Baptist School Dedicates Library

There was ample praise to go around Thursday for those who helped to make Los Angeles Baptist Junior/Senior High School’s new $1.75-million library and media center a reality, but in the end all the credit went to God.

Quoting Psalms 127:1, Principal Gary Smidderks told students, faculty, parents and guests invited for the dedication ceremony that “unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it.”

Those same words rolled across dozens of computers in the new facility Thursday, serving both as screen-savers and constant reminders of the dual educational and Christian missions of the 800-student school.

The completion of the 13,200-square-foot building, which opened this school year, represents the end of a 15-year mission to upgrade facilities at L.A. Baptist, administrators said.

Located on an 11-acre site at the corner of Woodley Avenue and Lassen Street, L.A. Baptist was established in 1962 with the help of the Los Angeles City Mission Society.

In addition to the expanded library, the two-story brick building houses two computer labs with audiovisual equipment, four new classrooms and a faculty workroom.

The building was named Lunsford Library in honor of C. Rowan Lunsford, the school’s founder and first principal.

“I had to fight back tears when I came and saw this building, these new classrooms and library that we’ve needed for so long,” said Lunsford, who is now retired and living in Orange County. “It’s always nice when something is done right.”

Cassie Williams, a 17-year-old senior at L.A. Baptist, agreed. After hearing about plans for a new building since the seventh grade and watching the construction for the past year and a half, she was pleased with the final result.

“Right now it’s awesome, but it was a big nuisance when they were building it,” she said.

“The new computer lab is great, and the library. They are both much bigger than what we had before.”