LOMA LINDA>> Shirley McCumber Pettis, an only child, was born at home on July 12, 1924, in Mountain View, California and died on December 30, 2016, in Rancho Mirage, California. Her father, Harold Oliver McCumber, with a doctoral degree in American History from the University of California—Berkeley—was a great story teller. Dinner and breakfast table discussions had a very strong influence on her life.
During her childhood, Shirley developed a great passion to catch butterflies. She had a really fine mounted collection and knew all the names. And her father taught her to become a really good baseball player and ice skater. Starting in the fifth grade, and for a number of years, Judson Klooster, future dean of Loma Linda University School of Dentistry, was one of her classmates. Shirley’s aunt, Dr. Maude O’Neill, a nurse and very talented author and poetess, became her professional mentor throughout life.
Because her parents were very devout Seventh-day Adventists, they felt convicted to go back into denominational work. Her father eventually directed the history department at Emmanuel Missionary College (EMC, now Andrews University), in Berrien Springs, Michigan.
Following graduation from the academy, as Shirley entered college, she wanted to become a nurse like her aunt Maude. During the summer, she sold Uncle Arthur’s Bedtime Stories, and earned two scholarships. At EMC, she earned all straight A’s.
Following her heart, and to be closer to a “very serious love affair with a Loma Linda medical student,” Shirley moved to California to attend the School of Nursing at the Glendale Sanitarium and Hospital. Because of a rule at the time, one could not be married and continue her nursing education, she quit school to marry Jack McNulty in his senior year at the College of Medical Evangelists—Los Angeles campus. Shirley was only 19. The newlyweds lived with her aunt Maude, and Shirley worked in Medical Records at the White Memorial Hospital.
Jack going to the Pacific with the United States Marines was a very traumatic experience for Shirley. “We were really madly in love. Some people use that term loosely; I don’t. We were so happy. Neither one of us could believe we could be that happy. It was a real fit. We had so much fun….” When Jack died suddenly from a heart attack in Pearl Harbor, Shirley was devastated. She called it “an almost life-destroying blow.” The experience became the beginning of her real walk with God.
Shirley went back to college. But she became very lonely, and cried herself to sleep every night. When her father’s health was impacted negatively by the cold climate in Michigan, he moved to Pasadena, California, where he was invited to teach in the Cal Tech history department. Shirley enrolled at Pacific Union College, in Angwin, California, where she became a reader for English Professor, Richard Lewis, PhD.
Dr. Lewis’s good friend Jerry Pettis was a pilot for United Airlines. Unbeknownst to Shirley he said to Pettis, “I have a reader/secretary you have got to meet.” So, next time you’re in the country, give me a call and we’ll have you up to Sabbath dinner, and we’ll casually ask her over as well.”
Shirley wasn’t really interested in dating and wasn’t interested in anyone. After church one Sabbath, she went over to the Lewis residence where she saw a foreign car in the driveway and heard a melodious voice she did not recognize. Jerry was dressed in his United Airlines uniform. “We just sort of looked at each other and visited a bit, and it was practically love at first sight.”
Shirley reported that Jerry “campaigned for me and didn’t let up for one day! We were married six months later.” Jerry played the piano and organ, had a beautiful bass voice, and eventually became a pastor in Arizona, Kansas, and Colorado. While in Kansas, he commuted by train to teach speech at Union College in Lincoln, Nebraska. He had learned to fly at age 16.
Circumstances eventually led Mr. Pettis to accept an invitation to direct the Loma Linda College of Medical Evangelist’s Alumni Association. According to Shirley, his head was like a kettle of popcorn, always popping out a new idea it seemed every five minutes. He started the School of Medicine’s alumni post-graduate convention, known today as The Annual Postgraduate Convention (APC). During this time, Jerry’s fertile mind started subscription-based Audio-Digest, a voice recording of articles from all the outstanding medical journals. It eventually encompassed 18 medical specialties in many languages and used the world’s first high-speed magnetic tape duplication system. Audio-Digest eventually contributed $40 million to the education of medical students, and was donated to the California Medical Association.
After becoming Vice President for Development at Loma Linda University, San Bernardino City fathers persuaded Jerry to go into politics. Following his second try, Pettis very handily became the United States congressman for the 33rd Congressional District in California, the largest congressional district in the United States. He became the first Seventh-day Adventist to become a member of the United States Congress.
When her husband wasn’t at home, Shirley made some of his speeches. But she acknowledged that he was one of the best public speakers she had ever heard. During Jerry’s first term in the 90th Congress, he became a member of the House Science and Astronautics Committee. As such, the Pettis family became acquainted with all of the Apollo astronauts and Wernher von Braun, PhD, father of the United States space program, thought by many to be the greatest rocket scientists who ever lived. They were present in the White House when President Richard M. Nixon talked to the men on the moon. They also developed personal relationships with Ruth and Billy Graham, and became next door neighbors of Barbara and George H. W. Bush.