The Christian Chronicle

The Christian Chronicle was founded by journalist and Bible scholar Olan Hicks as a newspaper with the primary goal of providing information about Churches of Christ, modeled after publications that served other denominations such as the Deseret News. Hicks launched the Chronicle in Austin, Texas, and soon moved the operation to Abilene. The newspaper attempted to fill a void in the journalistic landscape among Churches of Christ by covering news and events from across the spectrum among Churches of Christ. The Chronicle covered the news in a way its peers did not. It stood virtually alone as a rare publication that, aside from the editorial page, did not offer teaching articles. Rather, it devoted its pages exclusively to news. Further, according to the canons of newspaper journalism, each issue carried a “letters to the editor” section that afforded the reader a means by which to comment on its coverage. In these letters, historians will find much otherwise unobtainable information reflecting how the events that shaped American religion were viewed from the church pews. This digital repository of The Christian Chronicle is the result of a partnership among Special Collections and Archives, Abilene Christian University (Abilene, TX), The Christian Chronicle publishers, Oklahoma Christian University,and Oklahoma Historical Society (Oklahoma City), and funded by a TexTreasures Grant administered by the Texas State Library and Archives Commission.