09 Oct Evelyn Baker Given Distinguished Alumni Award

During this year’s Homecoming festivities at Huntington University, Mrs. Ruth Evelyn Baker received the Distinguished Alumni Citation, an award annually to recognize outstanding service over an extended period of time.

Mrs. Ruth Evelyn Baker accepts the Distinguished Alumni Citation from (l-r) Margaret Roush, Alumni Board chairman Greg Will, and Dr. G. Blair Dowden, HU President.

Evelyn earned a teaching certificate from Huntington in 1939, and went on to teach in Ohio and Maryland. After World War II, she and her husband, Dewitt, traveled to Sierra Leone, West Africa, where they spent 16 years as United Brethren missionaries. During that time they opened 20 schools, including the high schools at Bumpe and Mattru.
In 1965, Dr. Baker was chosen as President of Huntington College, and so Evelyn and Dewitt moved back to the States. Evelyn served as Huntington’s “First Lady” for 16 years. Though retired, Mrs. Baker remains active in the university community and at College Park UB church in Huntington, Ind.