall, I’m pretty sure Billy and somebody else delivered our bags because they said “Man on the floor!”  And it was the first time I’d ever heard that. And I noticed what they were wearing and this guy, that I found out later was Billy Graham, had on these old country shoes. You know they were high topped leather. They’re just right in fashion now with what the fellows are wearing but back in those days, most of the boys wore saddle outs with something like that. And I looked at his shoes, and I thought “My goodness, he must be from the farm.” [Shuster laughs]. And sure enough he was!

Excerpts from a 1953 letter by W. Lloyd Fesmire, class of ’42:

Billy was not much of a dresser when in college.  As I remember it he didn’t have many clothes – a couple of suits for Sunday and good, and then a sports shirt and corduroy pants for school.  I particularly remember a pair of brown shoes Billy wore: they were high tops, the kind working men wear on a construction job.  We could never figure out why he wore them, but he said they were good.

Betty Kraklan Dresser, class of ’46, CN74, Tape T66:

INTERVIEWER: Well what did he look like? What was his physical appearance at that time?
DRESSER: That time? Well he was tall and thin and very nice looking. Had a shock of hair, blond hair combed back. And had an intensity about him, I guess you could say.
INTERVIEWER: How do you mean intensity?
DRESSER: Well [pauses] he was just…I guess you’d say passionate would be the feel that was just around him. I guess enthusiasm. I don’t know how else to describe it…..  I think it was obvious.

The Lane Family

Graham found a home away from home with the Lane family in Wheaton, who had an early morning prayer service and an open dinner for students every Sunday. Mortimer Lane was Professor of Political Science and Economics at Wheaton College.

Grovenor Rust, class of ’44, CN74 Tape T72:

RUST:  That brings up the connection with Mortimer Lane’s home and the Tab and so forth because Billy was often times present at the little breaking of bread service that would be at the Lane’s home along with me and others….  Because you know, the Lanes were of the Plymouth Brethren persuasion. Brethren…have the sense…of the New Testament church…where on the first day the disciples gathered together to break bread and to worship…..  And individual men spoke as they were led by the Spirit to respond to passages of Scripture. Most of it centered around the death and resurrection and the power of Christ in connection with the origin of the church. When He said “do this in remembrance of me,” that He meant that and that the Plymouth Brethren usually have that Breaking of Bread service, what is normally called the Communion or the Eucharist….  Sometimes Graham would be there and leave the rest of us because the Lane meeting was very early Sunday morning.

INTERVIEWER How many people were usually at the services of the Lane house?

RUST: I would say, as I remember as many as twenty-five or thirty or so. The Lanes lived in a large, very large house, which is no longer standing in Wheaton….  A large old mansion that had been built there and that living room is where many of us gathered…..

INTERVIEWER Now I know the Lane’s also had students over at the home on Sunday evenings for dinners. Is that right?

RUST: Oh yes, we were there a number of times. [laughs] And one time, a young couple came walking in the door and Mommy Lane didn’t recognize her but she said, “Why don’t you sit down and have dinner?”  When they got all through, they wondered how much the fee was….  They thought that she was running a restaurant in her house….

INTERVIEWER So were there usually a dozen people there or half a dozen or twenty?

RUST: Oh, it would be a dozen or maybe a few more. I don’t know. She had…the Lanes had a maid service that came. And she had a cook and others, so she was…they had a ministry a ministry of hospitality and encouragement.

INTERVIEWER There must have been a pretty substantial part of the family budget to have twelve people over every Sunday.

RUST: Oh Mr. Lane was…Professor Lane as he was known was teaching at Wheaton for a dollar a year. I don’t know if that’s supposed to be public or not. Maybe that should not have been in there, but at any rate, the Lanes were independent financially.

Charlotte Cook, class of ’42, CN 74 Tape T56

INTERVIEWER Okay. Did you have any classes with Billy Graham?

COOK: My junior year, my cousin came out to Wheaton to attend the academy. And she stayed at the Lane home….

INTERVIEWER This was the home of one of the professors at the college?

COOK: Yes, they were an outstanding family. I forget what his position was at the college. But they had a large home in Wheaton and they were always hosting young people. They had a large dining room table that would hold about twenty. And they were most always had friends in to that table….  Billy Graham was frequently invited to come to this Lane home for dinner….  they invited me to come to the Thanksgiving dinner. And Billy Graham was also there at that dinner.

