Early History of The Presbyterian Church


	This history appears in Chapter XCVI of "History of South 
	Dakota" by Doane Robinson, Vol. I (1904), pages 552-558 and was 
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CHAPTER XCVI

THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH.

BY DR. H. P. CARSON.

	The first missionary work done under the auspices of the Presbyterian 
church in what is now South Dakota was desultory and the first organization 
disappeared before regular missionary work became established.  Probably the 
first public religious services conducted by any minister of the gospel in what 
is now South Dakota was by the Rev. Stephen Riggs, a Presbyterian minister who 
came from the Indian mission on the Minnesota river to Fort Pierre in the autumn 
of 1840, accompanied by Alexander Huggins.  His audience consisted of Indians, 
with an occasional paleface.  Fort Pierre was then the principal trading post 
for all that region.  (Further mention of Dr. Riggs' later work among the 
Dakotas will be made later on.)

	In January, 1860, the Rev. Charles D. Martin, a missionary connected with 
the Presbyterian church, reached Yankton and preached there the first sermon 
ever delivered to any congregation of white people in Dakota territory.  The 
congregation was large and enthusiastic.  His text was, "Whoso despiseth the 
word shall be destroyed; but he that feareth the commandment shall be rewarded" 
(Prov. 13:11).  His pulpit was an upturned whiskey barrel, the most available 
article at hand for the purpose.  The first hymn he put out, one of his hearers 
reports, was "Old Hundred," and a part of his first prayer, "0 Lord, may the 
people of this town not become puffed up with importance because of their 
greatness, and become proud and haughty, but accept this great trust as coming 
from the hand of a kind and generous Father to be used by them for the 
upbuilding of education and religion for Thy great glory."

	Mr. Martin seems to have been familiarly called "Father Martin," and to 
have come at that time from Dakota City, Nebraska, a distance of about seventy 
miles.  In October, 1860, he solemnized the first marriage recorded after Dakota 
territory was opened for settlement, the parties being a Mr. Jacob Deul and a 
Miss Robinson.

	On June 14, 1861, he succeeded in organizing a Sabbath school in 
Vermillion, so far as is known, the first in Dakota territory.  Its sessions 
were held in a log building erected by the settlers under Mr. Martin in August, 
1860, and since known as the first church building erected in what is now South 
Dakota. It was small but was immediately supplied with the necessary furniture.  
It was used for public-school purposes until the summer of 1862, the early 
settlers being too poor to build also a public-school building. To build this 
log church building they had fifty dollars aid from the Presbyterian Board of 
Church Extension at Philadelphia and Mr. Martin procured a bell from Cincinnati, 
Ohio. Gen. J. B. Todd, as a local citizen, especially helped the enterprise.  
Judge John W. Boyle acted as superintendent of the Sabbath school.  To this 
Sabbath school the Board of Publication of the Presbyterian church sent a 
library.  But the Indian outbreak at New Ulm, Minnesota, became the occasion of 
converting this log church building into a fort for the protection of the 
settlers in the autumn of 1862. By this time Mr. Martin. having been appointed 
clerk of the United States court, third judicial district of Nebraska territory, 
had ceased to preach at Vermillion and at Elk Point.

	Thus this organization disintegrated and now only the site of this first 
church building remains. It is on the Missouri river bottom about ten rods west 
of the south end of what was known as Market street in the first Vermillion 
townsite and now almost on the bank of the Vermillion river.

	In September, 1901,  Hon. Doane Robinson, secretary of the State 
Historical Society of South Dakota, and several of the old settlers of that 
community erected on this first church site a wooden post having on it the 
following inscription:  "Site of the First Church in Dakota, erected in June, 
1860, by Presbyterians."

	After the desultory efforts from the eastern Nebraska side and the 
interruption of the Indian uprising, further work in that region was and has 
since been left to other denominations of church workers.

	The visit of the Rev. Stephen Riggs to Fort Pierre in 1840 seems to have 
been the precursor of the next renewal of effort under the auspices of the 
Presbyterian church to evangelize Dakota.  The presbytery of Dakota was 
organized in 1844, and antedates all other presbyteries in the territory and 
includes what is now the states of Minnesota, North and South Dakotas, Montana, 
Idaho and Colorado. It was bounded on the north by the international line, on 
the west by the Pacific ocean, on the south by Iowa and Missouri and on the east 
by Wisconsin. This presbytery had its origin early in the missionary work among 
one of the most powerful and warlike native tribes on this continent, known as 
the Sioux, or Dakotas.  The Rev. Stephen R. Riggs was one of the missionaries 
and original members of this body.

