USA > Massachusetts > The Diocese of Western Massachusetts, 1901-1951 > Part 2
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The next business before the Convention was the election of a bishop. The choice fell upon the Rev. David Hummell Greer, D.D., Rector of St. Bartholomew's Church, New York. Dr. Greer's was the only name placed in nomi- nation and he was elected on first ballot by the unanimous votes of both clergy and laity. Upon this note of unanimity the Diocese of Western Massachusetts began the first half century of its existence with high hopes for the future and a determination to make of western Massachu- setts a fertile field for the growth of the Chris- tian faith.
Six days later, on November 26, word was received from Dr. Greer that, though the unani- mous election on the first ballot was a strong temptation for him to leave the noises of Madi- son Avenue for the quiet of the hills of western Massachusetts, he felt that his work at St. Bar- tholomew's Church was not completed and that he must regretfully decline his election as Bish- op of Western Massachusetts.
A special meeting of the Convention was called for January 22, 1902, at Christ Church,
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Springfield, for the election of a bishop. Three names were put in nomination; the Rev. Alex- ander Hamilton Vinton, D.D., Rector of All Saints Church, Worcester; the Rev. Edwin S. Lines, D.D., Rector of St. Paul's Church, New Haven; and the Rev. William S. Rainsford, D.D., Rector of St. George's Church, New York. On the first ballot the Rev. Alexander Hamilton Vinton received a majority of the votes of both Orders and was declared elected by the Rev. Thomas W. Nickerson, Jr., President of the Convention.
At the time of the meeting of the first annual Convention of the Diocese, April 23, 1902, there were fifty-four clergymen reported as canonically resident within the Diocese and thirty-five parishes and thirteen missions within its area. The names of these clergymen and the location of their cures follow.
Vinton, Alexander Hamilton, D.D., Bishop Armstrong, Richard E., Assistant, Christ Church, Fitchburg Arnold, Charles O., Brewster, New York Arrowsmith, Harold, Trinity Church, Lenox Black, Newton, Grace Church, Chicopee Boardman, Norman S., Canaan, Connecticut Bowser, Charles B.B., Wakefield, Massachusetts Brooks, John Cotton, Christ Church, Springfield Brown, Francis A., St. Mark's Church, Leominster Buck, Frederick E., St. Helena's Chapel,
New Lenox
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Burgess, Francis G., Florence, Italy Callender, William R., Poughkeepsie, New York Carter, John Franklin, St. John's Church, Williamstown
Chase, Arthur, Trinity Church, Ware
Chase, Rufus S., St. Philip's Church, Easthampton Dakin, William T., St. Peter's Church, Springfield Dumbell, Howard M., St. James' Church, Great
Barrington and Trinity Church, VanDeusenville Egbert, John L., Springfield
Ellis, James S., Christ Church, Sheffield
Hague, Henry, St. Matthew's Church, Worcester
Haughton, Victor M., Church of the Good Shep- herd, Clinton
Hodgkiss, Samuel, St. John's Church,
Wilkinsonville and St. John's Church, Millville Klaren, Johan H., Emmanuel Church, Shelburne Falls
Knight, Franklin, Grace Church, Dalton
Kreitler, Robert P., St. George's Church, Lee
Lawrence, Arthur, D.D., St. Paul's Church, Stockbridge
Lemon, James S., Berlin, Germany
Mclaughlin, Medville, St. Paul's Church, West Gardner
Moorhouse, Arthur B., St. Luke's Church, Lanesboro Morrill, Henry H., St. Paul's Church, Holyoke
Mott, Marshall E., Church of the Reconciliation, Webster
Newton, William W., Dinan, France
Nickerson, Thomas W., Danbury, Connecticut
Nickerson, Thomas W., Jr., St. Stephen's Church Pittsfield Otterson, James P. S., (Deacon) Greenfield
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Paine, George S., London, England
Palmer, Charles J., Lanesboro
Perry, James DeWolf, Jr., Christ Church, Fitchburg Sandford, Frederick W., St. John's Church, Athol Sharp, James C., Assistant, Christ Church,
Springfield
Short, Charles L., St. Andrew's Church, North Grafton
Shrimpton, Charles J., Athol
Smith, Roland Cotton, St. John's Church, Northampton
Sprague, David, Grace Church, Amherst Stewardson, Langdon C., Lehigh University,
South Bethlehem, Pennsylvania
Tebbetts, John C., St. John's Church, North Adams Treat, Sidney H., St. James' Church, Greenfield Vernon, Frank L., Dean of the Cathedral, Portland, Maine
Washburn, Henry B., St. Mark's Church, Worcester White, Eliot, St. John's Church, Worcester Whittaker, Albert L., Fall River
Williams, Francis G., Trinity Church, Milford Wright, Frederick A., New Milford, Connecticut Zahner, Louis, D.D., St. Mark's Church, Adams
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THE RT. REV. ALEXANDER HAMILTON VINTON Bishop of Western Massachusetts, 1902-1911
BISHOP VINTON
T HE consecration of Dr. Vinton took place in All Saints Church, Worcester, on April 22, 1902. The consecrator was the Rt. Rev. Thomas Frederick Davies, D.D., Bishop of Michigan. The co-Consecrators were the Rt. Rev. Frederick Dan Huntington, Bishop of Central New York, and the Rt. Rev. Chauncey Bunce Brewster, Bishop of Connecticut. The presenting bishops were Bishop Lawrence of Massachusetts and Bishop Burgess of Long Island. The sermon was preached by the Rt. Rev. Henry C. Potter, Bishop of New York.
