Benjamin Tucker Tanner

Benjamin T. Tanner eighteenth bishop of the A. M. E. Church, was born in Pittsburgh, Pa., December 25, 1835, the son of Hugh S. and Isabel H. Tanner; was educated at Avery College, Allegheny, and Western Theological Seminary; received the A.M. degree from Avery in 1870; D.D. and LL.D. from Wilberforce; married Sarah E. Miller, August 19, 1858; was converted in Pittsburg in 1856 and joined the A. M. E. Church; was licensed to preach 1856 by Rev. J. A. Warren; admitted to conference and ordained deacon in 1860; also elder the same year; was editor of the Christian Recorder from 1868 to 1884; founder and editor A. M. E. Church Review, 1884-8; elected bishop in May 1888; retired in 1908. Author: “The Origin of the Negro,” “Is the Negro Cursed?” “Apology for African Methodism,” “Outline of A. M. E. Church History,” “The Dispensations in the History of the Church,” “The Negro in Holy Writ,” “Hints to Ministers, Especially of the A. M. E. Church,” “The Color of Solomon–What?” He was a delegate to the third Ecumenical Conference of Methodism, September, 1901, in London, England, and read a paper before that body on “The Elements of Pulpit Effectiveness.” He married Sarah Miller in 1858 and the couple had seven children. He is the father of Henry Ossawa. Tanner, distinguished artist of Paris, France; Dr. Carl Tanner, of Georgia; Mrs. Bell Temple, one of the editors of the Women’s Recorder, and Dr. Hallie Johnson (deceased), first Negro woman physician of Alabama, and three other daughters. He died at the age of 88, in 1923.