Elmore J. McMurphy

1917 - 1998

Elmore McMurphy graduated from Pacific Union College in the late 1930's with a theology major. He had an exceptionally strong and resonant voice and throughout his time at PUC was a serious music student under the tutelage of George Greer, legendary choir director at the college. Following graduation, he was pastor of the Worthington, Ohio, Seventh-day Adventist Church. He also continued music study at Capital University in Columbus, Ohio.

When McMurphy went to the SDA Seminary, which at that time was in Takoma Park, Washington, for graduate study in 1944, he was invited to teach voice at nearby Washington Missionary College, now Washington Adventist University. It is likely that the relationship he had enjoyed with Greer, his former PUC mentor who had just left WMC after six successful years, was a factor in his being hired to teach voice lessons while he completed an M.A. in Biblical languages.

McMurphy subsequently sang on the George Vandeman television program in Washington, D.C., taught theology at Southern Missionary College, now Southern Adventist University, and taught communications and theology at PUC, the latter from 1956 until his retirement. He pastored the St. Helena SDA Church in California after he retired.

McMurphy was married to Kathleen M. Burrows, who taught English at both SMC and PUC. They were living in Angwin, California, at the time of her death in 1976, at age 59. He would die there 22 years later, at age 81.

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Sources: Pacific Union Recorder, 19 December 1966, (Kathleen’s father’s obituary); 9 Jul 1956, 8; Kathleen’s obituary, 23 February 1976; (Elmore’s obituary) 7 June 1999, 57; Social Security Death Index.