(Receive our blog posts in your email by clicking here. If the author links in this post are broken, please visit our Free PDF Library and click on the author’s page directly.)
At the outset, it will be noted that the Souvenir of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church U.S. (1924), compiled by Samuel Mills Tenney, and pictured here, is not yet available to read at Log College Press. But this little volume has proven so useful in our research that we wish to highlight it today.
The book is simply a collection of biographical sketches of persons associated with the Southern Presbyterian Church. Beginning with Francis McFarland (who called to order the first General Assembly meeting on December 4, 1861 in Augusta, Georgia) and ending with Hallie Paxson Winsborough (superintendent of the Woman’s Auxiliary of the PCUS), almost 100 individuals are highlighted, providing an introduction to the leaders of the denomination — many of them General Assembly moderators, but also other officers, missionaries and other notables figures — with both illustrations and a record of their doings and published writings.
For many weeks we have been combing the pages of this little book and it has led us to names and places and books and articles of great interest. Now we can say that every individual highlighted in the book can be found at Log College Press, although the work of adding all of their published writings is still ongoing. The historical, biographical and literary rabbit trails have been most profitable, leading to dozens more individuals added to Log College Press than are listed in the book itself. Missionaries to Asia, Africa, Mexico and other parts of the world have been added. Family members of C.W. Grafton and other worthies have been added. Photographs have been added. Secondary sources have been added. After studying the pages of Tenney’s Souvenir, Log College Press has grown, expanded and profited by careful attention to the contents therein.
We are thankful for the labors of Samuel Mills Tenney, and others (such as Wayne Sparkman and Barry Waugh), who have done much to highlight the names and writings of Presbyterian worthies of the past. Their efforts have helped us shine a light on people worthy of remembrance.
