My friend Jim Pitts has died

   The tributes to Furman chaplain Jim Pitts are pouring in on his facebook wall. His father Milton was the barber in the White House for Nixon and Reagan and in 1974 with Martin England, the man who ushered ML King's letter from the Bham Jail out to the wider world and eternity, Pitts had lunch with Ga Governor Jimmy Carter after Carter was presented a Civics award by the South Carolina SBC in Charleston.

     Pitts came to Furman in 68, came back to Furman after graduating in the late 50s as assistant Chaplain to LD Johnson. Between the two of them they were networked to the Baptists that mattered in those days including James Dunn, Stewart A Newman, Will Campbell and Marney. When Furman's great Marshall Frady died in 04, it was Pitts and his great friend TC Smith Will Campbell called on to go to the funeral where Jesse Jackson was the main eulogist and read a note from Campbell in honor of Frady for the gathered.

    Pulitzer winner David Halberstam called Frady the greatest social justice journalist the last half of the 20th Century.

   TC was in Montgomery, had marched with King the last few days from Selma, and was present for King speech on the capitol steps with George Wallace looking on shadowed in the curtains from a first floor window when King said The Moral Arc of the Universe is Long, but it Bends toward Justice.

    That afternoon Smith caught a ride with Viola Liuzzo to the train station to catch a ride to the Atlanta Airport. Liuzzo was assassinated a few transports later. Such was the company of Baptist greats Pitts kept company with his ministry at Furman and Upstate South Carolina. 

     Pitts was a force in his on right as the facebook tributes attribute. And he was a treasure trove of Furman and Baptist stories. I am convinced the Presidency of John Johns at Furman was on auto pilot while his wife Martha and Pitts ran the show.

   Pitts took over the Pastors school with Vic Greene after LD Johnson died. I attended many weeks in the late 80s through the 90s on the day pass, Bring ten dollars the first day and then send another ten for a few months the rest of the year until you forget to send in a payment or Ms Shirley writes you off the Ledger....And come again next year.

      Pitts was proud the Daniel Chapel events were the only ones on Campus that didnt have to work through dining hall protocols for catering. Baptist preachers love their Henry's BBQ . LOL

     I was doing some free lance writing during the height of the Baptist drama, somehow got my name on a piece that got published in the Christian Century about Furman's adventure with SC Baps, the closure--also see Courtney Tollison's dissertation at USC on Furman and SC Baptists.

    Pitts was giving me a lot of inside Furman baseball during the Furman drama. He called me in May of 90 or 91 from the final entanglement, a special session after a year long task force on Furman and SC Baps, a law suit, and a couple thousand letters in the Baptist Courier, the state newspaper.

     I answered the phone in Alabama and Pitts said, Stephen, the AC went out and it was Hotter n Hell in there. Johns was sweatin we all were. A Few Days before Pitts was in the Room with Furman Trustees when Big Minor, Minor Mickel got the call from fundy trustee I think last name Head, who said Ms Mickel, I think we have the votes. This niece of Eisenhower's great friend Charles Daniel, who housed Nixon in his mansion outside Furman's back gates when Dick needed a sleepover in 62, said, "Tim you go ahead and do what you feel like you need to do."

      He and Tom Hartness took a trip in those days down to Union for a little persuasion.

    High Baptist drama in the name of Jesus on many fronts in Pitts era.

     He was my friend. I was looking forward this spring to some monthly chats at the Chic Fil A in Travelers Rest post covid, or after we got the shot, and maybe a baseball game in Greer, to see his Grandson, a Trump supporter (how that happens I don't know but right now I'm covered by the blood of Jeesus and all that stuff Will Campbell said you love one you gotta love em all) play for the Yellow Jackets.

   But that is not gonna happen.

    So Chaplain, All that stuff the Episcopalians say at funerals, about the Eternal light, the stuff they said at Celestine Sibley's funeral, all that.

    Blessed are Those Who Die in the Lord, that they may rest from their labors, and all those smart ass students who came to Furman thinking they already knew all there was to know, And their Works Do follow Them.

   Amen.