COLL/257 Guide to the Johanna Timmer Collection Timmer, Johanna Collection

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Hekman Library 1855 Knollcrest Circle SE Grand Rapids, MI, 49546 URL: http://archives.calvin.edu Email: crcarchives@calvin.edu Phone: 616-526-6913 Fax: 616-526-7689
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Guide to the Johanna Timmer Collection 1925/1939 Heritage Hall, Hekman Library Overview of the Collection Johanna Timmer Collection 1925-1939 COLL/257 Timmer, Johanna, 1901-1978 0.50 1 Boxes Heritage Hall, Hekman Library
Hekman Library 1855 Knollcrest Circle SE Grand Rapids, MI, URL: http://archives.calvin.edu Email: crcarchives@calvin.edu Phone: 616-526-6913 Fax: 616-526-7689
Christian school teacher and first dean of women at Calvin College. The collection includes reports, correspondence, notebooks, articles, clippings, and pamphlets used while dean of women.
Biographical Information:

Johanna Timmer was born in Graafschap, MI in 1901. Growing up Timmer received her education in a two-room country school and she attended a high school that was a three-mile walk through a woods in Holland, Michigan. When Timmer graduated high school, she began to teach at a Christian School in Paterson, New Jersey. After a year of teaching, Timmer returned to western Michigan to attend Calvin College. Timmer was one of the first women to earn a B.A. degree from Calvin. She then taught a year at Grand Rapids Christian School. At the age of 26 she was appointed the first Dean of Women at Calvin College. Although being the first Dean of Women was a prestigious honor, Timmer had her own hesitations before accepting the position. Timmer had always envisioned herself working in the mission field, a dream of hers since she was a young girl. However, with much thought and prayer, she accepted the position.

Timmer would spend the next twelve years at Calvin as Dean of Women. Some of her male peers mocked her and some of her own male students did not take her seriously. However, many of her students and peers found her to be an excellent English teacher. Even though she was a successful teacher at Calvin, Timmer still felt restless. Her dream of serving the mission field still lingered inside of her. Although she did not pursue mission work herself, Timmer opened the Reformed Bible Institute in 1940. The Reformed Bible Institute was a school dedicated to training its pupils for the mission field. Almost single-handedly, Timmer ran the RBI. With the success of her institution, she was invited to help set-up a similar model in the Netherlands. Timmer would eventually become the principle of the Ripon Christian School in California in 1951. After many requests from the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, she helped establish the first Christian High School, known as the Philadelphia Montgomery High School.

Timmer finally retired in 1963. She continued to stay busy after retirement by teaching Bible to women societies in Holland, Michigan. In 1978 Johanna Timmer died at the age of 76 at Holland Hospital.

Arrangement of Materials:

Folder level description

Detailed List of Contents id35496 Items Relating to the Dean of Women Position 1925-1939 id35497 1 id35498 1 1 Correspondence; and paper, "The Employment of Women" id35499 1 2 Photograph: Miss J. Timmer with Mrs. John T. Holwerda id35500 1 3 Calvin College Dean of Women 1928-1929 id35501 1 4 Conduct id35502 1 5 Problems id35503 1 6 College Women id35504 1 7 Amusement Problems 1925-1937 id35505 1 8 Presidential Reports 1926-1939 id35506 1 9 Announcements id35507 1 10 Counseling id35508 1 11 Constitutions of Societies id35509 1 12 Christ and the College id35510 1 13 Graduates id35511 1 14 Correspondence 1934-1935 id35512 1 15 Faculty id35513 1 16 School Spirit id35514 1 17 Religion id35515 1 18 Landladies - correspondence 1929-1931 id35516 1 19 Personal work id35517 1 20 Health and Hygiene 1929-1939 id35518 1 21 The Position id35519 1 22 Group Discussion id35520 1 23 Personal [RESTRICTED] Access Restriction

RESTRICTED

id35521 1 24 Great Missionaries to Africa inscribed to Rev. & Mrs. Carl Toeset 1946