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The Reverend
William Plumer Jacobs
Born(1842-03-15)March 15, 1842
Yorkville, South Carolina, U.S.
DiedSeptember 10, 1917(1917-09-10) (aged 75)
Clinton, South Carolina, U.S.
EducationCollege of Charleston
Columbia Theological Seminary
Spouse
Mary Jane Dillard
​
​
(m. 1865; died 1879)​
Family
Signature

William Plumer Jacobs (March 15, 1842 – September 10, 1917) was an American minister who founded Presbyterian College and Thornwell Orphanage and was the pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Clinton, South Carolina.

Early life and education

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William Plumer Jacobs was born on March 15, 1842, in Yorkville, South Carolina, to Mary Elizabeth (née Redbrook) and Ferdinand Jacobs.[1] He enrolled at the College of Charleston at the age of 16[2] and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in March 1861.[3] Afterwards, he graduated from Columbia Theological Seminary in May 1864.[4][1]

Aged 17, Jacobs was in attendance when the South Carolina General Assembly voted in convention to secede from the United States on December 20, 1860.[5] He was a supporter of secession, and he wrote in his diary that the David Flavel Jamison's declaration of South Carolina as an independent nation "was the noblest moment of my life".[5][6] At the time, Jacobs had been reporting for the Carolinian on the activity of the South Carolina House of Representatives;[7] he was moved to cover the South Carolina Senate the following year.[8] On February 26, 1861, he wrote in his diary expressing support of a prospective Confederate attack on Fort Sumter,[9] and he later wrote that the United States' surrender in the battle was "glorious news".[3] On the final day of that year, he referred to himself as a "proud citizen" of the Confederacy.[10]

On March 15, 1862, Jacobs was declared ineligible for conscription due to a diagnosis of amaurosis.[11]

Career

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First Presbyterian Church in Clinton, South Carolina, where Jacobs was pastor from 1864 to 1911

Jacobs was licensed to preach by the Charleston Presbytery on April 3, 1863.[1][12] He was ordained pastor of Clinton First Presbyterian Church, Duncan's Creek Presbyterian Church, and Shady Grove Presbyterian Church in May 1864 and began teaching Bible classes around the same time.[1][13] He had previously preached in Clinton in July 1862, at the invitation of Zelotes L. Holmes, who helped in first organizing the Clinton First Presbyterian Church.[14][15] He officiated his first wedding on November 10, 1864, for which he received $50 (equivalent to $974 in 2023).[16] Jacobs had been made chairman of the Clinton Male Academy board of trustees by February 1866[17] and received an honorary Master of Arts degree from the College of Charleston in March 1867.[18] He declined offers to preach in Albany, Georgia, in March 1868,[19] and in Good Hope, Alabama, in November 1871.[20] By December 1868, he had ceased preaching at Duncan's Creek and Shady Grove and was working solely at First Presbyterian Church in Clinton.[21]

The Clinton Library Society, with Jacobs as president, first introduced the idea of forming a high school in Clinton at their meeting on March 7, 1872.[22] The Clinton High School Association was formed several months later.[23] That same year, Jacobs began planning an orphanage, which he named Thornwell after James Henley Thornwell; the idea of founding an orphanage in Clinton had been brought up some months earlier.[24] Jacobs was said to have an interest in founding an orphanage because his mother was an orphan.[25] The plans were approved following a meeting on October 20, 1872, and Jacobs was made president.[26] He received the first donation towards the orphanage from an orphan boy nine days later.[27] The new Clinton High School opened for the first time on January 13, 1873, with an enrollment of 41 students, and Jacobs periodically gave lectures over the course of the following semester.[28] By February 1873, the school had grown to fifty students and three teachers.[29]

