Jerry A. Pattengaleאור
A winter Indiana road at dusk with a distant church window glowing

Life

From Buck Creek to the scholar’s lamp

Born 1958. Family of ten. High school at sixteen. Homeless. Then a church, a scholarship, and a life spent putting other people in front of the evidence.

  • 2024Sagamore of the Wabash
  • 2021Three Telly Awards
  • 2020United Nations address
  • 2017Museum of the Bible opens
  • 2014Inaugural University Professor
  • 1994NEH · Isthmia / Corinth
Pattengale walking a brick campus path with books under his arm

The campus walk. The painted archive study lives on Field.

Early life

Buck Creek, Indiana

Jerry A. Pattengale was born in 1958 and raised in a family of ten in Buck Creek, near Lafayette, Indiana. He graduated high school at sixteen and was homeless. PBS/WIPB told that story in Leading the Way out of Poverty (2006). The same town became the long-running Buck Creek newspaper columns.

After his conversion to Christianity, Wesleyan Church members and Marion College alumni put a scholarship under him. He served as student body president and graduated at the top of his class. The Olive Tree Media interview From Homelessness to History Maker is the first-person telling of that road.

He is married to Cindy. They have four adult sons and live in Marion, Indiana.

A life in rooms

Pattengale at a chapel lectern
Pattengale studying a manuscript by lamplight
Pattengale in a museum gallery
Pattengale with colleagues over manuscript fragments

Education

Every earned credential

No other earned doctorates or additional master’s degrees are documented beyond this list.

  • 1977–78Semester studyJerusalem University College / Institute of Holy Land StudiesLanguages and the land; the Holy Land semester that set the rest of the work in motion.
  • 1979B.S., History and ReligionMarion College, now Indiana Wesleyan UniversityStudent body president. Graduated at the top of his class. Top senior award.
  • 1981M.A., Interpersonal DevelopmentWheaton Graduate SchoolYouth-program work in Chicago during this period.
  • 1986M.A., Tudor-Stuart England; Ancient History (second field)Miami University (Ohio)4.0 GPA on CVs.
  • 1993Ph.D., Ancient HistoryMiami University (Ohio)Dissertation: Benevolent Physicians in Late Antiquity: The Cult of the Anargyroi (saints Cosmas and Damian). Mentor: Edwin Yamauchi. 4.0 GPA on CVs.

Career

Youth work, Azusa, Scriptorium, IWU, the museum, RNS

  • 1981–1985

    Founder, J.C. Body Shop

    College Wesleyan Church, Marion, Indiana

    A Christian youth center that later occupied a large facility adjacent to the IWU campus.

  • 1986–1988

    Graduate assistant to Edwin Yamauchi; instructor

    Miami University; Ohio Northern University; Miami Hamilton

    The ancient-history apprenticeship that produced the Anargyroi dissertation.

  • 1988–1997

    Assistant then Associate Professor of History

    Azusa Pacific University

    Helped launch Common Day of Learning, Pew Younger Scholars / honors work, and Night of Champions. Professor of the Year, 1993 and 1995.

  • 1995–1997

    Co-founder and COO

    Scriptorium: Center for Christian Antiquities

    Van Kampen Collection. Seminars with leading manuscript scholars; British Library presentation on manuscripts, 1996.

  • 1997–present

    Faculty, administrator, then inaugural University Professor (2014)

    Indiana Wesleyan University

    Coined purpose-guided education in 1997 while building student-success programs. Grants leadership, Assistant Provost for Scholarship & Public Engagement, honors and first-year work, Triangle Publishing, National Conversations.

  • 2010–2018

    Founding scholar; Executive Director of Education

    Museum of the Bible, Washington, D.C.

    One of two founding scholars, with Scott Carroll. Founding Executive Director of the Green Scholars Initiative. Museum opened November 17, 2017. Left the education directorship in December 2018.

  • 2014–present

    Co-founder / Executive Director

    Lumen Research Institute

    IWU and international partners — a research network, not a vanity title.

  • 2019–2020

    Interim President and CEO

    Religion News Service and Religion News Foundation

    A year running the wire service that still sets the religion desk for American newsrooms.

  • 2020–present

    Senior Advisor to the President

    Museum of the Bible

    Returned in spring 2020. Spoke at the United Nations on 14 February 2020 on protecting religious sites.

Also: White House OFBCI compassion roundtables, 2007–2008. United Nations, 14 February 2020, New York, on the Plan of Action to Safeguard Religious Sites. Capitol Hill, 2022, on Public Intellectuals and the Common Good.