Alexander Hamilton Vinton was born in Brooklyn on March 30, 1852, the son of David H. Vinton, a Major-General in the army of the United States of America, and Elizabeth Arnold, his wife. He came of a staunch Church family. His uncle, for whom he was named, was Rector of St. Paul's Church, the largest and most influential of the Episcopal churches in Boston. Dr. Vinton received his earliest educa- tion at a private school in Stamford, Connecti- cut, not far from the family home in Pomfret.
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Entering St. Stephen's College in Annandale, New York, he was graduated in 1873, with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. His preparation for the Sacred Ministry was made at the Gener- al Theological Seminary where, in 1876, he received the degree of Bachelor of Sacred Theology. Ordained to the Diaconate in 1887 by the Rt. Rev. John Williams, Bishop of Con- necticut, and to the Priesthood in 1878, by the Rt. Rev. Thomas March Clark, Bishop of Rhode Island, he spent one year as minister of the Church of the Holy Communion in Norwood, New Jersey. For the next five years, 1879 to 1884, he was Rector of the Church of the Holy Comforter in Philadelphia. Thence he went to All Saints, Worcester, and for eighteen years served that parish as its rector. Bishop Vinton was fifty years old when he was elected head of the new Diocese of Western Massachusetts.
On the day after his consecration, Bishop Vinton, in the parish house of Christ Church, Springfield, presided over the first regular ses- sion of the Convention of the Diocese of West- ern Massachusetts. There were the customary elections and reports, but the time of the Con- vention was largely devoted to a consideration of the Constitution and Canons for the Diocese and the necessary modifications and adjust- ments required to adapt the Constitution and Canons of the Diocese of Massachusetts to the
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needs of the Diocese of Western Massachusetts.
The Bishop declined to make any statement of his plans for the Diocese, asking the patience of the clergy and laity for at least a year, until he could have visited all the parishes and mis- sions and have a clearer idea of the field and of its problems and possibilities. He reported forty-eight parishes and missions and fifty-four clergymen canonically connected with the Dio- cese, and 8,258 communicants. One passage in Dr. Vinton's first Annual Address should be remembered as typical of his attitude towards his larger ministry: "I pledge to you and to the Diocese the devotion of my life wholly to the interests and work required of one who is ap- pointed an overseer in a set portion of the Mas- ter's vineyard, to bring forth fruit meet to be offered unto Him, and abundantly according to the nature of the soil. Such as I have, give I you-without reservation-while life shall last." Never was pledge more nobly kept.
Western Massachusetts was very definitely a missionary field. Of the forty-eight parishes and missions reported to the Convention of 1902, thirty-seven are listed as parishes and eleven as missions. At least seven of the thirty- seven parishes were receiving help from the Diocese and, though operating under a parish constitution, might better have been called mis- sions. Later, by action of the Convention, they
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were actually given the status of missions, and three of them still appear as missions in the Journal of 1950. The four largest churches of 1901 remain the four largest churches of 1951, if communicant strength is regarded as a meas- ure of size. With the exception of these four parishes, only ten other churches reported a communicant list of over two hundred persons. The remaining thirty-four parishes and missions averaged about one hundred communicants each. This preponderance of small and weak churches has presented a problem to the dioc- esan authorities throughout our history. A partial, and not too satisfactory, solution has been found by having two small and adjacent missions served by a single clergyman. Even with diminishing population and changing nationalities in the rural towns, every parish and mission of 1901 is still in existence in 1951.
