Point Loma Nazarene University (PLNU) is a Christian liberal arts college. Its main campus is located on the Point Loma oceanfront in San Diego, California. It was founded in 1902 as a Bible college by the Church of the Nazarene. The college was founded by several female laypersons in the Church of the Nazarene with the assistance of Phineas F. Bresee, co-founder of the Nazarene Church in Los Angeles. The "initiators," in the words of historian Timothy L. Smith, convinced "a reluctant Bresee to support the venture." The institution envisioned was "a simple Bible college" to train ministerial and lay leadership for the newly established Nazarene denomination, but a Bible college did not fit Bresee's notion of a real Christian school and he "promised little or no assistance." The women went ahead with their plan, with money raised from their husbands, and Pacific Bible College opened in 1902 under Principal Mary Hill. In 1906, Bresee's interest in the college was piqued with a large donation from Jackson Deets. Bresee now saw the possibility for a real liberal arts college in the newly renamed Deets Pacific Bible College.