Reverend P. Thomas Stanford

Reverend P. Thomas Stanford. Author, Pastor, and Community Activist. The Reverend P. Thomas Stanford is best known as an author and as the protégé of the Reverend Henry Ward Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe, Born into slavery in Hampton, Virginia, Stanford was orphaned at an early age when his parents were sold away from him. He grew up in the home of Perry L. Stanford in Boston. Later, he fled to New York City, where he encountered the Beecher family. They took him in and arranged for him to be educated at the Suffield Institute in Connecticut., Stanford received a call to the ministry and was ordained pastor of a church in Hartford in 1878. In 1883 he went to England and studied medicine, law, and theology. There he achieved fame as a powerful speaker and writer, becoming known as America's Negro Beecher., In 1895, Stanford accepted a position with the American Home Mission Society to minister to African Americans in Boston, where he founded St. Mark's Congregational Church in Roxbury. He and the Reverend William H. Scott, then of Cambridge, also organized the Interdenominational Ministers Association., Stanford moved to North Cambridge in 1899, founding the Union Industrial Church and Stranger's Home for homeless women and children. It was located in this house, where Stanford himself lived until his death., Stanford wrote two books, including The Tragedy of the Negro in America (1898), and contributed to Colored American magazine, which was edited by his neighbor Pauline Hopkins. He also served as vice president of Christ's Medical and Theological College in Baltimore and as vice president of the National Baptist Convention. , Stanford died on May 20, 1909, and is buried in Cambridge Cemetery, Related Cambridge African American Trail Markers: , Reverend J. Henry Duckrey 12 Magnolia Avenue , Pauline Hopkins 53 Clinton Street , Bishop George A. McGuire 239 Harvard Street, Sources: , Cambridge Chronicle May 21, 1909 , P. Thomas Stanford, The Tragedy of the American Nergo 1898. (Photo), Cambridge Discovery Inc. , Cambridge Historical Commission