Baptist Sunday School Board?

With tension mounting between the members of the Northern and Southern Baptist churches, in 1845, the leaders of various Southern Baptist churches broke away from established the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC). However, during most of the 1800s, the American Baptist Publication Society, based in Philadelphia, published all literature for Baptists throughout the United States. In the interest of unifying the denomination, the SBC formed the Baptist Sunday School Board (BSSB) around 1891.

In 1914, the SBC built the Baptist Sunday School Board building (above) in Nashville. The BSSB printed everything for every Southern Baptist Church - hymnals, prayer books, bibles, Sunday School books, religious, books, Sunday School teachers' manuals, etc. JM Frost, head of the SBC at the time commented that it looked like a "Baptist Business Temple."

Known today as LifeWay, the organization still prints all church-related publications for the Southern Baptists as well as other evangelical churches. In addition, it also produces audio and video productions and operates more than 140 LifeWay Christian Bookstores in over 20 states. And, while the original building is still part of LifeWay, the complex has probably tripled in size over the years.