If you add up the many years that Dr. J. Kenneth ’61 and Carroll L. ’60 Kreider P’81 P’85 have been connected with Elizabethtown College, they equal more than half of the College’s 125-year history. It’s a wonderfully fitting equation for a couple who first met as young Blue Jays in an Etown math class in 1957.
“I just happened to see a cute redhead across the room,” Ken said. “The next class, I happened to be sitting beside that redhead.”
“I think that he needed help with math,” Carroll added with a chuckle.
Ken and Carroll, who are Professor of History Emeritus and Professor of Business Emerita, respectively, were connected to the College as students and faculty members for a combined 73 years. They continue to be strong and steady servants of the College and have dedicated their lives to Etown as alumni, faculty, donors, volunteers, and tireless advocates.
It was the location that initially attracted Ken to the College. After three years of working for Heifer International distributing cattle to refugees in eastern Europe in the aftermath of World War II, Ken was looking to attend a Church of the Brethren-affiliated college close to home.
“After living in Europe and seeing the evidence, I wanted to know what in the world caused Adolph Hitler to come to power in a civilized, educated, and cultural nation,” Ken said. “I wrote home to my mother and said, ‘I’ve decided to go to college for a year. I want to find out what caused World War II.’ She wrote back and said, ‘We’d be proud to have a college graduate in the family.’ I thought, ‘Who said anything about graduating?’”
Ken earned a bachelor’s degree in History from Etown and went on to earn master’s and doctoral degrees in History, with minors in Political Science, from The Pennsylvania State University.
A star high school basketball player, Carroll wanted to attend college to become either a music or business teacher. A timely visit to her high school by Etown Admissions Director Eby Espenshade sealed the deal, along with the fact that the College had a women’s basketball team and a business program. She enrolled at Etown sight unseen.
Carroll was a four-year varsity women’s basketball player and was named Outstanding Female Athlete as a senior. In 1996, she was inducted into the College’s Ira R. Herr Athletic Hall of Fame. She earned a bachelor’s degree in Business Education from Etown and later a master’s degree in Education from Penn State University. Carroll said she was the first female faculty member at Etown to rise through the ranks from instructor to full professor based on the established criteria meriting Ph.D. equivalency.
As Etown faculty members, the Kreiders were not only inspirational in the classroom but were also powerful mentors and role models for their students. “We thought that it was important for them to know that their instructor was not only concerned about them inside the classroom, but outside as well,” Ken said.
In 2013, a former student established The Kreider Prize for Teaching Excellence to honor their service to countless Etown students. The prize is awarded annually to a current full-time Etown faculty member.
Married 65 years, the couple fondly recalled how they were able to build a home and raise a family within the College community, amongst people with like-minded values.
“Our two daughters (Brenda Barlet ’81, Denise Voloshin ’85) grew up here,” Carroll said. “The faculty lived as a family. We always had picnics together. We were backdoor neighbors. We babysat each other’s children.”
Ken and Carroll have long supported the College and its many initiatives, with an emphasis on supporting scholarship and scholarly research related to the Church of the Brethren and the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies. In 2003, they received Etown’s Educate for Service Award – Service to the College, the highest honor bestowed upon Blue Jay alumni.
Carroll believes the Young Center is a great resource for current and future students and serves as a way for Etown to foster its Educate for Service motto and historic values of peace, nonviolence, social justice, and human dignity.
They have strong connections to Etown’s Church of the Brethren roots and remain actively involved in community service and church- and College-related activities. Ken continues to work with his church to provide relief, rehabilitation, and resettlement for refugees. A conscientious objector, Ken recently spoke about the Vietnam War and its effects on the College as part of Etown’s 125th Anniversary Speaker Series.
“We’re glad that Elizabethtown College was founded, and a lot of people sacrificed to make it survive,” Ken said.
“It’s been rewarding to see where our graduates are and what they have done,” Carroll added. “We have some outstanding alumni who were graduated from Etown.”