Franklin-Cook-Marion County IL Archives Biographies.....Matthews, William A. 1868 - 
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Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 October 25, 2008, 4:15 am

Author: George Washington Smith (1912)

   DOCTOR WILLIAM A. MATTHEWS. In 1868, the very year in which, by a pleasant
coincidence, a little group of the good citizens of Franklin county, Illinois,
met together and formulated the plans which resulted in the foundation of Ewing
College, an institution which, fostered by their enlightened and upright ideas,
was to constitute a fitting place of educational discipline for their children
and grandchildren, there was born near the city of Birmingham, England, one
William A. Matthews, who was one day to cross the blue Atlantic and take his
place as president of this college. Dr. Matthews is the son of John and Ann
(Smart) Matthews, both deceased. He comes from Welsh and English stock, and, as
one biographer has said in this connection, "This may account for his passion
for Evangelism on the one hand and his persistent determination to succeed on
the other." When only a few years of age his parents concluded to come to this
country in search of the wider opportunity which they believed America to
possess for them and their children. They soon found their way to Illinois and
located at Centralia. At the age of fourteen young William was converted and
baptised into the Centralia Baptist church and in 1888, when only twenty years
of age, he was licensed to preach by the Fourth Baptist church of St. Louis,
Missouri.

   Doctor Matthews, from his boyhood, was ever zealous for learning and found
his greatest satisfaction in books. He received a very thorough training for the
ministry, pursuing his studies in the following institutions of learning:
Shurtleff, Ewing, Washington Universities, Morgan Park Baptist Seminary and the
Divinity School of the University of Chicago. He took his Bachelor of Arts
degree at Ewing in 1895, M. A. in 1898, and in 1904 his alma mater conferred
upon him the honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity. He has held leading
pastorates in St. Louis, Missouri, Aurora and Chicago, Illinois, and in 1909 he
was summer supply at Dr. James Spurgeon's Tabernacle in London, England. That
was followed by a three weeks' campaign of evangelism in Scotland. He came into
international prominence in 1909 by reviewing Professor G. B. Foster's Theology
before the Baptist Ministers' Conference of Chicago in such manner that the
Professor's name was dropped from the roll of the conference. He is widely known
in the central west as a lecturer against higher criticism and has made himself
a recognized authority on the subject.

   Doctor Matthews assumed the presidency of Ewing College in 1910, and his
incumbency has proved a material, intellectual and spiritual blessing to school
and student, citizen and community. Under his administration a wise and
progressive leadership is bringing the school on towards the accomplishment of
its purposes and realization of its high mission. It has been said of him,
"Perhaps no man could have been elected to the presidency of Ewing who would
bring it greater strength or better command the confidence and support of
Ewing's constituency than Doctor Matthews."

   Dr. Matthews was married to Miss Delia M. Burton, of Upper Alton, Illinois,
in 1892. They have six children: Stewart, Esther, Ruth, Delight, William A.,
Jr., and Dorothy.


Additional Comments:

Extracted from:

A HISTORY OF SOUTHERN ILLINOIS

A Narrative Account of its Historical Progress, its People, and its Principal
Interests

BY
George Washington Smith, M. A.
VOLUME II
ILLUSTRATED

THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY
CHICAGO AND NEW YORK 1912


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