The first issue of the journal Church History appeared in 1932—seventy-nine years ago—the year William Warren Sweet was president of the American Society of Church History. It was a time of considerable pain and social stress in many parts of the world. Perhaps in response to this turmoil, the inaugural issue conveyed a deep-seated optimism about the future. A bracing faith in the providential course of history characterized the three essays in that first issue and the authors conveyed that faith with erudition, narrative flair, and sweeping knowledge of Christian history. Few authors today exert such broad command of events in the larger history of Christianity, or display such facility with a wide range of primary documents, and few write with such ebullience. Such may be the price of leaving behind a world where providence is clearly in sight.