01/03/2025
Bertha Munro (1887–1983) taught language arts at the Pentecostal Collegiate Institute in North Scituate, Rhode Island, USA, from 1910 to 1915. When the school was renamed Eastern Nazarene College (ENC) upon its relocation to Quincy, Massachusetts, USA, in 1919, Munro was appointed a founding member of the faculty and its first academic dean.
Munro graduated from Boston University in 1907 as class valedictorian with a major in languages. She earned her master’s degree in English from Radcliffe College and pursued doctoral studies at Harvard University. For a time during her years at the Pentecostal Collegiate Institute she taught fourteen classes a day in English, Greek, Latin, French, and German. She taught eight half-hour classes in the morning and six in the afternoon.
In 1912 she wrote these words to her students:
“What is that scarcely defined longing at the bottom of your heart, that half-desire you would not dare breathe to a living soul? Listen to it. Who is that person whose life causes you to thrill with admiration until you say, ‘If I could only be like him!’ Be like him, but be more—be what God planned for you. What is that station in life that above all others you would wish to fill? What is it that, if your truest dream should come true, you would be? Be that. Do you want to amount to something in the world? Why not! Do you hear one person objecting, ‘You can’t?’ He can who thinks he can. Be sure your gleam is right, and you can follow it steadily, however cruelly hindered by obstacles. It will lead you truly.”
Munro both taught and served as academic dean at Eastern Nazarene College until she resigned her administrative post in 1957. She continued teaching at the college until her retirement in 1968. A residence hall on the campus was named in her honor. She served the ENC campus community for over half a century.