	The work in Dakota was located chiefly on the Sisseton reservation, though 
the first organization was not attached to any location, the Indians comprising 
it living at that time a migrating life, wandering from the James river, Dakota. 
to Redwood, Minnesota.  It was organized in 1865 with fifty-five members and 
named Washtekicidapi.  About the same time the Christian Indians among the 
Indian scouts attached to the United States army, who for some years after the 
Minnesota massacre patroled the country from Fort Abercrombie on the north to 
the regions south, were organized as "the Scout Church."  This organization grew  
in numbers from thirty-three to forty-one and had only the occasional 
ministrations of the missionaries.  Both these churches were later disbanded and 
organized into five local churches, three of which are near Sisseton and still 
active. Others have since been added to these both in that region and among the 
Sioux or Dakotas elsewhere until they number twenty-seven at present with a 
membership of over fifteen hundred.  These are ministered to mostly by native 
pastors.  They have also an industrial school at Good Will and prosecute mission 
work among their own people with increasing interest.

	Two years previous to the coming of the Rev. Stephen Riggs, D. D., to 
engage in mission work among the Sioux Dakotas, the Rev. Thomas S. Williamson, 
M. D., had come.  The great work of these two men was to translate the Bible 
into the hitherto unwritten language of the Sioux or Dakotas, which work they 
completed in 1879 a few weeks before Dr. Williamson's death. The uplifting and 
far-reaching results of their great work are inestimable. Their children and 
grandchildren are honored citizens of our state and still engage in 
disseminating the same gospel. Among them are the Rev. John P. Williamson, D. 
D., the Rev. Thomas Riggs and Mrs. Martha Riggs Morris and the Rev. Jesse P. 
Williamson. Others are in the same work just across the line in Nebraska.  This 
move of church work came into Dakota from Minnesota.

	The next distinct move of the Presbyterian church work, though again 
somewhat desultory like that from Nebraska, came from Iowa and occurred along 
the Big Sioux river at Dell Rapids and Canton, in 1872. The Rev. Caleb M. Allen, 
colporteur of the Presbyterian Board of Publication, was the worker and his 
visits involved a journey of one hundred miles by team.  The Dell Rapids church 
continues active and is the oldest Presbyterian church in the state save among 
the Indians.  The nearest railroad being sixty miles distant. Preachers became 
fewer and after three years ceased altogether for a time. During this time the 
Canton church disbanded, though it was later reorganized.  They had both been 
enrolled in Iowa.

	In 1877 the Rev. George F. Leclere came from Iowa and located near Dell 
Rapids.  The next year the Rev. W. S. Peterson came from New York state and 
located at Swan Lake in Turner county. The next year the Rev. James B. Currens 
came from Kentucky and later the Rev. M. E. Chapim from Ohio; the former located 
in Parker, the latter in Mitchell.  About the same time Rev. Ludwig Figge, a 
German Presbyterian minister from Iowa, located near Lennox.  Each of these soon 
had a church organization and then another as the people began to come in large 
numbers. In response to their appeal for more missionaries the Rev. H. P. Carson 
came and located at Scotland and a Rev. W. L. Alexander at Volga, early in 1880. 
Later in the same year others came, two of them fresh from the theological 
seminary.

	In the central part of what is now South Dakota. and along the way of 
approaching railroads. two other young missionaries had located in 1870. One at 
Volga, effecting organization there.  The names of these four young men are 
H. V. Rice, William Carl, John B. Taylor and John B. Pomerov.  Of all these and 
those before mentioned, only H. P. Carson continues to labor in the state, 
though W. S. Peterson and M. E. Chapin both  continued to do so for over twenty 
years, and John B. Pomerov for more than ten years, most of that time as pastor 
of the Huron church and synodical missionary.  He secured the organization of 
the Black Hills presbytery during that time.

	Informal presbytery meetings or conventions of the missionaries began to 
be held as early as July. 1870.  The first, held at Cameron in McCook county, 
was for the purpose of adjusting ecclesiastical relations  the missionaries at 
that time, save among the Indians,  were connected with the synod of Iowa and 
naturally took with them the churches they organized, while they were really 
located within the territory of the synod of Minnesota.  The synodical 
missionary of each synod was present; Revs. A. K. Baird, of Iowa, and D. C. 
Lyons, of Minnesota, but the former held the sympathy and attachment of both 
missionaries and churches, since their help came substantially from Iowa.  Elder 
T. M. Sinclair, of Cedar Rapids, had helped both by his presence and his cash 
contributions, as well as a missionary pony, and he continued to help until he 
departed this life, having, a year later, one day fallen down one of the 
elevator shafts of the Sinclair pork-packing house, of which he was manager and 
one of the proprietors.  His wife, for some years after, continued his 
contribution of the first fifty dollars toward paying for each hew house of 
worship erected by the South Dakota Presbyterian church.  Other Iowa people also 
helped.

