In the 1850s, two men in Rutherfordton, North Carolina--Edward Carter and Nathan Young, both of them loyal Baptists--became concerned that there were no good Baptist schools near their town.

Carter first became alarmed when he heard that his niece and nephew had converted to Methodism. This dire circumstance occurred at a local Methodist school they attended. Now you can imagine how this affected a dyed-in-the-wool Baptist. These young people had become--horrors!--Methodists! Even more alarming, Carter's own son attended that school, and he was worried the boy might also be led astray by strange Wesleyan theologies. So Edward Carter and his friend, Nathan Young, began raising funds for a Baptist College to be built on Carter's land.

They raised pledges of $2,000 from their neighbors, and…