In 1901 there were five archdeaconries in the Diocese of Massachusetts. When that dio- cese was divided, the Diocese of Western Massachusetts inherited two of these archdea- conries; Worcester and Springfield. All of the archdeacons reported annually to the Board of Missions but otherwise were left largely to their own devices in regard to missionary work with- in their territories and in the securing of mis- sionary funds for their operating expenses. The Primary Convention of the Diocese of Western
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Massachusetts elected its own Board of Mis- sions and the two archdeacons remaining with- in the Diocese made their reports to the new Board.
It was not long before this division of mis- sionary authority created uncertainty in the de- velopment of new work in the missionary field. In a report to the Convention of 1903, the Rev. J. Franklin Carter, secretary of the Board of Missions, calls attention to the fact that "The Canon creating the Board calls for such merely perfunctory duties that in the ordinary course of affairs the annual report would constitute merely an introduction to the reports of the two archdeacons in regard to the missionary work of their respective archdeaconries." The Conven- tion, recognizing that the Board of Missions should be something more than a reception committee for the archdeacons' reports, adopted a new Canon which made the Board responsible for the missionary work of the Dio- cese and eliminated the archdeaconries from the diocesan structure.
The crying need of this missionary field was money. There were congregations gathered in public halls and rented stores, pleading anxious- ly for outside help to enable them to build a church in which they might worship Almighty God according to the forms prescribed by the Book of Common Prayer. During Bishop Vin-
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ton's brief episcopate eight new missions were organized-St. Andrew's, Ludlow (1904), Christ Memorial, North Brookfield (1906), Holy Trinity, Southbridge (1906), St. An- drew's, Blackinton (1907), St. Mary's, Palmer (1907), Christ Church, South Barre (1908), Trinity, Whitinsville (1908), All Saints, Spring- field (1911). All these missions have adequate and attractive church buildings. Three of them have ceased to be missions and enjoy the status of parishes.
In every case but one, these missions were the outgrowth of the spiritual needs of small groups of church people in the various com- munities. The one exception was Christ Me- morial Church, North Brookfield. There were only a few Episcopalians in North Brookfield, and they were ministered to in occasional serv- ices by the Rev. Frederick Foote Johnson, who had been appointed Diocesan Missionary in 1904. It chanced that the Union Congregation- al Church in that town was without a pastor, and the Rev. Mr. Johnson was asked to supply the pulpit during the interim. He was unable to do so for more than a few Sundays, but he did invite various clergymen, both Congrega- tional and Episcopalian, to take Sunday serv- ices in North Brookfield. At the end of six months, the Union Congregational Church requested Bishop Vinton to take the oversight
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of the parish, and on January 27, 1905, the con- gregation asked to be instructed in the doctrine and discipline of the Episcopal Church with a view to becoming confirmed members of that Church. The petition was granted by Bishop Vinton and the greater part of the membership of the Union Congregational Church were eventually confirmed. This transfer brought to the Diocese of Western Massachusetts a large granite building of Gothic architecture which, unfortunately, had later to be taken down because it was found to be in a dangerous state of unrepair. It was also much too large for the needs of the mission. The present Christ Memorial Church was originally the chapel of the larger building.
Second only to the need for missions was the need for the creation of a diocesan spirit. For many years Boston had been the center of every diocesan activity. The names of the clergy and laity of the larger churches were fre- quently found on important committees of the Diocese of Massachusetts. The Rev. John Cot- ton Brooks of Springfield, the Rev. John C. Tebbetts of North Adams, the Rev. Arthur Lawrence, D.D. of Stockbridge, and Dr. Vin- ton, then of Worcester, were well known and much respected in the eastern part of the undi- vided Diocese. Such laymen as Edward L. Davis of Worcester, Alvah Crocker of Fitch-
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burg, Edmund P. Kendrick of Springfield, and William A. Gallup of North Adams, played im- portant parts in the activities of eastern Massa- chusetts. Others of the clergy and lay dele- gates from the parishes in the four counties west of the county of Worcester were seldom or never seen in the Conventions in Boston. The cost was too great, the journey too long, and the reward too doubtful. Both clergy and laity could find many reasons for remaining close to their own parishes.
The result was a decidedly parochial out- look. The always latent congregationalism of the hill towns of western Massachusetts de- veloped a myopic vision in which the parish loomed far larger than any diocese. Some means had to be found to make the Diocese of Western Massachusetts a matter of importance to the people of the Church. Thus it was that Springfield was chosen as the see city. It was easily accessible from every part of the Diocese. The most distant mission was scarcely more than two hours away by train. Also, Springfield was far enough away from Boston to distract the thoughts of the few to whom Boston was the hub of the spiritual universe.
