In the Beginning Male and Female, Then She Came to Seminary: A History of Women at Princeton Theological Seminary

Abstract

A history of women at Princeton Theological Seminary covers briefly the scope of women’s participation in the life of Princeton Theological Seminary from the early years to the present, while concentrating on the expanding presence and influence of women faculty and women students from the 1930s through the early 1980s. The article describes the effects of an influx of women M.A. students with the arrival of the Tennent School of Christian education on the Princeton Seminary campus in 1944. Women students’ initiatives in the 1970s for the founding of the Women’s Center and a child care center are summarized. Anecdotes about the experiences of early women students, including the first woman B.D. graduate, Muriel Van Orden Jennings, as well as the experiences of early women faculty members Freda Gardner and Katharine Sakenfeld, reveal the changing attitudes of male students, faculty, and presidents toward the presence of women on the Princeton Seminary campus. This article was originally presented as the Seminary’s 2011–12 Frederick Neumann Lecture and as part of the Seminary’s 2011–12 Bicentennial Celebration.