Sabrina Riley, Library Director, and Kelti Dickerson, Heritage Room Assistant Ella Johnson Crandall Memorial Library – Union College Beginning at Union College, the Medical Cadet Corps became a nation-wide program during World War II with nearly every Adventist college and secondary school offering a pre-military orientation course which would help prepare young Adventist men to serve in non-combatant roles. The Union College Library Heritage Room now holds this unique collection of photographs, 16 mm film, manuscripts, uniforms, curriculum materials, and more.

1. Sabrina Riley, MILS
Union College Library
Director and
Archivist
&
Kelti Dickerson,
History major
Union College
Heritage Room
Assistant
CONSCIENTIOUS
COOPERATORS:
THE UNION COLLEGE MEDICAL CADET CORPS
AND THE SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTIST
DENOMINATION'S UNIQUE RESPONSE TO
CONSCRIPTION 1934-1971

2.  Conscientious Objection : Two philosophies:
 Pacifism: All forms of violence or resistance are immoral, including
legitimate warfare and refuse to serve in military.
 Church of the Brethren, Religious Society of Friends, Mennonites,
Jehovah’s Witnesses, Christadelphians
 Noncombatant roles: Acknowledge that armed resistance is
sometimes necessary but choose not to take life, accepting service
roles in support of the community and/or military.
 Seventh-day Adventists, Community of Christ
ADVENTISTM’S UNIQUE RESPONSE

3.  Civil War (1863 draft law) – Newly formed Adventist church
claimed noncombatancy status
 World War I – Affirmed noncombatancy principals citing Civil
War precendant
DENOMINATIONAL BACKGROUND

4.  Earthly governments ordained of God to secure order, justice,
and tranquility
 In exercise of legitimate functions, governments should
receive loyal support of citizens (Romans 13)
 Citizens should render tribute, custom, and honor to earthly
governments (Matthew 22:21)
 But in keeping with Adventist doctrine, members seek to
 Avoid secular labor on Sabbath (Fourth Commandment)
 Avoid taking life (Sixth Commandment)
 Engage in work of necessity and mercy, to relieve suffering (Matthew
12:11)
DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES

5.  The war to end all wars
 Isolationism was the prevalent attitude
 Economy still struggling to recover from the Great Depression
 Isolationism was particularly popular in the Middle West
among rural and small-town populations, Republicans, and
German-Americans.
SOCIAL CLIMATE 1930S

6. First meeting
January 8,
1934
UNION
COLLEGE
MEDICAL
CORPS

7. 47th General
Hospital, Army
Reserve - 1936
COLLEGE OF
MEDICAL
EVANGELISTS

8. Artificial
resuscitation
1940
CENTRAL
UNION
SUMMER
MCC

9. Everett Dick
Orason Brinker
Walter Crawford
Josephine Stone
1940
CENTRAL
UNION
SUMMER
MCC CAMP
STAFF

10. October 1940
LAKE
UNION
CAMP

11. 1942
GAS MASK
DRILL

12. Dressed up for
an MCC
banquet in
1941.
BONITA
COZAD AND
GLENN
DAVENPORT

13. Grand march
through
Nevada, Iowa
to end at the
public school’s
football field.
OAK PARK
ACADEMY
1941

14. In 1941 Iowa
governor,
George A.
Wilson
reviewed
cadets from
camp held on
the Oak Park
Academy
campus.
OAK PARK
ACADEMY,
NEVADA,
IOWA

15. February 1-21, 1942
MAPLEWOOD ACADEMY

16.  Consensus was the prevailing attitude
 Booming and optimistic
 Economy
 Population
 Sense of American superiority
 Underlying weaknesses
 Communist threat
 Civil rights
 Seventh-day Adventists seek to correct misconceptions
SOCIAL CLIMATE 1950S

17. Beulah,
Colorado
CAMP
CARLYLE B.
HAYNES

18. March 20 or
22, 1951
MADISON
COLLEGE

19. April 1955
SOUTH-
WESTERN
JUNIOR
COLLEGE

20. Col. Wergeland,
Carlyle Haynes,
and Everett
Dick with
Desmond Doss
CAMP
DESMOND
T. DOSS

21. Headquarters
meeting June
1951
CAMP
DOSS
STAFF

22. Grand Ledge,
Michigan - July
1954
GRAND
MARCH

23. Camp
Almansask,
Canada –
Washroom tent
AROUND
THE
WORLD

24. Anatomy lesson
under a tree –
August 1951
DOMINICAN
REPUBLIC

25. Everett Dick
Inspects
Hawaiian
Cadets at Camp
Erdman –
January 1953
HAWAIIAN
MISSION

26. Everett Dick
Instructs
Philippine
Cadets – May
1953
PHILIPPINE
UNION
COLLEGE

27. 1955 in
Singapore
SOUTHEAST
ASIA
MEDICAL
CADET
CORPS

28. JAPAN MISSIONARY COLLEGE
FEBRUARY 1953

29. April 11, 1957
LINCOLN
CITY CIVIL
DEFENSE
DRILL

30. Desmond Doss
and Everett
Dick at a Lake
Union bivouac.
WAINING
DAYS

31. LAKE
UNION
BIVOUAC

32.  Last Camp Doss – 1970
 Union College – 1969-1970 last bulletin to list MCC courses
 Changing social climate:
 Civil rights
 War protests
 The end of the draft
 The Seventh-day Adventist denomination continues to advise
that its members take noncombatant roles in the military, but
leaves the decision up to the conscience of the individual.
THE END OF AN ERA

33. To view these photographs and more, visit the Union College
Heritage Collections at
http://cdm15913.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/
Exhibit in the Library: “Conscientious Cooperators”
Research is ongoing
Organizing the archives left by Everett Dick
Preparing a storyboard for documentary film (production uncertain)
Digitization of photographs and 16mm film
UNION COLLEGE HERITAGE COLLECTIONS

34.  Berg, Thomas. The Seventh-day Adventist Medical Cadet Corps,
1934-1945: Reconciling War, Conscience, and Noncombatancy.
Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska, 1990. [M.A. thesis].
 Brock, Peter. Pacifism in the United States, from the colonial era
to the First World War. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, 1968.
 General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists. Office of
Archives, Statistics, and Research.
http://www.adventistarchives.org/
 Medical Cadet Corps Collection (000016). Ella Johnson Crandall
Memorial Library Heritage Room, Union College, Lincoln, NE.
 Schwarz, R. W. Light Bearers to the Remnant. Boise: Pacific
Press, 1979.
 Wilcox, Francis McLellan. Seventh-day Adventists in Time of War.
Washington, DC: Review & Herald, 1936.
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY