☰ In This Section

Bethel History

The Digital Library works with the History Center, Archives of Bethel University and Converge to provide digital collections about the history of Bethel University and its founding denomination.

Search the Digital Library for Bethel, the Baptist General Conference, and Converge Worldwide history

Collections

Documenting a Pandemic COVID-19 Community Archive

A collection of the Bethel community's personal and shared experiences during the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Academic Catalogs

The catalogs include the record of the academic life, faculty, calendar, programs and courses of study for Bethel from 1906 to 2011.

Christianity and Western Culture Collection

The Bethel Christianity and Western Culture Collection includes lecture recordings, podcasts, videos, images, and other artifacts from Bethel University's Christianity and Western Culture course (GES130).

Clarion Student Newspaper

The Clarion is the student newspaper of Bethel University. Published first in 1921 by the students of Bethel Academy, it continues to record Bethel’s news, history, and culture up to the present day. This collection is growing and will eventually hold issues spanning from 1921 to 2007.

Bethel eBooks Collection

A collection of books by and about Bethel University, the Baptist General Conference (now known as Converge), and their related communities. Some books were formerly published in print by the denominational press called Harvest Publications and are now made digitally available through the Bethel University Digital Library.

Baptist General Conference Annual Meetings

The Baptist General Conference Annual Meetings Collection includes documents and artifacts related to the annual gathering of members of the Baptist General Conference, now called Converge, including the Annual Reports and Badges worn by attendees.

Baptist General Conference Collection

A collection of images of Minnesota's historical churches in the Baptist General Conference denomination, which is now called Converge.

Bethel Historical Photographs Collection

The Bethel University Historical Photographs Collection includes images of the history and culture of Bethel University from it’s early history (1871) to the present day.

Bethel Historical Documents Collection

A collection of selected documents from the History Center: Archives of Bethel University and Converge that illustrate Bethel's 1871 beginnings as the Swedish Baptist Theological Seminary in Chicago to its present status as Bethel University located in St. Paul, Minnesota.

The Standard - Baptist General Conference

The Standard was the official publication of the Baptist General Conference, now called Converge, from 1940 to 2002 and included contributions from both Conference and Bethel authors.

Bethel Yearbooks

Bethel's yearbook documents the people, events, activities, and ideas of the Bethel community during the school year. It was published annually from 1909 to 1989 except for the years of 1933-36, 1982, 1984-87.

Bethel Faculty Journal (Bethel Community Only)

Faculty Journal was a journal by and for Bethel faculty. Begun in February 1960, Faculty Journal was an “occasional” journal that ran until 2008 (the journal was not published between 1968-1977 and 2001-2007).

Bethel Archives Video Collection

This collection features videos stored at the Bethel History Center on film reels, VHS tapes, DVDs, and other formats.  Included are historic missionary videos from around the world filmed by the Baptist General Conference.

Bethel Libraries Collection

The Bethel Libraries Collection contains the historical documents and publications of the Bethel Libraries including the Friends of the University Library newsletter.

Mounds Midway Nursing Yearbooks

This collection contains the yearbooks of the Mounds-Midway School of Nursing from 1962-1983. The school sought to train and educate Christian nurses and transitioned to become Bethel’s nursing program in 1982.

History Center Information

The History Center, Archives of Bethel University and Converge is located at the Lakeside Center.

Contact archivist@bethel.edu to make a research request.

Digital Collections related to Converge Worldwide and the Baptist General Conference.