The news which follows may bring joy or sadness to the heart of the reader depending upon your attitude toward Gospel Guardian. Whatever your reaction, we want you to know that it is not something that was done without due consideration and prayerful thought. Due to Brother Theron N. Bohannon's advancing age, his health, Sister Bohannon's health, and his personal affairs, the editor of Gospel Guardian has been for the past year urging Brother Bohannon, is some way or the other, to get himself out from under the burden which continued publication of The Gospel Guardian imposed. Several courses of action were considered. The editor of the paper had first chance at buying and continuing to operate the paper himself. He considered it, but ruled that course out due to insufficient capital and his own age. Had I been ten years younger, I would have bought the company and continued to publish it myself, despite my finances, but unfortunately I am not ten years younger. The paper could have been given or sold to a Non-profit Corporation which we had set up with that it view. In fact, the corporation had already achieved both State and Federal (IRS) 4pproval and was ready to be activated. Several considerations caused this to be rejected. Brother Bohannon finally decided to sell The Gospel Guardian, Inc, lock, stock, and barrel, to The Cogdill Foundation. This became an accomplished fact, September .19, 1980, but it will not pass from one to the other until December 31, 1980. Until that time, the company and paper will continue to be operated as it has been for the past five years.

Theron N. Bohannon has unselfishly underwritten the company and the paper for five years. He has sacrificed thousands of dollars of his personal funds to do this. He has given the editor an absolutely free hand with the paper's publication. Our relationship has been close and brotherly in every sense of the word. It remains so at this moment and w"continue to remain so as the years pass whether few or many. I regret that we did not achieve our goal of getting the paper operating in the black financially. We were approaching this goal, but only by the editor giving his time to the task without remuneration, except for reimbursed expenses. This is how we have operated throughout 1980. I leave the paper with no regrets and by choice. My reasons are strictly personal, hence no person's business except my own. Beyond this statement, I plan to make no comment. I would appreciate not being asked, and I shall consider any speculation, publicly or privately voiced, as unwarranted meddling in other men's matters, hence will dignify all such with the contempt of silence which it deserves. I regret the necessity for having to say this, but knowing the disposition of some, I deem it proper and necessary.

I shall make no comments concerning the future, either of the paper or the bookstore, but shall let the new owners of the company and paper make whatever statements they care to make and reveal whatever plans they have in mind for the future. I shall only assure our subscribers that all subscriptions will be fulfilled satisfactorily by those who assume ownership. This was a part of the sale agreement. We have no unpaid obligations beyond current operating expenses which will all be satisfied.

During my tenure as editor of the paper, my daughter, Patricia Spivey, has efficiently and faithfully operated the bookstore. It has been a great experience for her. She is a university graduate and competent, hence could have made more money elsewhere. I could not have managed the operation without her, so she made a large contribution to my editorship in this respect. I enjoyed writing for the paper and doing the work of an editor, however imperfectly. I trust that good was accomplished. May the Lord bless the good and overrule anything that was otherwise. A special thanks to our faithful readers for the hundreds of letters I have received encouraging me in my efforts, for those who may have respectfully written criticizing this or that about our efforts, and for your subscriptions and book business that helped us continue.

As to my future: I shall continue, as I have for more than forty-five years, to "do the work of an evangelist." I work fill time with the good church at Huntington, Texas, in which labor I am most happy. I shall continue in this capacit~, will hold a few meetings each year, and plan to do some writing of a more permanent nature that I have contemplated for a number of years. When I perceive, as I will inevitably if I live long enough, that my powers of mind and body are waning to such an extent that my work is no longer productive, I shall retire from public work and dedicate the remainder of my life in simply living for God so as to go to heaven when I die and to take as many with me as possible. I hope it will be in the Piney Woods of East Texas that I spend these years. Though not a native of this section, I regard it as home!

Truth Magazine XXIV: 44, pp. 705, 715
November 6, 1980