DR. REUBEN P. JESCHKE ’34
Dr. REUBEN P. JESCHKE, former college president, minister and long-time educator, died Nov. 20, 2004, at his residence in Salem, Ore. He was 93.
Jeschke, who moved to the Capital Manor retirement community in 1982, was born July 20, 1911, near Volinia in the Russian Ukraine. When he was two, he and his family immigrated to Saskatchewan, Canada, where he lived until 1928.
At the age of 18, Jeschke moved to the United States to study at Colgate-Rochester Divinity School, Rochester, N.Y. He graduated from Wesleyan University, with a bachelor of arts and was awarded a bachelor of divinity and master of sacred theology from Hartford Theological Seminary. He received a doctor of philosophy degree from New York’s Columbia University in 1951 and was awarded an honorary doctor of divinity from Northern Baptist Seminary, Chicago, Ill., and an honorary doctor of humane letters from Sioux Falls College, Sioux Falls, S.D.
Jeschke was president of Sioux Falls College, now the University of Sioux Falls, from 1953 to 1970. He was proud of his leadership of the college during its period of greatest development. He is credited with strengthening the finances of the then-struggling liberal arts college and was a primary motivator in helping the college obtain accreditation. Before assuming the presidency, Jeschke was dean of the college.
His teaching career included a professorship from 1947 to 1952 at the North American Baptist Seminary, Sioux Falls, S.D., where he also served as registrar.
As a Baptist minister, Jeschke served as pastor of the Memorial Baptist Church in New Britain, Conn., 1933-1937; the Fourth Street Baptist Church, now Shroyer Road Baptist Church, Dayton, Ohio, 1937-1947; and the First Baptist Church, Branford, Conn., 1970-1974.
He was listed in Who’s Who in America in 1964. He was the author of two books, Dream of the Pioneers, a history of Sioux Falls College; and My Life and My Family, an autobiography.
He was married in 1935 to Sabina Jacopian of Stratford, Conn. He is survived by his wife, Sabina, two sons, Paul Jeschke of Muir Beach, Calif., and Thomas Jeschke of Panora, Iowa, sisters Walda Kwast, Lansing, MI, and Elva Kuhn of Salem, Ore/, six grandchildren and two great grandchildren.
Private interment will be at Salt Creek Cemetery, Dallas, Ore. The family requests that donations in his honor be sent to the University of Sioux Falls, Sioux Falls, S.D.