legacynewsletter Making an Eternal Impact


When Faye Hughes Van Sickle was a child, her father began training for ministry. Through her estate, Faye is perpetuating training for future generations of ministry leaders.


The OBU alumna’s estate has provided the university $857,500, which will be used as endowment funds for scholarships and an academic position, OBU President David W. Whitlock announced recently.


The gift creates an endowment trust in honor of Van Sickle’s parents, the Reverend A.E. and Dora Johnson Hughes, to support a professorship chair in Christian studies and to supplement an existing endowed scholarship benefiting OBU students.


The professorship will be named the Reverend A.E. and Dora Johnson Hughes Chair of Christian Ministry. The faculty member who is selected for the chair will have an earned doctorate, preferably in Christian studies, and will be selected by OBU’s president upon recommendation from the chief academic officer and the dean of the university’s Joe L. Ingram School of Christian Service.


According to a university statement, endowed chairs and professorships – which assist with compensation – are awarded to select professors who are “outstanding teachers and who have demonstrated exceptional ability in their academic disciplines.” The gift which provides an endowed academic position is invested in the university’s permanent endowment fund, and the annual earnings are used to assist with compensation.


The Van Sickle gift also supplements the existing Reverend A.E. and Dora Johnson Hughes Endowed Scholarship, which provides financial support for OBU students preparing for the pastorate or music ministry.


“This is a very significant gift, and we will be good stewards of it,” said Dr. Mark McClellan, dean of the School of Christian Service. “The real impact of this gift


6 OBU LEGACY NEWSLETTER August 2010


will be in the lives of countless numbers of students who will be educated and prepared for Christian ministry here at OBU in the School of Christian Service. This gift will impact the proclamation of the Gospel, the exposition and preaching of the Word of God, making disciples, the growth of the church, global missionary outreach, and the impact of churches on our communities and culture. The scholarships for church ministry students and the position of a chair for a professor of church ministry will be invaluable.”


Faye Hughes Van Sickle


Born in Tillman County, Oklahoma, in 1897, Alter Eli Hughes was a Southern Baptist pastor and missions leader in Oklahoma and Texas. He followed a call to ministry which came after he began a career in agriculture. He attended Decatur Baptist College (now Dallas Baptist University) in Decatur, Texas, and Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth. In 1917 he married Dora Johnson in Elbert, Texas. He died in 1958.


Faye graduated from high school in Byron, Texas, and earned an associate’s degree from Decatur Baptist College. She attended OBU as a member of the Class of 1947, and also attended the University of Hawaii. She taught grade school near the southwest Oklahoma towns of Frederick and Hollister before moving to Fort Worth, Texas, with her husband, Col. Charles T. Moreland. She fulfilled her goal of becoming a licensed private pilot, and was employed by General Dynamics for 20 years, attaining the rank of aircraft design engineer.


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