Hazel Crouch, a former Assemblies of God (AG) World Missions missionary and wife of former Central Bible College president Philip Crouch, passed away on Tuesday after an extended illness. She was 94.
In 1938, Crouch received a missionary appointment and married Phillip, who had joined his parents as missionaries to Egypt in 1937. The Crouches would later work with Lillian Trasher as missionaries at the Assiout Orphanage in Egypt from 1948 to 1955.
Crouch and her husband also served as faculty members at the AG Central Bible College prior to 1963. Philip was named president in 1963 and led the college for the next 17 years. For most of her husband’s tenure as president, Crouch taught at the college.
Many of the Central Bible College campus buildings were constructed during the Crouches’ tenure, including the E.S. Williams Chapel, Boyd married student housing, Horton, Flower and Bowie dormitories, the Pearlman Library, and the Peterson Dining Commons, according to Gary Denbow, current president of the college.
“The Crouches led this campus during a period of great growth,” Denbow says. “They ministered here with elegance, diligence and deep spirituality. Truly, their mark of influence in all these areas still remains so evident—both on campus, and in the lives of literally thousands of CBC graduates as they minister around the
world.”
Crouch was preceded in death by her husband, Philip, (2005) and is survived by two sons, Wedge (Janice) and Mark (Ginger), four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. She is also survived by a sister, Mildred Taylor of Houston.
The memorial service for Hazel Crouch is scheduled for 10 a.m. Saturday, Feb. 25, at Central Assembly of God in Springfield, Mo. Visitation will be Friday, February 24, from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Greenlawn North Funeral Home.
