JIM PENTON was born in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan just north of eastern Montana in April 1932. His great grandfather, Henry Penton, had become a Bible Student in association with the Watch Tower Society some time about 1900. Through Henry Penton, Jim's grandmother, Margaret Thomas Penton, and his parents, Levis and Ida Penton, became Bible Student-Jehovah's Witnesses.

In both the First and Second World Wars the Pentons experienced police raids on their homes as, during the First, Watch Tower literature was banned in Canada and, during the Second, Jehovah's Witnesses were completely outlawed. Although never disciplined directly over the flag salute issue, Jim indicates that he suffered the severe disapproval from one of his teachers over it.

For reasons of health Jim moved to Tucson, Arizona in 1948, finished high school there, and in 1951 married Marilyn Kling, a young Jehovah's Witness pioneer woman from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, whose great grandparents had been associated with Charles T. Russell as early as the 1880s. Rather than pioneering as a Witness evangelist, Jim decided to go on to university since health prohibited him from doing hard manual labor. He and Marilyn also wanted a family. Interestingly, Jim's family supported his decision to attend university despite the fact that many Witnesses and the Watch Tower Society looked askance at higher education.

Jim graduated from the University of Arizona with a B.A. in 1956, and started graduate studies at the State University of lowa immediately thereafter. In 1958 he obtained a Master of Arts degree in history and in 1965 he received his Ph.D., also in history.

In 1959 Jim and family moved to Mayaguez, Puerto Rico, where Jim taught briefly at the Universidad de Puerto Rico. In 1960 he began teaching at Northern Michigan University at Marquette, where he and his family lived for three years. In the summer of 1963 Jim returned to lowa to complete his doctoral dissertation, and in 1964 he took a position at the University of Wisconsin - Whitewater. He determined to return to Canada, however, as the Pentons' sons were growing up, and Jim didn't want them to face being drafted or going to prison as conscientious objectors during the Vietnamese War. Thus, in 1965, Jim took a position at the University of Calgary in Alberta, and two years later at the University of Lethbridge, also in Alberta, where he taught until 1990. He is now a professor emeritus at the U of L. He is also a past president of the Canadian Society of Church History.

Over the years Jim and Marilyn remained loyal Jehovah's Witnesses, and Jim held practically every Witness congregational position then in existence - plus that of circuit news servant - at one time or another. After returning from a sabbatical leave in Spain in 1973, Jim was recommended to become a Witness elder. Then, in 1975 he published the book Jehovah's Witnesses in Canada which told the story of the Witnesses' fight for civil liberties under Canadian law. Thereafter he was active on a local hospital committee which dealt with blood transfusion cases, and in the mid 1970s began to symbolize his heavenly hope by partaking of the "Lord's Evening Meal" or communion, much to the shock of his wife and family.

Both Jim and Marilyn were becoming increasingly unhappy with the leadership of Jehovah's Witnesses during the late 1970s, however. Neither believed the Watch Tower Society's assertion that the present world would probably end in 1975, and both were taken aback by the fact that for years the Society refused to admit any fault in the matter. Both also became distressed over the Watch Tower's methods of cajoling ordinary Witnesses into going preaching from door to door, the Society's lack of love and concern for ordinary persons, and the mistreatment of their older son, David, for attending university. Thus, after a trip to the Watch Tower's Brooklyn, New York, Bethel headquarters in the summer of 1979, Jim decided to write a letter of protest to the Society concerning a number of issues. As a result, an attempt was made to remove him as an elder through the collection of solicited letters against him. Eventually this resulted in Jim's disfellowshipment and a major schism in southern Alberta. Over eighty persons, including fifteen members of the both Jim and Marilyn's families, left Lethbridge Witness congregations. In addition, news of this revolt against Watch Tower oppression was publicized throughout Canada and abroad. The story of what happened has been told in James Beverley's book Crisis of Allegiance. Unfortunately, the trauma connected with the Pentons' break with Jehovah's Witnesses had a serious impact on Jim's health. Shortly- thereafter he suffered two heart attacks and was forced to undergo a bowel resection, all as the result - in part at least - of extreme stress. Eventually Jim was forced to take early retirement from teaching in 1990.

Since leaving Jehovah's Witnesses, Jim has been active in Christian ministries. He has also edited two journals and written five articles on Jehovah's Witnesses for encyclopedias (including the Canadian Encyclopedia and the Americana), and the book Apocalypse Delayed: The Story of Jehovah's Witnesses, which has received wide recognition throughout the English-speaking world and beyond. His publisher, the University of Toronto Press, is at present producing the second edition of Apocalypse Delayed.

Jim and Marilyn have three children - David, John, and Anne - and seven grandchildren. Until the fall of 1998, they lived in Lethbridge and then moved to Mexico where they built a new home in a community predominantly populated from Canada and the U.S. as well as other countries.