Jay Omar Good, an alumnus benefactor, was born in 1887 in Waynesboro, Pennsylvania. Good often went by his middle name, Omar, throughout his lifetime. He was raised in a Brethren family, being born Brethren church was just starting to promote post-secondary education within the church. At sixteen, he moved to Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, to attend what was then called Brethren Normal School, later to be Juniata College, with the hopes of becoming a teacher. He graduated two years later with a degree in English but chose to stay another year to study the Bible as well as classic literature.
Instead of becoming a teacher, Good chose a career in business. He left his first job, a business in his hometown of Waynesboro, for an opportunity in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, at William Mann Printing Company. During his time at the company, as well as his retirement, Good attended Philadelphia’s First Church of the Brethren, where he served as Missionary Treasurer for fifty years. Good loved the children there; he is recorded as having spent time telling them stories of his days in college. He also drove people to church every Sunday in his Buick. When his church faced a membership crisis and had to decide whether or not to allow African Americans within the congregation, Good spoke up. He stated that while he would go with what the others decided, his thoughts were: “I would welcome black brothers and be happy to wash their feet.” Not surprisingly, he met his future, Mabel, at church. Upon Good’s marriage to her in 1902, they moved to a home in Germantown, Pennsylvania. They had no children.
Good amassed a small fortune in his lifetime, but kept it hidden. His home, cars, and clothes remained modest, likely due to his religious Brethren beliefs. His modesty was so significant that no one realized his true wealth. For example, people within his congregation knew of his generous donations to the church but did not understand how he could afford to make them. His donations were so generous that his annual pledge to the church was $25,000, half of the church’s annual budget, and the missionary fund never seemed to drain.
After the death of his wife, whom he outlived by around thirty years, Good lived on his own in fairly good health until 1962. At this time, he was found to be ill by the Rosenbergers, a couple from his congregation who had gone to check on Good following his absence from church. They had him admitted to the hospital, where he was treated for pneumonia and later released into a nursing home. Before his death, Good came to trust the Rosenbergers, so much so that he named them his power of attorney and will executors. He also attempted to give his estate to them, but they refused. They assisted him in organizing his estate and calculating the worth of stock certificates he had.
At the time of his death in January 1969, at the age of ninety-one, Good’s net worth was three million dollars. Much of this money was set aside prior to his death for donating to organizations including a hospital in his hometown and Juniata College. It is part of this money, one million dollars, that funded what is now known as Good Hall, an academic building that is named in his honor. Another donation was also given to the college in his name, which founded the J. Omar Good Fund. This fund was used to create a faculty position, which began as a visiting position, which focused on teaching evangelical Christianity or a related field on campus. The J. Omar Good Fund was established due to the lack of mandatory religion education and the rise in smoking and drinking on campus. The conditions are strict, including that the fund is audited independently and that a Good trustee can terminate the fund at any time.
Alyssa Reed '23
Bibliography:
Gill, David W., and Earl C Kaylor. “Should God Get Tenure?: Essays on Religion and Higher Education.” Essay. In Should God Get Tenure?: Essays on Religion and Higher Education, edited by David Gill, 237–45. Michigan: William B. Eerdmans, 1997.
“Obituary for J. Omar Good.” Huntingdon Daily News. February 1, 1969. file:///C:/Users/pc/Downloads/Omar%20Good%20(2).pdf.