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Innovative Administrator
Sunday. She tried to reason with her mother, explaining why her conscience would not
allow her to work on Sabbath. Not being able to read seemed to compound Mrs.
Knight’s frustration. A strong-willed woman, she flew into a rage. She insisted that she
was Anna’s mammy, and that the girl could not teach her mother—Anna would have to
give up this Saturday-for-Sunday foolishness or leave home.
Anna came to the painful decision that she must leave home. Friends in Chattanooga
assisted her with expenses so that she could attend Mount Vernon Academy in Ohio for
one school year. It was a good time for her to get away from home, and she treasured
the opportunity to study.
The following year Anna found it possible to attend the new industrial school in
Battle Creek, Michigan, the predecessor of Battle Creek College. Along with hard work,
she exhibited strong faith and a tremendous spirit of vitality. In 1898 Anna Knight graduated from Battle Creek College, prepared to be a missionary nurse.
Dr. J. H. Kellogg, director of the Battle Creek Sanitarium (which was closely associated with the college), urged Anna’s class to volunteer for self-supporting missionary
work. Accepting that call, Anna decided that no other mission field had as great a need
for her ministry as her home county in Mississippi.
When she returned home from college, Anna was greatly relieved to find that the
family’s ill feeling concerning her religious faith had disappeared. Her relatives received
her gladly; they were willing to help create the school that Anna considered a necessity
for Jasper County. The school was housed in a dilapidated log cabin. Anna taught for a
dollar a week, plus labor that the parents and children could supply at odd times.
As the school was progressing admirably, the old building that housed it burned
down. Anna was not deterred by this calamity; she stepped out by faith again to organize the construction of a new building.
Miss Knight had planted four acres in cotton; she dedicated the proceeds to this
purpose. A friend solicited 50 dollars in Ohio. Patrons and friendly neighbors were
asked to contribute money or labor. All promised to do what they could. The building,
when finished, was so splendid that people came from 75 miles away to see it.
Miss Knight taught 24 pupils in eight grades, no small task for a second-year teacher.
Yet she did not see her calling as limited to her teaching duties. Anna organized two
classes on Sunday as a means of outreach, one in her school building and the other five
miles distant. After the religious classes she taught adults how to read, write, and figure,
how to cook and preserve food with healthful methods, and how to live according to the
principles of temperance. The teacher’s training for medical missionary work was put to
practical use.
Anna’s work in the temperance cause aroused the anger of some local “moonshiners”
to the point that they came to the school expressly to pick a fight. After a struggle with
Anna’s relatives, the brewers decided they had met their match and left.
The fame of Miss Knight’s intrepid missionary activities spread far beyond Jasper
County. In May 1901 Anna was astonished to receive from Dr. J. H. Kellogg an invita63