INTERVIEWER About how many people were at the dinner?

COOK: Oh, twenty at least.

Academics and Student Life

Although continuing to preach and minister off-campus, Billy Graham sought horizons outside Bible studies in his education at Wheaton, joining the Anthropology Department, newly formed under Dr. Alexander Grigolia.

Samuel D. Faircloth, class of ’43, Collection 658, Tape T1: 

FAIRCLOTH: Billy was…let’s say a B or high B student. He was in Anthropology. But the interesting thing is that Billy was a preacher all the time. So now he come in from the weekends into Greek class on Monday morning and Doc [Merwin A.] Stone had us lined up by alphabet in the class. We were in the front row and I was F and he was G. And he’d come in and say, “Sam, give me your notes. I haven’t had chance to bone up. We’re gonna have a quiz.” [Both laugh]

INTERVIEWER Did it work? Did your notes carry him through?

FAIRCLOTH: Yeah, well it must have done it. Yeah. And then in theology classes the…the most famous one was in theology. He came out of [Dr. Henry Clarence] Thiessen’s class one day toward the end of our course. And we were both in upper dining hall. There was a lower and upper dining hall, we were in the upper dining hall. We were in the line, and after class the line was forming and Billy about two or three back of me and the guys were talking about seminary. Some guys are going to Dallas, some guys are going here, there and yonder. Ernie Heimbach, Ernie said, “I’m going to Eastern” and I said, “Yeah, I’m going to Eastern.” And Billy piped up from the back and he said, “I’m not going to semitery!” [Sic, pronounced as a combination of seminary and cemetery] [Both laugh].

Excerpts from a 1953 letter by W. Lloyd Fesmire, class of ’42:

One of the features of “Attic” [nickname for the private home where Graham boarded as a student] life was the bull sessions that covered a wide variety of subjects but usually ended on things of the Lord.  Everybody would get into one room and many were the theological discussions we had. Billy used to contribute to these discussions, but was always ready to listen to the opinions of others, especially those who had Greek or Hebrew.  He was more the practical preacher than the theological student. We all greatly respected his preaching gifts, which were even then very much in evidence.  We had some wonderful prayer meetings together as a group of ‘men whose hearts God had touched.’….

Meeting Ruth Bell

At Wheaton, Graham met and began dating Ruth Bell, fellow member of the Class of 1943. They married shortly after graduating in August 1943 and remained together until her death in 2016.

Helen Stam Fesmire, class of ’43, CN 74 Tape T78:

INTERVIEWER And do you remember when you first met Billy Graham?

FESMIRE: First memory that comes to me is when I lived at Scott House, he must have wanted a date with one of the girls who lived in that place whose name was Ruth. And somebody got him a date with the wrong Ruth. There were two Ruths there. And I remember his coming to the door, and I don’t know why I was the one who came down the steps and answered the doorbell. But anyway, he said “That was the wrong Ruth!” [laughs]. And I just said “Oh, I can fix that up. I’ll get you one with the right Ruth.”

INTERVIEWER And was it Ruth Bell that he was…looking for?

FESMIRE: Right. [Laughs].

Excerpts from a 1953 letter by W. Lloyd Fesmire, class of ’42:

Billy was very much in love, and would talk by the hour (if I would let him) on the beauties and excellencies of Ruth. I myself was in a state to appreciate such sentiments, and so we made good company for one another. Frequently we would study in the library with our fiancés and then walk them home. The first couple home (this is when they were roommates at the Welsh house on Washington) got to use the steps inside; the second one had to keep on walking. Frequently we made a foursome in the dining hall.

Lorraine Houpt Payne, class of ‘46, CN 74, Tape T63:

PAYNE: Well when Billy was preaching, he had invited Ruth to go out for dinner after church. And they were just dating at the time….. So they went out for dinner and when the bill came, Billy reached in his pocket to pay the bill and all he had in his pocket was a dollar. And of course, he was most embarrassed. So he said “Well when I left campus, when I left home, I had a ten dollar bill and a dollar in my pocket. I must have put the ten dollar bill in the offering plate by mistake.” And all he had left was a dollar. So Ruth very quickly spoke up and said “Just remember, you only get credit for one dollar because that was your only intention.” And of course, the big joke on campus was whoever paid the bill? We never got the answer. [Both laugh]….They both were very distinguished looking people. And…I’m not sure how to express that. But in this day and age, you would say they were very conservative in their expressing their fondness of each other. Of course everything was more conservative then than it is now [laughs]. I don’t know how it would be taken today. But it was just a very warm, sincere…private affair with them.

