In 1956, a group of church members and supporters, mostly couples, established the Fortnighters group to discuss “our church, our community, and our university.” The group’s combination of intellectual and social events drew non-church members to us, too. 

Reviewing just the first decade of the Fortnighters, I found an impressive array of topics and social events. From September 1957 to September 1958, some of the issues presented at the meetings were election prospects, international conflicts, integration, birth control and family planning, astronomy, nuclear power, criminal justice, evolution, and economic policy. 

Speakers came from the church’s membership, the University, and the wider Champaign-Urbana community. Most meetings took place in member’s homes, though some were held in the “chapel,” which we now know as the Channing-Murray building.

The Fortnighters did not neglect the social side of fellowship. From the late 1950s until the group apparently disbanded in 1988, the Fortnighters went to museums, galleries, rehearsal halls and dance studios, and theaters. They held formal dinners, potlucks, pig roasts, cabarets, New Year’s Eve parties, jazz & blues performances, receptions for politicians, movie nights, game nights, dances, picnics, even a hootenanny.