Reverend Dr. H. Dale Jackson (December 7, 1930 – February 15, 2003) was a Baptist minister, denominational leader and ethicist. He is most remembered for his efforts in promoting the historic distinctives of the Baptist faith; among those being the ideals of absolute separation of church and state, the authority of the Holy Scriptures, the autonomy of the local church, the priesthood of the individual, perseverance of the saints and the ordinances of believer's baptism by immersion and Holy Communion. For twenty years, he served as senior pastor of the Overland Baptist Church in St. Louis, Missouri.
Early life and education
Herman Dale Jackson was the third son of Herman William and Annie Rachel Dunton Jackson, born December 7, 1930, near Chesapeake, in rural southwestern Missouri. Jackson's ancestry included English, Scotch-Irish, French Acadian (Louisiana 'Cajun') and Missouri Sioux. His forebears came to what is now Missouri in 1796, when the land was still under the rule of Spain. The religious preferences of his immediate ancestry were Baptist, Methodist and Disciples of Christ. His great-great-grandfather, the Rev. Jason E. Dunton, was a Methodist minister who had been excommunicated for practicing spiritualism and lecturing on socialism in the late 19th century.
Jackson's parents were tenant farmers during the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl. His father, who led congregational singing in the church, had been raised in the rural Southern Missionary Baptist tradition; his mother, a Sunday School teacher, had converted to that faith in childhood. Jackson was baptised into the First Baptist Church of Stotts City, Missouri, at the age of nine.
Jackson's lifelong appreciation for the outdoors stemmed from his experiences growing up in the rural Ozarks. He attended Stotts City School and Mt. Vernon High School and married Frances Reinsmith. They had four children.
Jackson had planned to become a cattle rancher, but made a decision to enter the ministry at the age of twenty. He was ordained at the First Baptist Church of Joplin, Missouri, in November 1951. He received degrees from Southwest Baptist University and Ouachita Baptist University, and did graduate studies at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He was a member of Alpha Kappa, an academic sociological fraternity. He received a Doctor of Sacred Theology degree from Southwest Baptist University, a Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Missouri Baptist University and was honored by William Jewell College with a Walter Pope Binns fellowship and election to the Charles Haddon Spurgeon Society.
During his childhood, he was called "Dale" in order to distinguish him from his father, Herman. While in college, he was designated "H. Dale" to differentiate him from another student named Dale Jackson. The name stayed with him for the rest of his life.
In his later years, he spent time in Great Britain on a study fellowship with Missouri Baptist University, visiting the sites of early Baptist martyrdom and gathering data on the history of the English Baptists.
Pastoral career and beyond
Jackson pastored churches in rural southwestern Missouri and southern Arkansas while in college. After college, and while continuing his seminary education, he served as pastor of the First Baptist Church of Des Arc, Arkansas, 1956–1957 and the Eagle Heights Baptist Church in Harrison, Arkansas, 1957–1967. During the early part of the Cold War era of the mid 1950s through the early 1960s, Jackson was in demand as an after-dinner speaker. One of his topics was the threat of Soviet Communism.
Overland Baptist Church
According to family recollection, Jackson was being groomed by Dr. Paul Roberts, senior pastor of the First Baptist Church of Little Rock, Arkansas, to take leadership of that congregation following Roberts's eventual retirement. In March 1967, Jackson informed the South Highland Baptist Church in Little Rock of his intention to accept the position of senior pastor there.
Having been contacted previously by the search committee at the Overland Baptist Church in St. Louis, Missouri, Jackson called the Overland church to inform them of his decision. The committee chairman responded by telling Jackson that he was the only candidate whom they were considering, and if he took the position in Little Rock, the Overland church would wait until he made himself available to them again. Jackson reconsidered, and in May 1967, he accepted the position of senior pastor of the Overland church, following the twenty-year ministry of Dr. David W. Jones. Health problems forced Jackson into an early retirement in May 1987.