INTERVIEWER How would you describe Ruth? What kind of person was she when you knew her as a student?

PAYNE: Well [laughs] Ruth was very outgoing. She lived in Williston Hall and Helen Stam Fesmire was her roommate. And apparently, Ruth came in one night after the curfew. And she didn’t want to come through the lobby because she didn’t want the house mother to hear her come in. And she lived on the first floor. So she climbed in the bedroom window. And she thought oh she got over this good. But the next morning when the house mother saw [she] said to her, “Ruth, I didn’t see you or hear you come in last night.” So then Ruth had to confess how she got in….  She was a mischief maker. And just full of it . I don’t know how else to describe it. She was really a perfect match for Billy. And she kept him on his toes.

Anna B. Fryga, class of ’44, CN 74, Tape T61:

FRYGA: Ruth had some pretty good advice for me one time when I asked her. You know we were brought up with the idea that that you didn’t…go for extravagant things, you see. I had just come out of the Depression days and my family had really suffered from that. My father lost his job. So when I was on campus, I needed a dress coat and I had found one at Marshall Field’s [Chicago department store] that I thought was nice and had a fur collar [both laugh] That was extravagant to me. So I went to Ruth and I asked her if she thought that would be a good witness if I went that extravagant route to have a coat with a fur collar [laughs]. Yes. And she advised me that yes, the Lord could use the nicest things to witness for him, so I went out and bought the coat with the fur collar. [Both laugh].

INTERVIEWER Of course a fur collar is not an extravagance during a Wheaton winter.

FRYGA: Oh no!  That was rather necessary.

United Gospel Tabernacle

A small church near Wheaton’s campus, the United Gospel Tabernacle was popular with many students. The church was originally pastored by V. Raymond Edman before his appointment as Wheaton College’s new president in 1940. On the recommendation of Edman, Graham took over the position while still a student and he served there until he graduated.

Grovenor Rust, class of ’44, CN 74 Tape T72:

INTERVIEWER What was a typical service at the Tabernacle like?

RUST: It was a lighter and more informal type service. The students liked it a lot. Quite a number of faculty members used to go there. I remember Russell Mixter did and Gordon Clark, my Greek teacher, was there. And…there was another fellow [Howard Z.] Cleveland I think something like that. That was his name I remember. A number of other faculty members who went there. Billy was a serious minded type preaching young man.

Dotsie Corwin, daughter of Lloyd and Helen Fesmire, CN74 Tape T78:

CORWIN: In the letter from my dad, it talked about how people wanted to go there because it got out earlier and they could…for one reason besides Billy’s preaching…they could sprint across the lawn and get to the dinner line faster than…

HELEN  FESMIRE: The dinner line, yeah [laughs].

CORWIN: …the other churches that were a little later at getting out.

Donald McDowell, class of ’46, CN74, Tape T59:

SHUSTER: What did the…what did the Tabernacle look like?

MCDOWELL: Well it was a typical lodge. It had the…the dark, red, velvet…. And we had folding chairs there…where the audience sat and a small, very small platform where Billy stood to give his sermons. I would say 150 to 200 [people attended]. Yeah…. I remember singing there. I think there was a small piano. I don’t remember any other instruments there….

SHUSTER: So what was a typical program at the Tabernacle like?

MCDOWELL: Well there was brief singing and then a sermon that often was for thirty to forty-five minutes by Billy Graham. And always very interesting. A typical Gospel message style that he continued after he left and graduated from Wheaton College.

SHUSTER: What was his preaching style like?

MCDOWELL: Well it was one in which he moved about the platform and would sometimes strike the pulpit for emphasis. I guess it is what we would call southern style evangelistic preaching. [Both laugh]….  It was a voice that changed volume and tone in order to give emphasis to certain items in the sermon.

Wrestling

Although often busy with preaching and other ministry projects, Billy Graham was also an active participant in Wheaton student life, joining the Naitermian Literary Society, serving on the Christian Service Council, and (briefly) going out for the Wrestling team.

