The Methodist Church 1956 General Conference - Kum Ba Ya

Topic: Kumbaya 1955-1961
By May 1956, “Kumbaya” was spreading spontaneously outside the domain of CRS songbooks.  Karen remembers she learned it “at a youth night at the Methodist General (international ) Conference in Mps in about 1956.  There were 5000 MY ers singing the song and it was memorable.” [1]

The Methodist Church holds quadrennial meetings [2] to elect members of the hierarchy [3] and decide critical issues.  The one in 1956 voted to accept women in the clergy. [4]

The conference in Minneapolis lasted from Wednesday, April 25, to Wednesday, May 9, and was highly structured.  Most morning programs began with devotions that began and closed with a hymn led by James Houghton.  These were planned in advance, and published in a conference songbook. [5]  The meeting’s songbook did not contain a version of “Kumbaya.” [6]

When the conference reconvened after a morning recess, the assembled sang another hymn and heard a short concert by a college choir.  Afternoon sessions also began with a hymn, and sometimes the choir would reappear after the break.  Given logistics and expense, choral groups probably came by bus.  I assume choirs arrived the day before they were scheduled, and left the day after.

The vote on women was taken on Friday, 4 May, and apparently delegates began leaving after that.  The Journal of the proceedings said on Saturday that “some on the Program have to leave early, and I hope many of them will want to get away before too late.”  The entertainment chairman also asked that those who were leaving early to “notify the ushers know by note so we may fill those places.” [7]

May 5 was an evening of relaxation for the conference.  Instead of holding debates, two famous entertainers appeared: Minnie Pearl and Ralph Edwards. [8]  The first was part of the Grand Ole Opry radio program, and the other had a television program, This Is Your Life.  It had shared an Emmy with What’s My Line? in 1955, when it ranked twelfth in audience size.  That fell to a respectable twenty-sixth place in the 1955–1956 season. [9]

It is not clear if Youth Night was part of the original program, or was added.  The Journal simply said it had been requested by the Minnesota Delegation for a Youth Night. [10]  The event was held “under the supervision of the General Board of Education of The Methodist Church.” [11]

Youth Night differed from the more formal sessions because it began with a Fellowship Sing led by Glen Johnson of Dallas. [12]  Although the conference Journal usually listed hymns led by Houghton or sung by the choirs, it didn’t for this event.

Johnson may have used song sheets that were distributed with the evening’s program, or may have depended on songs being so familiar, songsters weren’t necessary.  If he was the one who introduced “Kumbaya,” he may have learned the words from the Song Sampler.  Rohrbough would have sent copies to all the important people in The Methodist Church. [13]

Johnson may have followed a strict program like the one Larry Eisenberg used at the Christian Youth Conference held on the campus of Purdue University in 1952, [14] or, more informally, he may have called on people to make suggestions.

One possible group would have been the members of college choirs in the audience.  The local Hamline University performed that night, [15] but the Ohio Wesleyan University Choir was scheduled to sing the next evening. [16]  If its director, Rexford Keller, didn’t know Lynn Rohrbough, at least some members of the choir would have.  Some probably attended the Methodist church nearest the Delaware, Ohio, campus where Bliss Wiant was serving between 1953 and 1955.  Some may have had copies of his recently issued Hymns of Universal Praise. [17]

The OWU choir is the most likely source, although one cannot overlook the possibility someone who attended the Student Volunteer Meeting in late 1955 introduced “Kumbaya.”

Regardless of the source or method of teaching “Kumbaya,” the individuals in the audience did not have songbooks with the melody.  If they taught it to others when they returned home, it was from memory.  Each person who did continue to sing the song could have launched a separate line in the radiation of folk tradition.

Title
Kum Ba Ya

Performers
Vocal Group: audience attending Youth Night
Vocal Director: unidentified

Credits
Karen, the woman who remembered singing “Kum Ba Ya,” wrote: “The people who taught us said it came from Africa.” [18]

Notes on Performance
Occasion: Youth Night, 25 May 1956
Location: the audience apparently was seated in the balcony. [19]

Notes on Audience
“MY’ers” referred to members of the Methodist Youth Fellowship (MYF), the Methodist organization for high school students. [20]  The national conference did not include a youth convention.  This was a special event for members from Minnesota who “have done so very much to help us in getting ready for this Conference.”  The program chairman added “We feel a certain moral obligation for they have put more money into this than we have given to help in the total expense.” [21]

Notes on Performers
Karen attended sessions of the Northland Recreation Laboratory discussed in the post for 26 September 2021.  She was one of the people who answered my email asking if anyone remembered when they learned “Kumbaya.”

Johnson was born in Wisconsin, but his parents soon moved to the lower Río Grande valley in Texas.  Before moving to Dallas 1947, he had headed the music department at the Texas College of Mines in El Paso.  When he was young, he played trombone in dance bands. [22]

Houghton had been directing the Boston University Seminary Singers for 29 years.  In that position, he trained over a thousand ministerial students.  On 26 April, he had his former singers join the group of stage to sing the 130th Psalm and “De Profundis.” [23]

End Notes
1.  Karen.  Email, 30 June 2016.

2.  The quadrennial meetings are the modern form of the camp meetings organized by Francis Asbury in the early 1800s to unify the frontier denomination.  This is discussed briefly in the post for 8 November 2020.

3.  As is clear in the post for 14 August 2022, the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church adopted this same organizational model.

4.  Connor S. Kenaston.  “From Rib to Robe: Women’s Ordination in the United Methodist Church.”  Methodist History 53(3):162–172:April 2015.

5.  James R. Houghton.  A Selection of hymns from the Methodist hymnal: for use at the General Conference of the Methodist Church: Municipal Auditorium, Minneapolis, Minnesota, April 25-May 9, 1956.  Nashville, Tennessee: Methodist Publishing House, 1956.

6.  Cassie Brand of the Drew University library said it had no index and was too recent to be photocopied.  She did look through to see if it contained version of “Come by Here” or “Kumbaya.”  She wrote back, “We looked through the book, as it wasn’t large, and neither song appears in the book.” [24]

7.  Journal of the 1956 General Conference of The Methodist Church.  Edited by Lud H. Estes.  Nashville, Tennessee: The Methodist Publishing House.  815.  The Chairman of the Program Committee of the Commission on Entertainment and Program was Paul V. Galloway.  I wish to thank Carlton Young for helping me locate the Journal. [25]

8.  Journal.  879.

9.  “This Is Your Life.”  Wikipedia website.  The Emmy was for Best Audience Participation, Quiz or Panel Program.

10.  Journal.  815.
11.  Journal.  643.
12.  Journal.  867.
13.  The Song Sampler is discussed in the posts for 31 July 2022 and 7 August 2022.
14.  Eisenberg’s song-leading techniques are discussed in the post for 21 May 2021.
15.  Journal.  870.
16.  Journal.  875.
17.  Wiant and Hymns of Universal Praise are discussed in the post for 2 October 2022.
18.  Karen.

19.  The Journal indicated on page 815 that delegates who normally sat in the balcony would be seated on the lower floor that evening.  This would have left the balcony open to the MYF members.

20.  MYF replaced the Epworth League in 1938 after the merger of the northern and southern branches of the Methodist Episcopal Church.  For more information, see the posts for 9 August 2020 and 30 May 2021.

21.  Galloway.  Journal.  815.
22.  “Johnson, Glen R.”  Dallas Morning News, Dallas, Texas, 28 May 2009.
23.  Journal.  297–298.
24.  Cassie Brand, Drew University.  Emails, 17 October 2016.
35.  Carlton Young.  Email, email 6 December 2016.