| Further Information |
This photograph is a contribution within the MSS-003C Collection Box 1, Folder 2. Information regarding George Martin: George Washington Martin was born in Marion Township, Hocking County, Ohio on April 27, 1848 in Logan, Hocking County, Ohio to John Shaw Martin and Mary Wiley Black. He was raised on a farm, attended Ohio University (B.A. 1895) and Union Theological Seminary (B.D. 1879). He became a prominent Presbyterian missionary and minister in Utah and a leader in the anti-Mormon movement in Utah. While Martin's work was centered on the community of Manti, his influence extended throughout central Utah and especially in the cities of Ephraim and Gunnison. The Manti Mission was opened in 1877 and the church was organized in 1878. Reverend Martin arrived in Manti in 1879. The First Presbyterian Church building in Manti, Utah was constructed under Martin's supervision and dedicated in 1881. The building was constructed of oolite, from the same quarry as the Mormon Manti Temple. Martin served the Manti church from 1879 until his death forty years later in 1919. The church continued until 1940, when it was dissolved. It was one of several Presbyterian churches built in central Utah's Sanpete and Sevier Valleys from 1875 to 1917. G.W. Martin married Matilda Peebles Work and had four children. Three of their children graduated from the Salt Lake Collegiate Institute. Daughter Jane Martin became a teacher at West Side High School, Salt Lake City. Daughter Mary Martin was an instructor at Westminster College, and later Principal of the New Jersey Academy for girls in Logan, Utah. One of their sons, Theodore Day Martin, born in Manti, Utah on August 24, 1885, graduated from Hamilton College and Union Theological Seminary, became a high school principal in Richfield, Utah, and the first executive secretary of the Utah Education Association in 1924. George W. Martin was a member of the organizing committee creating Westminster College and an early trustee of the college. The last six year of his life, G.W. Martin was President of the Board of Trustees at Westminster College. He died March 1, 1919 at St. Mark's Hospital, Salt Lake City, Utah. His funeral was held in Manti, Sanpete County, Utah. Speakers at the funeral were Dr. William M. Paden (Synodical Supt. of Presbyterian Home Missions in Utah), assisted by several other Presbyterian ministers from Utah, and Westminster College President H.W. Reherd. The attendees were both Presbyterians and Mormons. Sources for Martin biographical note: Ancestry.com website viewed August 29, 2012 Brackenridge, R. Douglas. Westminster College of Salt Lake City : from Presbyterian mission school to independent college. Logan, Utah : Utah State University Press, 1998 George W. Martin obituary in The Utah Westminster, Vol. 5, No. 6, March 1919, p. 1-3. Utah State History Markers and Monuments database, viewed online August 29, 2012 |
