Origins, Destiny, and the “New Gathering Place”
By John Gaughan and Anna Bowers
In a sweeping presentation entitled “Origins and Destiny of Southern Virginia University,” Friday’s Convocation revealed the University’s surprising past, hinted at its future, and culminated in the dedication of the Knight Stadium.
In her eye-opening remarks, Professor Rachel K. Wilcox shared the hidden history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Shenandoah Valley and its connections to the founding and development of Southern Virginia University.
After almost a year of research, Wilcox prefaced her remarks by saying, “[This story is] still in the process of growing. We’re still gathering information.”
She then introduced two well-known figures in the Church’s history — Karl G. Maeser, Brigham Young University’s founding principal, and Elder J. Golden Kimball.
Maeser recruited Kimball to Brigham Young Academy, and helped him come back into the fold after several years away from activity in the Church. Soon after, Kimball was called on a mission to Virginia.
He found little success at first, but after being moved to a settlement just four miles from Southern Virginia’s campus, he found a receptive audience in a small community in the Blue Ridge Mountains.
Sparked by the baptisms of a young woman and members of the Lawhorn and Mason families, the efforts of Kimball and other missionaries gained momentum. The area became a hub for the Church in a region of the country otherwise largely hostile to Mormon theology and its adherents.
Despite setbacks, including limitations due to the Church’s racial policies at the time missionaries first came to the area, the community of believers persisted and began to blossom in the latter end of the 20th century.
Over the last 50 years, several predictions were made by local church leaders regarding the growth of the Church in Buena Vista and the surrounding area.
In 1987, local church leader James Clawson shared a dream in which he saw a “stake [a regional group of LDS congregations] within a stake.” As Wilcox noted, the Buena Vista Young Single Adult Stake, created in 2012, geographically resides within the Buena Vista Stake.
In a video, Glade Knight, the former chairman of the Board of Trustees of the University and the founding figure of the school, recalled his first visit to the campus of Southern Virginia University in 1995:
“I walked into the cafeteria and the overwhelming Spirit hit me, and it said, ‘Some day, this building will be filled with LDS students.’ I couldn’t deny it,” Knight said with emotion in the clip.
In Spring of 1996, Southern Virginia College reopened its doors under a new Board of Trustees as an institution based on LDS values.
In September 2016, major LDS leader Elder Ronald A. Rasband made a formal visit to Southern Virginia University. In an address to students, staff, and faculty Rasband commented on the history of the school. “Much has happened here… and there is much, much more to come,” Rasband promised.
After Professor Wilcox finished her presentation, President Reed Wilcox recounted how many significant happenings occurred within five miles of campus. With a smile, he remarked, “So, all of these are ‘coincidences’.”
“This university is an idea as much as it is a place,” he continued. Wilcox outlined the school’s model, including small class sizes, scalability, and self-reliance. “This is the model of this school, and more of this school than any place else,” he said.
Citing the close parallels between the Southern Virginia approach to education and that of Karl G. Maeser, President Wilcox announced that the convocations in the next two weeks would delve further into his life. After reemphasizing the hand of God in the story of Southern Virginia and the growth of the Church in Shenandoah, he shifted his focus to the event of the day.
“This is a special day that commemorates another step in the progress of this school and it involves the dedication of the new stadium, the new gathering place,” he said.
Mitch Scott, longtime active member of Southern Virginia’s Board of Trustees, delivered the dedicatory prayer for the new Stadium.
“As the stadium will become perhaps the most visited part of this campus over the years, we come before thee to dedicate it,” Scott prayed.
He continued, “And do so, with the knowledge that it will become an icon; that more people will view this university from the vantage point of this beautiful structure.”
Scott’s prayer included the new stadium will be a place filled with transformative experiences for students, opening the doors of opportunity to those who attend.
Following Convocation a special luncheon was held in the ballroom in Main Hall to commemorate Bob and Lois Hobson. Bob Hobson filled various official roles after Southern Virginia changed ownership in the late 1990s, including leading the first congregation of the school’s LDS students from 1996–1996, and serving as Provost.
Sitting in the ballroom after the luncheon, the Hobsons reflected on that time.
“This room is really sacred to me, because this is where we met. Seventy-one brave souls. I loved them, I knew every one by name,” he said, referring to his congregation of college students.
Lois Hobson, who grew up in Buena Vista and was the daughter of the city’s first Branch President, was visibly moved as she expressed her reaction to seeing how the University’s story has unfolded.
“It’s just an amazing process to see what is happening, how it has grown and that we were a part in the beginning. Look where we are now,” she said.
For one of the students the Hobsons watched over twenty years ago, Friday’s events also held special meaning. Craig Lawhorn, now Assistant Provost at Southern Virginia, was living in the area when he became a member of the LDS faith in September 1996. In a conversation with one of the professors at the new college, he told Lawhorn to consider completing a bachelor’s degree at the school.
“As soon as he said that, the Spirit hit me so powerfully,” he said. Within twelve hours he had started the application process, and was soon enrolled for the Spring semester of 1997.
For Lawhorn, a native of the area, joining the church and coming to Southern Virginia were part of a larger plan. “Lots of different pieces started falling together,” he commented.
At the time of his baptism, Lawhorn thought he was the only member of the Church in his family. He later learned that his ancestors, including Paulus Lawhorn, were among the first people to be baptized in the area over a hundred years earlier.
Despite the uncertainty and obstacles the school faced in those early years, he said the community had a united faith in what they were doing.
“We all felt like we were supposed to be here, and we were supposed to keep going and stay on the path,” he recalled.
As he recollected his first experience on campus, Hobson said almost the same thing. “As soon as I walked in here, you could feel it. You knew it was just something special about this place.”
