| This Day In Presbyterian History |
March
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2 |
1771 |
On March 2, 1771, Rev. Robert Hett Chapman (1771-1833) was born at Orange, New Jersey. Graduated from the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University) in 1789, he was licensed by the New York Presbytery on October 2, 1793, as a missionary to the south. From 1812 - 1817, Chapman served as the President of the University of North Carolina. |
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3 |
1821 |
On March 3, 1821, Charles William Forman was born in Washington, Kentucky. He was converted at a revival meeting when he was twenty. He attended Centre College in Kentucky and then Princeton Theological Seminary. He was ordained as a Presbyterian minister on July 7, 1847 and immediately set out for India as a missionary under the Presbyterian Foreign Mission Board. Settling in Lahore in north India (now Pakistan) during 1849, he founded the Rang Mahal School. In 1865, the school added a college curriculum, and later became known as Forman Christian College. |
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5 |
1771 |
On March 5, 1771, the Rev. Samuel Dorrance stepped down after nearly 48-years of continuous service as pastor of the Voluntown (now Stirling, CT) Presbyterian Church. Graduated from Glasgow University and licensed in 1719 by the Dumbarton Presbytery in Scotland, Rev. Dorrance came to America and settled at Voluntown in 1723. The town's newly Presbyterian Church was organized on Oct. 15, 1723. He died November 12, 1775, at the age of ninety, leaving a large family. The church allfiliated in 1779 with the Congregational denomination. |
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6 |
1922 |
 On March 6, 1922, former U.S. Postmaster General and Presbyterian Deacon Will H. Hays started his job as the first president of Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA), the industry's self-censor.
At a $100,000 annual salary, Hays goal was to restore the image of the movie industry in the wake scandals and amid growing calls for federal censorship of the movies. He sought to persuade individual state censor boards to not ban specific films and to reduce the financial impact of the boards' cuts and edits, which studios were required to pay.
Hays was an unsuccessful candidate for moderator of the General Assembly in 1927. |
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8 |
1740 |
 On March 8, 1740, Rev. Gilbert Tennent preached a sermon entitled "The Danger of an Unconverted Ministry." In the new revival tradition of George Whitfield, Tennant's sermon at his New Brunswick Presbyterian Meeting House led to the first split in the American Presbyterian church between the self-styled New Lights vs. the Old Lights, 1741 - 1758.
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9 |
1824 |
On March 9, 1824, the Second African Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia was organized by 75 members from the original African Presbyterian Church. The church was located at 2nd & Norris Alley. |
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10 |
1901 |
 On March 10, 1901, the Rev. B. T. McClelland died. Rev. McClelland (at right) was  the first president of Daniel Baker College, the first Presbyterian college in west Texas, founded in 1888. The college was named for the Rev. Dr. Daniel Baker (at left), a Presbyterian minister, who helped organize the first presbytery in Texas in 1840 and Austin College in 1849. |
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11 |
1995 |
 On March 11, 1995, the Rev. Dr. Lloyd John Ogilvie was named the Chaplain of the U.S. Senate. He served as chaplain until 2003. Rev. Ogilvie was the pastor for the Presbyterian Church, Hollywood, California, from 1972 - 1995. |
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13 |
1815 |
 On March 13, 1815, James Hepburn was born in Milton, Pennsylvania. In his Presbyterian medical missionary work in Japan, he compiled the first Japanese-English dictionary and supervised the first complete translation of the Bible into Japanese, published in 1888. |
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15 |
1842 |
 On March 15, 1842, the Rev. William Plumer Jacobs was born in Yorkville (now York), S. C. The Presbyterian minister founded Presbyterian College in Clinton, S.C., in 1880. Rev. Jacobs also founded The Thornwell Home and School for Boys and Girls. He died in Clinton on September 10,1917. |
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16 |
1906 |
On March 16, 1906, various denomination representatives agreed in Charlotte, NC, to form "The Council of the Reformed Churches in America holding Presbyterian System." The Council sought to develop spiritual unity, promote closer relations and cooperation among the Presbyterian denominations, as well as better cooperation in home and foreign missions. Signing the agreement were delegates from the Reformed Presbyterian Church, the Reformed Church in America, the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America, the United Presbyterian Church, the Presbyterian Church in the United States, the Reformed Church in the United States, and the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church. |
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16 |
1972 |
On March 16, 1972, for the first time Presbyterians with Chinese, Filipino, Japanese, Korean, Taiwainese and Southeast Asian roots meet at White Sulphur Springs in St. Helena, California, to form the Asian Presbyterian Caucus. The groups aim was to assure the self-development and "cultural integrity" of these churches. |
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19 |
1860 |
On March 19, 1860, William Jennings Bryan was born in Salem, Illinois. Raised a Methodist and Baptist, Bryan  was baptized in 1874 into the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. As an adult, he joined the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America. A three-time presidential candidate, he was Wilson's secretary of state. In May 1923, Bryan was a leading and conservative candidate for moderator of the General Assembly. He led on the first two ballots, before being defeated by the Rev. Dr. Charles F. Wishart, president of Wooster College, who advocated tolerance. Wishart said: "I believe an overwhelming majority of Presbyterians are thoroughly loyal to our historical evangelical faith, yet willing to find room for different opinions within reasonable limits."
