Hemphill to Southwestern

by   Herb Hollinger                                                                                                                                        Vol. VII, No. 6, August 1994

Kenneth S. Hemphill, Southern Baptist church growth specialist and former pastor of First Baptist, Norfolk, is the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary search committee's nominee for president of the seminary. Hemphill, 46, was elected by the seminary's 40-member trustee board at a special called meeting in Fort Worth July 29, will succeed Russell Dilday, who was fired by the trustees March 9 as president of the world's largest seminary. Hemphill thus becomes the seminary's seventh president.

Miles Seaborn, Jr., chairman of the search committee, told Baptist Press the committee came to a "total and excited unanimity" about the nominee.

Southwestern is the largest of the six SBC seminaries with more than 4,000 students. The 86-year-old seminary is located on a 200 acre campus in Fort Worth and has 102 elected faculty with a 1993-94 budget of more than $22 million.