William Bell Riley

1861-1947. Baptist minister and educator. Born in Indiana, he graduated from Hanover College (1885) and the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (1888). He was ordained to the Baptist ministry in Kentucky and was pastor of several Indiana churches; Calvary Baptist Church, Chicago (1893-97); and First Baptist, Minneapolis (1897-1942). Riley founded and was president of Northwestern Bible Training School (1902) and Northwestern Evangelical Seminary (1935) and founded Northwestern College (1944). He strongly opposed theological liberalism and evolution. He was president of the Minnesota Baptist Convention (1944-45). The forty-volume Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist (1924-38) is one of his major writings.