Bryan would go on to be one of the prosecuting attorney, representing the World Christian Fundamentals Association, at the famous Scopes Trial (1925) in Tennessee. |
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20 |
1747 |
On March 20, 1747, David Brainerd, a Presbyterian missionary to the Native American Indians (1743 - 1747) in New England and the mid-Atlantic regions, quit his ministry among the Delaware Indians in New Jersey because of tuberculosis. He died on October 9, 1747. |
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22 |
1758 |
 On March 22, 1758, Presbyterian minister Jonathan Edwards dies from the effects of a smallpox vaccination after arriving in New Jersey to accept the presidency of what is now Princeton University. Edwards is considered one of America's great theologian. |
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24 |
1879 |
On March 24, 1879, The Rev. Dr. Joseph J. Bullock was appointed chaplain of the U.S. Senate and served until 1883. He served as pastor to Presbyterian churchs in Frankfurt, KY, Baltimore, MD, Alexandria, VA, and Washington, DC. |
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25 |
1871 |
 Early in 1871, Presbyterian minister Ephraim D. Saunders, offered a two-and-a-half-acre property at 39th Street and Powelton Avenue to the Philadelphia Presbyterian Alliance for use to build the Presbyterian Hospital in Philadelphia. The donation was in memory of his son Courtland, who had been killed in service during the Civil War. The Alliance stipulated that the hospital mission was "to provide for the needs of the sick and disabled regardless of race, color or creed." On March 25, 1871, the hospital charter was approved. At right is the hospital in the 1920s. |
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26 |
1892 |
 On March 26, 1892, African Congo Presbyterian Missionary Samuel N. Lapsley (shown right) died. He and William Sheppard, an African-American ordained Presbyterian minister went to the Congo for the Presbyterian Church (US) in 1890. |
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28 |
1707 |
On March 28, 1707, Presbyterian Rev. Francis Makemie wrote to Rev. Benjamin Coleman of Boston, describing Makemie's ongoing trial in New York for preaching and the meeting of the first Presbytery in America :
"Since our imprisonment we have begun correspondence.... the penall laws are invading our American Sanctuary, without the least regard to the Toleration, which should alarm us all...."
Regarding the Presbytery, Makemie wrote: "Our design is to meet yearly, and oftener if necessary, to consult the most proper measures, for advancing religion, and propagating Christianity, in our Various Stations...." |
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30 |
1730 |
 The Rev. John Moorhead was born in 1703 near Scot-Irish Belfast. Educated at the University of Edinburgh, Moorhead came to Boston in 1727. He began services to a growing Scot-Irish congregation which was commonly known to Bostonians as the "Church of the Presbyterian Strangers." Rev. Moorhead was ordained as the Boston congregation's pastor on March 30, 1730. On April 16, 1745, the first presbytery in New England was formed by Rev. Moorhead and other Presbyterian ministers in the region. Moorhead died December 2, 1773. (The photo at right of a 1749 portrait of Rev. Moorhead is courtesy of
Childs Gallery, Boston.) |
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31 |
1839 |
The oldest church in Houston, Texas, First Presbyterian Church was founded on March 31, 1839, by The Rev. William Youel Allen. |
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