	The second presbyterial convention was held in Madison the same year, the 
third in Parker in February, 1880, the fourth in Mitchell in June, 1880, the 
Rev. A. K. Baird, synodical missionary of northern Iowa, being present, for it 
was under his leadership these conventions were held. After the second  
convention the question of ecclesiastical relation was dropped and the time 
devoted to reviewing work and fields and to discussing practical topics of 
Christian effort and plans for the future. By the time of the fifth and last 
convention, which was held in Flandreau in the autumn of 1880, the number of 
ministers and churches had so increased plans were adopted for securing their 
organization into a presbytery. Accordingly in Dell Rapids, October 19, 1881, by 
order of the synod of Minnesota, the presbytery of Southern Dakota was 
constituted.  It included all the ministers and churches, save Indians and their 
missionaries that were then located in Dakota south of the forty-sixth parallel-
sixteen ministers and twenty-two churches, with a membership of three hundred 
and eighty; besides these, they had associated with them seventeen missions.

	The first ordination service occurred at an adjourned meeting a month 
later in a claim shanty near Forestburg.  The newly ordained minister became the 
fourth member present and the whole presbytery composed itself for sleep that 
night in one bed.  A furious wind storm raged and some snow fell; for fuel they 
had only hay. In attempting to reach home the next day the nearest railroad 
point being twenty-five miles distant, some of the brethren missed their way 
but, being well provided with buffalo robes and with overcoats furnished by kind 
friends in the east, they escaped freezing and later reached their homes safely. 

	Such advantage was realized from the presbytery organization and so great 
was the inrush of immigration during the succeeding years that the  synod of 
Minnesota was, in 1883, petitioned to divide the presbytery, making three out of 
one, the number of ministers by this time having reached thirty-two with fifty-
three churches and over one thousand church members. 

	The synod of Dakota, later changed to South Dakota, was organized in Huron 
in October, 1884, and the Dakota (Indian) presbytery included with the other 
three,  Aberdeen, Central Dakota and Southern Dakota.  The territorial bounds of 
the synod are the same as were those of the Southern Dakota presbytery when 
first organized.  By this time the church membership numbered nearly two 
thousand in seventy-three church organizations with about sixty ministers. The 
women of the Presbyterian churches in South Dakota are organized in most cases 
into aid and missionary societies; these are gathered into presbyterial or 
district societies and the latter organized into a synodical missionary society. 
The last named was organized during the first year of the synod, with Mrs. J. S. 
Oliver, of Huron, president.  After seventeen years of effective training and 
developing work, she gave place to Miss Anna E. McCauley, of Bridgewater. These 
women's organizations constitute one of the most encouraging and effective 
departments of the church work.  During the six years preceding 1887, seventy-
two Presbyterian churches were organized and half as many houses of worship were 
built in the synod. 

In that year the Black Hills presbytery was organized, making the fifth in the 
synod though the Dakota (Indian) is without geographical bounds, being made up 
of the Dakota Sioux and their missionaries. The Rev. John P. Williamson, D. D., 
of Greenwood, continues their general missionary.  There are now in connection 
with the Presbyterian synod of South Dakota one hundred and thirty-three 
churches, having one hundred and three houses of worship, over thirty manses, 
nearly seven thousand communicants, one hundred and ten ministers and a property 
valued at a quarter of a million of dollars, exclusive of their college 
property. 

Pioneer experiences were common in this development, so that of those engaged in 
it a New York paper said, "Their genuine missionary spirit was not turned aside 
by hardships; they surmounted them with a 'heart of controversy', that carried 
success in its every movement. That handful  of brave missionaries away out in 
southern Dakota are, to use the words of Lincoln, making history hand over 
hand.'  They are genuine pioneers obviously in advance of all others in their 
line of things."

Besides the very common experiences of holding preaching services in private 
houses, new and partially completed store buildings, halls and schoolhouses, 
long journeys by team were made in attending the early conventions. In one case 
it took the missionary and his wife and two small children from sunrise on 
Monday morning till after sundown the following Saturday evening to make the 
trip and attend the convention, and he lost a ten-dollar wedding fee besides. 
The trip was made in a single-seated buggy drawn by one horse, the oats as well 
as the lunch for the family being included.

EDUCATIONAL.


Among the committees appointed as soon as the presbytery was organized was one 
on education, and it was instructed to inquire into the desirableness and 
practicability of establishing an academy under the auspices of the presbytery. 
This movement was encouraged by the agitation just then beginning in the 
Presbyterian church at large that resulted two years later in the origin of a 
Board of Aid for Colleges and Academies.

	At the second meeting of the presbytery the idea of an academy had grown 
to that of a college or university and the following was widely published and 
circulated: 

ANOTHER COLLEGE OR UNIVERSITY IN SOUTH DAKOTA.

