PRELIMINARY INVENTORY S1236 (SA4422, SA4447, SA4470, SA4472, SA4483, SA4499) NEW LIFE EVANGELISTIC CENTER RECORDS This collection is available at The State Historical Society of Missouri. If you would like more information, please contact us at
[email protected]. Introduction Approximately 68.08 cubic feet The New Life Evangelistic Center (NLEC) Records contain correspondence, meeting minutes, reports, newsletters, newspaper clippings, and photographs documenting NLEC’s mission to provide Christian hospitality to the poor through social service programs and spiritual care. The collection is divided into five series: Administration; Larry Rice; Penny Rice; Chronological Files; Publications; Jim Barnes; Photographs; and Scrapbooks. The Chronological Files series consists of materials Larry Rice and his son, Chris Rice, gathered during their research for their five-volume history of NLEC. This series contains Rice’s handwritten drafts of the book, newspaper clippings, meeting minutes, and photographs, arranged chronologically by year. Other series of interest include the publications series, which consists of issues of the ZOA Free Paper, which NLEC published from 1972 to 2005. The materials in this collection date from 1949 to 2018. The New Life Evangelistic Center (NLEC) was founded in January 1972 by Larry Rice (1949-present), as a non-denominational Christian church dedicated to providing Christian hospitality to the poor through free food and clothing, emergency shelter, job training programs, and spiritual care. Rice, a native of McAllen, Texas, originally intended to become a Lutheran minister, having graduated from Concordia Senior College, in Fort Wayne, Indiana, in May 1971. After attending a few weeks of classes at Concordia Seminary in Clayton, Missouri, in the fall of 1971, Rice became increasingly frustrated by what he perceived as his fellow Lutherans disinterest in the plight of the impoverished.