Seeing as the first week of April this year is also holy week for some, I thought it would be appropriate to look at the founders who were heavily involved in their respective religious communities. They took part in varying degrees but these founders show that their religions were important to who they were. As founding members of the Historical Society of Montgomery County, Pa, they likely saw their religions as representations of distinct communities within the county.
Reuben Krieble
Montgomery County is home to three of the four remaining primary Schwenkfelder churches in the world. Reverend Reuben Krieble started officiating for the Schwenkfelder church on May 26, 1849. He dedicated himself to the research and preservation of records for the members of his church. Presumably, this is how he became a founding member of HSMC. He saw the importance of preservation within his religious community and saw the importance of it for other communities, such as a county.
A. K. Thomas
Strangely it was difficult finding much information on Arthur K. Thomas while researching the founders. I found it strange because he owned the Lansdale Reporter and founded the Ambler Gazette. Apart from a timeline of newspaper ownership, as seen in a previous blog post on the founders, there was one other note on Thomas. It appears he was heavily involved in the First Baptist Church of Lansdale. So much so that he founded the A. K. Thomas Bible Class at the church. In 1920, the bible class past the fifty-member mark.
The Daily Ledger Founders
William J. Binder is another founder who we touched upon in the post connecting the newspaper industry with these men and women. He served as deacon of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Combining his work with the written word and with the church, he published History of Methodism in Pottstown and in the neighboring regions in 1902.
Meanwhile, his one-time partner, Lewis H. Davis was a member of the Bridgeport Baptist Church. In 1902 he invited the reverend Theodore Heysham (featured in this blog post) and his wife to his home for dinner. He was showing the reverend the barn when, suddenly, he turned and stated “My, but I feel queer” and dropped down dead.
Among the founders you can find many denominations of Christianity. Above we touched upon Schwenkfelder, Baptist, and Methodist, but there were also practitioners of Lutheranism, Reformed, and Quakerism. Montgomery County continues to have a diverse religious identity, including those that fall outside of Christianity.
To anyone celebrating this week we wish you a happy holiday. Join us next month for another post on our founding members.