	The Presbytery of Southern Dakota having, at its last meeting in Volga, 
declared its purpose to found and establish, as soon as practicable, an 
educational institution, in which shall be taught the higher branches of 
learning, and appointed the undersigned special committee to inaugurate and 
carry forward the movement, we would hereby so inform the interested public, and 
earnestly invite bids, proposals and correspondence looking toward the locating, 
establishing and endowing of such an institution. Any person willing to donate 
money or land to a college or university in South Dakota south of the forty-
sixth parallel, is most cordially urged to drop us a line. If your town desires 
an institution of learning located within or adjacent to its limits, please 
write to either Rev. H. P. Carson, Scotland, Dakota Territory, or Rev. R. B. 
Farrar, Volga, Dakota Territory, or Rev. W. S. Peterson, Huron. Dakota 
Territory.

	The committee especially encouraged bids from the towns of Mitchell and 
Huron.  In each place, however, both our church men and real estate dealers and 
business men were so absorbed with efforts to secure in their bounds the capitol 
of the territory, at that time being relocated, that the committee were unable 
to induce them to make as large a bid as came from Pierre: Land well situated 
and ample for a college campus, some town lots and twenty thousand dollars in 
cash.  They also agreed to do their best to secure five thousand dollars more in 
cash.  Though their bid imposed the condition that within eighteen months a 
building worth at least twenty-thousand dollars should be erected on the said 
campus, the presbytery deemed it wise to accept the offer and so located the 
school there.  It was named the Presbyterian University of Dakota. In due time 
the first building, a frame, for dormitory and school purposes and costing two 
thousand five hundred dollars, was ready.  The Rev. T. M. Findley, of Iowa, had 
been chosen president and the school was opened September 26, 1883.  Thirty 
students were enrolled the first year and the second building, built of brick 
and meeting the condition, was completed.

	In the meantime the presbytery of Southern Dakota had transferred the 
school and property to the synod, which changed the name to Pierre Unversity.  
The Rev. T. M. Findley having resigned, the Rev. William M. Blackburn, D. D., of 
Grand Forks. Dakota territory, was secured for president, during the summer of 
1885. The following October the synod formally dedicated the brick building and 
inaugurated Dr. Blackburn as president.  His address was  on the theme, "The 
Moral Element in Education." He was already widely and favorably known as an 
author and educator.  The synod had previously adopted a resolution to raise 
fifty thousand dollars toward endowing the school.

	The spirit of development was strong in the synod in accord with that of 
the region generally. The Presbyterian Board of Aid for Colleges and Academies 
had by this time come into existence. The presbytery of Southern Dakota had 
started an academy at Scotland and the presbytery of Aberdeen a collegiate 
institute at Groton.  The latter, however, aspired to take rank as a college. It 
was equipped with a fine campus, one large frame building for both dormitory and 
school purposes and a chapel building. 

	But, forced by the synod and the Board of Aid to take rank as an academy, 
and unfavorable conditions, financially and otherwise, overtaking it, the entire 
enterprise was abandoned three years later.

	Scotland Academy continued in operation, doing effective work till 1898, 
when it was deemed best by the synod to consolidate it with the school at Pierre 
and locate the combined plant at Huron. 

	Since September, 1898, the synod's educational institution has therefore, 
been known as Huron College. Soon after his resignation as president Dr 
Blackburn passed peacefully to his reward, increasingly appreciated and honored 
as his excellent qualities came to be better known. The Rev. C. H. French, who 
had been principal of Scotland Academy, succeeded Dr. Blackburn as president of 
Huron College.  Under his lead the school was reorganized and enlarged.  The 
enrollment of students has  steadily  increased from the first and reached 
nearly the number of three hundred the fourth year of his administration.  Huron 
College is recognized as holding equal rank with the best in the state, barring 
equipment, which it is rapidly acquiring.

	Under the lead of Hon. John L. Pyle, the Huron people secured and 
presented to the synod for college purposes a fifty-thousand-dollar hotel 
building, which was so changed as to serve effectively for both dormitory and 
school purposes.

	By the aid of friends in the east, secured through solicitation of Dr.  
French, under the auspices of the Presbyterian board, together with the earnest 
rally of support throughout the synod, the endowment fund of Huron College 
reached its first one hundred thousand dollars before January, 1904.  Of this 
over sixty-five thousand dollars were contributed within the state. 

	The women of Huron so enlisted interest in a girls' dormitory, Huron 
College being co-educational, that the other women in the state and in New York 
state and finally a Mr. Ralph Voorhees in New Jersey, that they helped the 
enterprise and made it a twenty-thousand dollar success, Mrs. John L. Pyle led 
in the movement, Mrs. French and others ably assisting her in finishing it.

	Mr. Ralph Voorhees' contribution amounted to fifteen thousand dollars and 
the building is named for his wife, "The Elizabeth R. Voorhees Dormitory for 
Girls."