History of Minaville, (Montgomery County) New York United States of America

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Sheldon Jackson, missionary, was born at Minaville, N.Y., May 18, 1834; son of Samuel Clinton and Delia (Sheldon) Jackson and grandson of Samuel and Louisa (Heyer) Jackson, and of Dr. Alexander and Miriam (King) Sheldon. Samuel Jackson came from England about 1790. Dr. Alexander Sheldon, who was for six terms speaker of the New York state assembly and the last speaker to wear officially the cocked hat of the Revolution was descended from Isaac Sheldon, who settled in Dorchester, Mass., early in the seventeenth century, and whose son Isaac is represented in history as removing from Windsor, Conn., in 1654. Sheldon Jackson was graduated from Union college in 1855 and from Princeton Theological seminary in 1858. He was a missionary to the Choctaws, 1858-59, and Presbyterian home missionary in western Wisconsin and southern Minnesota, with headquarters at La Crescent, Minn., 1859-64. During the fall of 1863, in the service of the Christian commission, he served in the hospitals of southern Tennessee and northern Alabama. He was pastor at Rochester, Minn., 1864-69; superintendent of the Presbyterian board of home missions for western territories, 1869-70; superintendent of the board of home missions for Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah and Montana, 1870-82; business manager of the Home Mission Magazine, New York city, 1882-84, and U.S. agent to supply the training schools for Indians at Carlisle, Pa., and Hampton, Va., with Indian children from New Mexico and Arizona, 1879-80. He was made superintendent of the board of home missions for Alaska in 1877, and in 1885 U.S. general agent of education for Alaska, where he founded and took charge of the public school system of that section. In the spring of 1895 he gave $50,000 to establish a Christian college at Salt Lake City, Utah. He was seven times commissioner to the general assembly of the Presbyterian church in the United States, and in 1897 was elected moderator. He assisted in the organization of two synods and seven large presbyteries. He organized the first Protestant (Presbyterian) churches and Public schools in Alaska; he also assisted the missionary societies of the several denominations in the establishment of Methodist, Baptist, Episcopalian, Moravian, Quaker and Swedish Evangelical churches. In 1890 he began the introduction of domestic reindeer into Alaska, and in 1897-98 he was sent by the general government of Lapland and Norway, where he secured a number of reindeer and Lapp attendants. Between 1869 and 1900 he delivered over 3000 missionary addresses. He founded and was owner and editor of the Rocky Mountain Presbyterian, published at Denver, Col., 1872-82, and also founded and was owner and editor of the North Star at Sitka, Alaska, 1887-93. He organized the Alaska Society of Natural History and Ethnology in 1887; became vice-president of the Alaska Historical society and also of the American Sabbath union, and an officer and member at different times of about thirty scientific, historical and literary societies. He received the degree of D.D. from Hanover college in 1874 and that of LL.D. from Union university, Schenectady, N.Y., in 1897. He is the author of: Alaska and Missions on the North Pacific Coast (1880); also Annual Reports on Education in Alaska (1881-1900), and Annual Reports on the Introduction of Domestic Reindeer into Alaska (1890-1900).

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

History of Minaville, (Montgomery County) New York

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