A Generation ago Dr. Washburn was known for and wide as one of the leading educationists of Southern India. His accomplishment with the Pasumalai Institutions of the American Madura Mission was the establishment of The American College. Mr. and Mrs. Washburn set sail on 1 Jan 1860 along with Dr. Mrs. Chamlarlain. It was a hundred day voyage round Cape Comrin to reach India. In the first decade of his service in Battalagundu station he focussed on educational and medical fields.

Mr. and Mrs. Washburn took charge of the new Theological Seminary and the general educational work of the mission at Pasumalai in Jan 1870. During his stay at Pasumalai for about three decades, he started the Lenox Press with an installation of a Hoe printing press from America. The Lenox Press had continued to print the proceedings of the local law courts for five decades. It also had the honour of printing the first newspaper in the Madura District.

Mr and Mrs. Washburn rendered a great service during the 1877 – famine in South India. They provided 1,500 famine victims with shelter, food and education. Some children were returned to the parents after the famine had ended. Mr. Washburn maintained an orphanage for the children whose parents did not return for about nineteen years. He had established a high school at Pasumalai which provided normal stream of education, teacher-training, skill-based improvement in agriculture, experimental farming, manual training, a printing press and the trade school. Raised to a second-grade the College at Madurai was affiliated to the University of Madras in 1881. .

Name   :  W.M.Zumbro,M.A.,B.D.

 

Educated at Western College, IOWA, Ann Arber University, Yale University and Teacher College, Columbia, Rev. Zumbro came to India in 1894. In his service to the Mission, to the college, to the University and to the cause of Education in the District of Madura and Ramnad, he was a great Missionary. In the prime of his youth he collaborated with Dr. Washburn and Dr. James of the Madura Mission in Pasumalai to develop The American College. His experience in his father’s farm endowed him with a strong physique and iron will. During his leisure, he used to work hard with a pickaxe and a spade either digging some pits for planting trees or sinking a well. The residents of Pasumalai admired his strong body, powerful mind and enduring spirit. With the help of Mr. Ramasubier, he secured a few acres of land south of railroad. He sank a well, planted coconut trees and laid the foundation of the school farm at Pasumalai. With a view to blend manual training and intellectual studies, and to inculcate self-reliance and dignity of labour, he not only laid the foundation for the industrial school but also secured adequate funds for construction. Dr. Washurn’s strong ties kept him rooted in Pasumalai. Mr. Zumbro’s untiring spirit of expansion brought about a paradigm shift in the locale of The American College at Madura. The landscape containing a tank and paddy fields provided a lot of challenges such as levelling up the grounds, planting trees, beautifying the premises with picturesque buildings. These have become monuments of technological, pedagogical, engineering, scientific and other departments according to his vision. He then secured splendid equipment and efficient staff, both Indian and American. With the cooperation of the staff and students he transformed the institution into a First Grade College in 1913.

His love for the Indian church made him buy more lands near Zumbropuram in order to promote a Christian settlement and community near the College. He created the college council and placed himself under the control thereby creating an ambience of democracy. Mottos like:

“A life is alive as long as it is used to give life!”

“Teach and live the best things, righteousness will fill the earth”

“The blessing comes when we have forgotten the service rendered”

stuck on his desk reflect Zumbro’s greatness, altruism and principle-centred character.

Name  :  W.W.Wallace,M.A.,B.D.

 

Throughout the tenure of office ,Mr. Wallace evinced a great interest in the physical plant of the College and he was responsible for very definite improvements .Since acquiring the section of land south of the original purchase , the campus had been divided by a public road which connected the main thoroughfare in the city, Alagarkoil road, with the present Collector Office. Naturally the steady stream of traffic was a disturbing factor in the Institution. Mr. Wallace was successful through negotiations with the municipality and the approval of the Government, in effecting a happy solution of the problem.

The road was closed to the public thus making the College holdings into a unit. In exchange, the College built for the city’s use of 60 foot road (the present Panagal Road, in front of Government Rajaj Hospital ) at the extreme southern boundary of its property on land which had been purchased for building purposes.

Another worthy achievement of his administration was the raising of funds in India, from friends and well –wishers of the College, sufficient to erect the hostel built in memory of Mr. Zumbro.

Name   :   Peter Isaac., B.A.,L.T.(Acting)

 

Mr. Peter Isaac’s active life of four decades of service may be divided into three sections before the last decade of happy retirement. He was for many years one of the leading and most active Christian laymen in Madura. He served as President of Indian Christian Association. No programme of work was undertaken without the advice sought and freely given of Mr. Isaac, and no gathering of Christian was complete without his presence.

Mr. Peter Isaac was pre-eminently an educationist. After completing his high school course he took his B.A., work on degree at the Madras Christian College and cherished the student memories of the strong men who were his teachers in the Institution.

On returning to Madura young Peter began his teaching career in the High School of Pasumalai. Later he was transferred as Head Master to the American Mission High School in Madura. He was appointed by the late Rev. W. M. Zumbro then Principal of The American College, Madura where he lectured logic and allied subjects for many years.

When the position of Vice Principal fell vacant, Mr. Zumbro welcoming an Indian Colleague in the administration of the college said, “I want a man of strong character, of ability and sympathy in dealing with Indian students and a representative Indian Christian. I know of no one better fitted for this position than Mr. Peter Isaac”. For a period of ten years Isaac was the vice principal of the college and its acting Principal between 1927 and 1928.

It was a fine tribute to his long years of service and a happy recognition of his character and worth to The American College. From these high offices of responsibility, he hardly at any time exercised his power either with undue severity or in any way injurious to the interest of the students or the staff. .

Name   :  B.S.Stoffer,M.A.,Ph.D.

 

Rev.Bryan S.Stoffer was elected President of the American College, Madura, India, in 1928. Since his appointment to the Madura Mission in 1923, he was connected with the educational work in Pasumalai and also acted as Principal of Union Theological Seminary during Dr.Bannig’s absence on furlough. A graduate of Ashland and Oberlin Colleges, he took his theological course and the degrees of Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy at Chicago University. During the tenure of Rev. Bryan S. Stoffer as Principal, the College was affiliated to Madras University in B.A. Zoology and Mathematics. He also started, on an extensive building programme, the Binghamton Hall, the Chapel and Library. In his last report, Mr. Stoffer wrote,” with the completion of this programme we shall have a College plant which will be able to minister effectively to the educational needs of the growing city of Madura and the surrounding districts”.