Rediscovering James W.C. Pennington, Black Reformed Minister and Activist

This lecture invites the audience to rediscover James W.C. Pennington (1808-1870), a truly remarkable figure of Black religious and political history who is unjustly overlooked in contemporary scholarship. During the antebellum period, Pennington was an internationally-recognized figure and important “race leader,”  often compared to Frederick Douglass. He was Yale Divinity School’s first (unofficial) Black student, and his intellectual achievement took him to Europe, where he published a bestselling slave narrative and received an honorary Doctorate from Heidelberg University. His writings, lectures, and involvement with various abolitionist organizations as well as the Underground Railroad make him one of the forgotten African American architects of the antislavery movement. The lecture will specifically look at Pennington’s career as Black Reformed minister in the context of transatlantic Protestant networks and discuss how his re-interpretation of the New Divinity tradition shaped his activism.

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