History

Texas Holiness University was founded by B. A. Cordell and E. C. DeJernett in 1898. It was then established on a 37-acre

Acre

The acre is a unit of area in a number of different systems, including the imperial and U.S. customary systems. The most commonly used acres today are the international acre and, in the United States, the survey acre. The most common use of the acre is to measure tracts of land.The acre is related...

 campus in 1899 by A. M. Hills and a small holiness community at Holiness, later called Peniel and now part of Greenville, Texas

Greenville, Texas

Greenville is the county seat, and the largest city, of Hunt County, Texas, in the United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 25,557....

. It was sponsored by the Holiness Association of Texas, but the association disbanded in 1910 after many of its members united with the Church of the Nazarene

Church of the Nazarene

The Church of the Nazarene is an evangelical Christian denomination that emerged from the 19th century Holiness movement in North America with its members colloquially referred to as Nazarenes. It is the largest Wesleyan-holiness denomination in the world. At the end of 2010, the Church of the...

. The school then became one of the first three "official" Nazarene educational institutions in 1908, supported by the Dallas District Church of the Nazarene, and the name was changed to Peniel College. In 1920, the college merged with Oklahoma Nazarene College in Bethany, Oklahoma

Bethany, Oklahoma

Bethany is a city in Oklahoma County, Oklahoma, United States, and a part of the Oklahoma City metropolitan area. The population was 20,307 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Bethany is located at ....

, which was then renamed "Bethany-Peniel College".

Peniel's presidents included A. M. Hills, Edgar Ellyson

Edgar Ellyson

Edgar P. Ellyson was a minister, theologian, and general superintendent in the Church of the Nazarene.Ellyson was born in Damascus, Ohio, August 4, 1869, of Quaker parentage. He became a Quaker minister and the headmaster of the Friends' Bible School in Marshalltown, Iowa...

 (1907-1911), Roy T. Williams

Roy T. Williams

Roy Tilman Williams was a minister and general superintendent in the Church of the Nazarene.- Biography :Roy Williams was born in Milam, Texas on February 14, 1883. His family moved to Many, Louisiana when he was five years old. Williams was not exposed to religion during his childhood; however,...

 (1911-1913), J. B. Chapman

J. B. Chapman

James Blaine Chapman was a minister, president of Arkansas Holiness and Peniel Colleges, editor of the Herald of Holiness, and general superintendent in the Church of the Nazarene.- Early life and education :...

 (1913-1918), and A. K. Bracken, who took the presidency at Bethany-Peniel College in 1920.

Legacy

Founded in 1906, Oklahoma Holiness College, called Oklahoma Nazarene College when it absorbed Peniel College, took on the founding date of Texas Holiness University (1899).