Early in his episcopate Dr. Vinton urged the formation in every parish and mission of branches of such organizations of national ex- tent as the Woman's Auxiliary, the Girls'
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Friendly Society, and the Brotherhood of St. Andrew, not only because of the teaching value of these organizations, but as a method of less- ening the parochialism of the average church group. This effort to change the outlook of the church people of western Massachusetts, though not immediately successful, eventually helped to accomplish that purpose.
Another way of welding diocesan groups into the diocesan fellowship is to encourage work for a common cause. In the Convention of 1902, Bishop Vinton requested that provision be made for a Bishop's House. This would be a common cause for which all the Church peo- ple of the Diocese might conceivably work. It must have been a disappointment to the Bishop when, in the Convention of 1904, the appointed committee reported that only $9,810.00 had been received. Three large gifts accounted for $7,000.00 and the remaining $2,810.00 came from nine of the forty-eight parishes and mis- sions. In the following year an additional $1,153.00 was received by the fund, and the chairman of the committee expressed regret "at the lack of interest and co-operation" on the part of the Diocese. Not until 1907 could the Bishop report that a sufficient sum had been raised and a Bishop's House bought. It is quite evident that the Diocese had not yet experi- enced any great sense of diocesan responsibili-
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ty, though it was slowly learning the duties and requirements of its independent status.
Bishop Vinton also felt that it would help to consolidate the Diocese if there could be a sym- bol around which the scattered parishes and missions might eventually grow into a unity of thought and action. He suggested a diocesan seal. A committee was appointed in 1903 to make choice of an appropriate design; but after three years of consideration, the committee could not agree and the choice was left to the Bishop. His choice was submitted to the Con- vention of 1908 and was accepted on the fol- lowing resolution by the Rev. Arthur Lawrence:
RESOLVED: That the arms of the Diocese of Western Massachusetts be established in accord- ance with the following blazon:
Argent on a chevron sable between three fountains proper five escallops of the field: a bordure engrailed azure. The shield ensigned with a mitre and resting on a key and crozier in saltire.
And that the seal of the Diocese shall contain the arms as above within a vesica form: on a border the following inscription:
Seal of the Diocese of Western Massachusetts A.D. MDCCCCI.
Dr. Vinton described the meaning of the arms as follows: "The engrailed bordure is azure, the same color as the shield of the Com-
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monwealth of Massachusetts, within which the Diocese of Western Massachusetts is contained. The argent field of the diocesan arms can signi- fy the field white, already to harvest, wherein are the wells of springing waters of Springfield. The five counties of the Diocese are displayed in the five escallop shells, symbols not only of pilgrimage from mother country, but also of the Church in the five counties baptizing in waters that spring throughout the diocesan field."
The need of larger salaries for the clergy was a subject repeatedly discussed in the Con- ventions of the Diocese. Everyone agreed that the clergy were poorly paid, but nobody seemed to know what to do about it. In the Conven- tion of 1908, the Rev. Thomas F. Davies asked for the appointment of a committee to consider the matter of clerical stipends and, where they seemed inadequate, to urge upon delinquent vestries the Christian duty of paying their rec- tor or missionary a living salary. Whether or not Mr. Davies' resolution resulted in an in- crease in clerical salaries remains known only to the individual parishes and missions. Suc- ceeding Conventions have listened to similar resolutions, and there have been occasions when the suggestions of such committees have yielded satisfactory results.
Bishop Vinton felt that one way of relieving the financial strain upon the parishes would be
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a greater emphasis upon the need of parochial endowments. It would also help the parishes if the Diocese itself had a larger endowment. They would be required to pay less for diocesan support. The Bishop did not stress his idea of an increased endowment for the Diocese, al- though the endowment funds still remained at the sum given by the Diocese of Massachusetts at the time of the separation. It is possible that a legacy which had just been received from the estate of Mary Sophia Walker, of Waltham, and which placed in the hands of the Bishop a gen- erous sum for the use of the Diocese, made the time seem inappropriate for further requests.
There are differing opinions as to the value of endowments. If they are too large, they en- courage the current church members to lean too heavily upon the beneficences of the dead. If they are too small, the income is negligible and the principal sum might well be spent for pres- ent needs. Bishop Vinton, not unaware of the possible misuse of endowments, in his address to the Convention of 1908 said: "Every parish should have an endowment, in my opinion. I know there is a danger here, in that parishioners, counting on that asset, may shirk their own responsibilities in giving and become lazy. In truth I have known instances where the present generation of Church people has thus lain down on the graves of its ancestors, complacently
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reading with personal application the tomb- stone inscription 'They rest from their labors.'"
