Roland H. Bainton was retired from Yale when I was there. Nevertheless, he was a popular lecturer in retirement and a familiar figure. If Bainton was speaking, I was there. We have a priceless photo of Bainton holding Little Ichabod in a baby carrier.
During the lecture in the basement of the dorm, Bainton mentioned Luther's son and our son raised his arm with an "Eep!" Everyone laughed.
Everyone longed for a drawing from Bainton. When I sent him the birth announcement for our daughter, Bainton responded with a drawing of Luther holding our first two children. We framed it immediately.
I contacted Bainton when I was working on my dissertation at Notre Dame. A. D. Mattson (my subject) went to Yale, so I wanted some additional information about those years. Bainton wrote about his book, a history of Yale Divinity School. He added, "If you don't have it, I will xerox parts of it and mail the pages to you."
When I returned to Yale for the Holmer lectures, we made an appointment to see Bainton at his Sterling Library office. He was still working, long into retirement.
Mennonites respected his church history efforts as much as Lutherans did. When others followed fads, Bainton learned all the languages he needed for his research and obtained the documents.
Martin Marty:
For a particular project, I am doing a good deal of research, a.k.a. remedial and required reading on Martin Luther in the form of texts by him and texts about him. Most helpful and memorable among the books on Luther, and the most readable since Roland Bainton's classic Here I Stand, is Oberman's Luther: Man Between God and the Devil (Yale University Press, 1989).
Information about Bainton
