October 13

Julius Kobner was the son of a Danish Jewish Rabbi. Following his training as an engraver he traveled from place to place plying his trade. While visiting in Hamburg, Germany he met the Baptist Johann Oncken when he came under conviction and was converted to Jesus...

October 6

Thomas Grantham was saved by God’s grace at an early age and joined the Baptist church at Boston, Lincolnshire, England. Soon after he began serving the Lord, he became the object of Satan’s hatred. He was arrested and thrown into the Lincoln gaol. While there, as did...

September 29

Elisha Andrews was born on this day in 1768. The place was Middletown, Connecticut. At an early age he was born a second time and soon began to serve the Lord, preaching the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. In 1793 he became the pastor the Baptist church in Fairfax,...

September 22

Fredrick Ludwig Rymker was born on this day in 1819 in Stige, Denmark. At the age of twenty he went to sea. On one occasion when his ship docked in New York harbor, he went ashore and stayed in a sailor’s lodging house which was sponsored by Christians. While there he...

September 15

Samuel Slater immigrated from England, bringing with him the skills though which he had been earning a living. From memory he reproduced the cotton machinery he had been using. In this it is said that Samuel Slater founded the American cotton industry. In 1793 he...

September 8

When George Mason was contemplating the Virginia Declaration of Rights, he wrote, “No free government or the blessing of liberty, can be preserved to any people but by a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, frugality, and virtue, and by frequent...

September 1

I use three primary sources for these vignettes, consulting with others for corroboration and background. For September 1, two of my books referred to the death of Sarah Boardman Judson. Sarah (nee Hall) was born in 1803. The Lord saved her soul, and she became a...

August 25

Vermont has a unique Baptist history. It begins with the birth of Aaron Leland in Holliston, Massachusetts. He was born a second time and became a member of the Baptist church in Bellingham in 1785. Shortly after receiving a license by that church to preach the...

August 18

On this day in 1846, General Samuel Kearny took possession of New Mexico in the name of the United States of America. Soon after he raised the flag over Santa Fe, two Baptist missionaries, H.W. Read and Samuel Gorman, entered the new territory in the name of Christ...

August 11

In 1829 the first Baptist church in the territory of Kansas was organized with David Lewis and his wife, and John Davis, a Creek Indian, and three black men – slaves of the Creeks. The group had traveled from Michigan with Pastor Isaac McCoy and his son-in-law...

August 4

Eleazer Clay was born on this day (August 4) in 1744. After the French and Indian War he settled in Chesterfield County, Virginia where he married, settled down and began to prosper. But that changed somewhat when the Baptists arrived. Clay was drawn by the Holy...

July 28

In Norway, before there were any Baptist churches, there was a growth of Baptist principles, including salvation by grace through faith, and as a result, the rejection of infant baptism. Strangely this religious insurgency took place among the disciplined soldiers of...

July 21

According to all that I have read, Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), the famous patriot, scientist, printer and Post Master General, was a moral bankrupt for most of his life. Like many intellectuals in this day, at least as a young man, he may have professed to be a...

July 14

In the case of John Taylor, missionary to Siam (Thailand), one of the key events to his “success” was the death of his wife. Taylor was raised a Congregationalist, becoming a Baptist while studying for the ministry. In 1828 he was baptized and joined the...

July 7

There are no less than seven men with the last name of Wightman listed in Cathcart’s Encyclopedia. As I made a quick survey, I wasn’t surprised to see that they were all related – sons, grandsons, great-grandsons. When a family is so closely linked together in the...