If it is true that the country which has no history is happy, it is also true of a diocese. As the first decade of our diocesan life was draw- ing to a close, the years had been without spec- tacular events. The reception of the North Brookfield Congregational Society into the membership of the Episcopal Church was the only incident which might have attracted pass- ing attention beyond the limits of the Diocese. Otherwise, the regular routine of diocesan affairs was as unexciting as the life of the aver- age New England family. Bishop Vinton's in- tention was to build foundations: material foundations upon which church buildings might be erected; ecclesiastical foundations up- on which the Diocese of Western Massachusetts might rest in the best traditions of the Anglican Communion; spiritual foundations upon which churchmen and churchwomen might stand in the sure and certain confidence of the saving power of their Lord Jesus Christ. He loved his clergy and his people with an emotional inten- sity which even his austere reserve could not conceal. He expected his clergy to preach re- ligion, not politics or economics. In his address to the Convention of 1909, he said: "There is a practical danger when public ills are keenly felt lest a minister should abuse the privilege of his
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position over a particular congregation and neglect the necessary provision for their nurture by using his pulpit to condemn those who do not hear, and to promulgate what his people do not need."
By 1911 there had been many changes in the Diocese of Western Massachusetts. The forty-eight parishes and missions of 1901 had become fifty-six parishes and missions in 1911. The number of communicants had grown from 8,458 to 12,760, an increase of fifty per cent. As the number of clergymen was only one more than the number listed in 1901, it would appear that nearer episcopal supervision had borne fruit in greater missionary enterprise. The Dioc- esan Missionary, the Rev. Frederick Foote John- son was elected Bishop of South Dakota in 1904, and the Rev. Charles J. Sniffen was appointed his successor. Of the clergy of 1901, only twenty still remained canonically resident in the Diocese; twenty-six had sought new fields and eight had died. Among these were some notable for long rectorates: the Rev. Arthur Lawrence, D.D., for thirty-seven years at St. Paul's Church, Stockbridge; the Rev. John Cot- ton Brooks, twenty-seven years at Christ Church, Springfield; the Rev. James S. Ellis, twenty-two years at Christ Church, Sheffield; the Rev. John C. Tebbetts, twenty years at St. John's Church, North Adams; and the Rev.
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Thomas W. Nickerson, nineteen years at Christ Church, Rochdale. It is a debatable question whether our churches have gained anything worth while in these modern days of revolving clergymen and revolving vestries.
One more soldier of Christ was soon to enter the Church Triumphant after twenty- seven years of faithful service in parish and dio- cese. After an illness of less than a week, Bish- op Vinton died at Springfield on January 18, 1911. Two days later the Order for the Burial of the Dead was read at high noon in Christ Church, Springfield, in the presence of a notable gathering of clergy and laity with the Rt. Rev. Frederick Burgess, Bishop of Long Island and one of the presenters at Dr. Vinton's consecra- tion in 1902, as the officiant.
Bishop Vinton was a man of great pride, but the pride was in his office. He demanded the full respect due to a Bishop in the Church of God. Personally he was a man of the utmost humility. This combination of official pride and personal humility comes out in the paper in which he left instructions for his burial. In it he desires to be buried with the full rites of Holy Church, including the celebration of the Holy Communion, but also requests that his grave be marked by a simple stone bearing only his name, the necessary dates, and the brief in- scription, "Jesu-Mercy."
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THE RT. REV. THOMAS FREDERICK DAVIES Bishop of Western Massachusetts, 1911-1936
BISHOP DAVIES
TH HE tenth Annual Meeting of the Convention of the Diocese of Western Massa- chusetts assembled at Christ Church, Spring- field, on May 10, 1911. The Rev. Henry Hague of St. Matthew's Church, Worcester, was elected President of the Convention. After the disposal of routine affairs, the Convention took up the chief business of the day, the election of a Bishop to succeed Dr. Vinton.
There were several nominations, but only two were seriously considered by the Conven- tion: the Rev. Thomas F. Davies, Rector of All Saints Church, Worcester, and the Rt. Rev. Frederick Foote Johnson, Bishop of the Mis- sionary District of South Dakota. As the clergy and laity were of different opinions, it took three ballots before the necessary concurrent majority of votes was received by the Rev. Thomas F. Davies and he was declared elected.
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