Dr. Horton was born on November 9, 1936, in Los Angeles, CA to his parents, Wallace and Jessie Horton. He graduated from Bob Jones University with a degree in English and History in 1958. He received a master’s degree in English in 1961 from the University of California Los Angeles. He completed summer study at the University of Oxford, UK in 1963. He married Martha Dillard Horton in 1968, and she taught English until 2000 with him at Bob Jones University. He was a recipient of a Folger Shakespeare Library Summer Fellowship in 1970. He received his doctoral degree in English (Renaissance Literature) from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill in 1972. He was a recipient of the South Atlantic Modern Library Association Award for a book manuscript in 1976 and was published in 1978 by the University of Georgia Press under the title The Unity of The Faerie Queene.
He taught at Bob Jones University from 1960-1966 and1969- 2019 and at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill 1967-1969. At Bob Jones University he was Chair of the Department of English (1969-72) and Division of English (1973-2001). He was Chair of the Department of Professional Writing and Publication 1981-2001 and Chair of the Department of Philosophy 2001-2019. He authored many secondary and college textbooks, many professional articles, and two other books, Mood Tides: Divine Purpose in the Rhythms of Life, Greenville, SC: BJU Press, 2008. Family: The Making and Remaking of a Christian Home, Greenville, SC: BJU Press, 2014 with his last book Mind the Story: The Readerly Reading of Scripture presently in progress to be published by BJU Press in 2019.
His life verse is Psalm 111:10. “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do his commandments: his praise endureth forever.” He wanted to follow God with his whole heart and to judge every idea he encountered in light of what God had said. He faithfully taught his last class this semester and loved and ministered individually to his children and grandchildren until the very end of this life. “...and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun.” Exodus 17:12.
Dr. Horton is survived by three daughters: Jennifer (Ted) Miller of Greenville; Jocelyn (Dennis) Rafaill of Gross Pointe, Michigan; and Jessica (Bevan) Elliott of Greenville; and eight grandchildren: Henry, Edward, William and Charles Miller, Andrew Rafaill, and Eleanor, Ronald, and Jane Elliott. He was predeceased by his wife, Martha Dillard Horton; his parents, Wallace and Jessie Horton; a granddaughter, Catherine Miller; a sister, Mrs. Carol Jean Brenneman; and a twin brother, Donald Horton.
Online condolences may be left at www.mackeymortuary.com.
Friends may visit the family from 6:00 – 8:00 PM Wednesday, June 5, 2019 at Mackey Funerals and Cremations Century Drive. The funeral service will be held 1:00 PM Thursday, June 6, 2019 in War Memorial Chapel on the campus of Bob Jones University, with burial service immediately following at Graceland East Memorial Park. A memorial service will be held later at Dr. Horton’s church, Trinity Baptist Church in Gaffney, where he faithfully taught and served for 32 years. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to Trinity Baptist Church, 907 E. Oneal St., Gaffney, SC 29340, www.tbcgaffney.org. Arrangements by Mackey Funerals and Cremations at Century Drive.