Robert H. Spiro, class of ’41, CN74, Tape T60:

SPIRO: Billy was on…came out for the wrestling team. That seems improbable because he was tall and skinny and not particularly athletic. But my memory is that Billy came out. He…didn’t wrestle on the team officially representing the college…in the conference. But it seems to me that he was a tall, skinny, like 6’4 and 130 pounds. And he was kind of considered a spider. Long legs and arms, you know. And enthusiastic. And tried to wrestle and did wrestle.

INTERVIEWER In his autobiography he says “When I went out for the wrestling team, probably about 160 pounds in class, I looked like a python on the mat. Two defeats in the inter-collegiate matches ended that career.”

SPIRO: I didn’t know that. I hadn’t read that. He said he looked like a python, huh?… My figure of speech was a spider [Shuster laughs] which is not far removed.

David R. Dresser, class of ’48, CN74, Tape T64:

DRESSER: Well, when I was a senior in high school…in the Academy, Ralph Christiansen and I used to go the [Wheaton College] wrestling room at night and work out. And…there were other guys there from the college that would occasionally work out. So one time we were there, Billy Graham came down and wanted to work out. Someone was wanted to work out with him and…so I agreed to. But he was so much taller than I. We started in the referee’s position and I was on top. I remember I could barely get my arm over his back. And so I grabbed his left arm, rammed my head in his armpit and flattened him out. [Shuster chuckles] I can’t remember much beyond that. I don’t think we wrestled very long because it was obvious I wasn’t going to give him much of a workout then.

INTERVIEWER Because you were a better wrestler than he was or he was a better wrestler?

DRESSER: No, because I was so much smaller than he….  But he was a very intense person. And he liked to get tired out so that he could sleep better at night. That’s why he came down.

Last Days at Wheaton

W. Glyn Evans, class of ’45, CN 74, Tape T53;

INTERVIEWER: [While describing a geology class field trip he took with Graham] you mentioned…that the next morning…when you had gotten up you found…Graham sitting with his head in his hands?

EVANS: Yes, he was sitting on the edge of the bed with his head in his hands. And it was about 5:00 in the morning. And I saw him sitting there and I said “Billy, are you sick? Are you alright?” He said, “Well,“ he said “I haven’t slept all night long.” And he was in his final year of college. That was in 1943. And he was to graduate very soon…as a result he was trying to catch up on everything. And at Wheaton of course, we had comprehensives in our fourth year. I don’t know if they still have them or not, but we had comprehensives. And you had to be tested in your major field in all the aspects of the major field that you had received in college. My major was Bible so I had my comprehensive in Bible and he, I think was the same thing [Graham’s major was anthropology]. He was a Bible major and he was having…he was expecting his comprehensive in Bible within a matter of just a few weeks, just a couple of weeks. And so he was stretched almost to the limit. He had been preaching out in various places. He was also in the office of the Student Christian Movement, Student Service, Christian Service, and he was also engaged to marry Ruth and that was looming on the horizon. And so he had a number of big aspects of his life just whirling around in his head. And so it was difficult for him at night to sleep apparently. So he said he didn’t sleep all night….  And after we came back, I remember seeing Ruth on campus maybe a week after we came back. And she said to me that she’s been trying to get Billy to slow down and not take these outside preaching engagements until he had graduated. She was afraid that he might head for a…burnout or…something like that. And so she wasn’t getting very far with him. He was still preaching. He loved to preach, and he wouldn’t pass up an opportunity. So she saw me on the campus and she came over and she said, “I wish you would talk to Billy and tell him to give up some of his work until he finishes his college career.” And I didn’t know what to say really. I didn’t want to interfere with Billy’s life and work. On the other hand, I understood what Ruth was trying to say. And so I said something like this to her, I said “Ruth, you and I know Billy. We know him real well. And the truth is, that you’re not going to get Billy to stop preaching for anything in the world.” I said , “Not even for a college degree.” So I said, “I don’t think it would pay me or be effective for me to try to talk to him and talk him out of going to these various churches and preaching.” And so…he did finally get his degree and he did finally graduate. And the next thing I knew about Billy, was that he was becoming the pastor of a Baptist church in Western Springs. Which is not too far from Wheaton. And that was the next step for him.

Read more about Billy Graham’s time at Wheaton College on a previous From the Vault blog post or take a self-guided walking tour of Billy Graham’s Wheaton with this guide created by our archivists. Additional resources on the life of Billy Graham can be found on the Archives & Special Collections website.