Jacobs attempted to create and maintain a Black church under the auspices of the Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUS; the "Southern Presbyterian Church") in addition to his existing preaching duties, but gave this up in 1874 after much of the membership had left for the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (PCUSA; the "Northern Presbyterian Church") instead.[30] Construction on the orphanage continued throughout the rest of the year, and in January 1875 a date of October 1 was set as a target for its opening.[31] The target was met, and Thornwell opened on October 1, 1875, housing ten orphan children.[32] By 1877, Thornwell had over $11,000 (equivalent to $315,000 in 2023) in assets, with nearly no debt,[33] and Jacobs set a goal of 24 children to be housed there.[34] By the close of 1882, Jacobs's salary from First Presbyterian Church was $800 (equivalent to $22,900 in 2023).[35]

Jacobs first mentioned the idea of "Clinton College" in his diary on May 29, 1874,[36] and he expanded on this with an idea of turning Clinton High School into a college on July 3, 1875.[37] In 1876, he set out a goal of laying the Clinton College cornerstone before May 28, 1885.[38] On September 11, 1880, Jacobs directed William States Lee, the principal of Clinton High School, to "organize the first of his college classes".[39][40] Lee was shortly thereafter made the first president of Clinton College.[40] The college received its charter on August 20, 1882, which allowed it to confer degrees for the first time.[41] The school's first commencement was held in July 1883; the first degree was given to Jacobs's daughter, and two other women also comprised the first graduating class.[42][40] In July 1885, Jacobs referred to the school as "Clinton Presbyterian College of South Carolina", and later that year he used a variant of the modern name for the first time when he called it "the Presbyterian College of Clinton, South Carolina".[43] Four new professors were added to the college in October 1885, including its new president, Robert Perry Smith. At this same meeting, Jacobs agreed to lecture weekly on "Bible themes".[44]

The college had grown to 80 students by the opening of the 1889–1890 academic year; on September 22, 1889, Jacobs set a goal of four endowed professorships for the college.[45] Around this same time, Jacobs estimated the value of the orphanage property to be $48,700 (equivalent to $1,651,000 in 2023).[46] The college's third president, Joseph Whitner Kennedy, died in February 1891 and was replaced on an interim basis by John Irvin Cleland, who was one of four members of the faculty.[47] In June of that year, Cleland was elected president and a fifth member of the faculty was hired.[48]

Personal life and death

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Jacobs' headstone at Clinton Cemetery in Clinton, South Carolina

Jacobs met Mary Jane Dillard on August 18, 1864,[49] and the pair were engaged January 26, 1865.[50] They married on April 20, 1865, in Coldwater, South Carolina, and had seven children, five of whom survived to adulthood.[1] Mary died at 11:35 a.m. on January 16, 1879,[51] after suffering illnesses periodically for the preceding year.[52] Among them was Thornwell Jacobs, who was president of Oglethorpe University from 1913 to 1941 and contributed to their Crypt of Civilization.[53] Jacobs's grandson, William Plumer Jacobs II, was the 12th president of Presbyterian College from 1935 to 1945.[54]

Jacobs was an advocate for the temperance movement,[36] and he authored a bill in February 1878 to outlaw the sale or manufacturing of alcohol in Clinton, which passed the legislature and was signed into law several weeks later.[55] Politically, Jacobs supported Samuel J. Tilden in the 1876 United States presidential election[56] and was a supporter of the "Prohibition ticket" in a local election in 1878.[57]

Legacy

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Jacobs Hall (left) and William Plumer Jacobs statue at Presbyterian College
  • Founders Library, PC
  • Jacobs Hall, PC
  • Thornwell facilities?
  • Anything at FPC?

References

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  1. ^ a b c d e Waugh, Barry (December 7, 2023). "William P. Jacobs, a Barnabas, a good man". Presbyterians of the Past. Retrieved November 18, 2024.
  2. ^ Lynn 1924, p. 20.
  3. ^ a b Jacobs 1937, p. 78.
  4. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 110.
  5. ^ a b Jacobs 1937, p. 69.
  6. ^ "David Flavel Jamison, president of the Secession Convention". Library of Congress. Retrieved November 21, 2024.
  7. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 67.
  8. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 73.
  9. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 76.
  10. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 88.
  11. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 93.
  12. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 105.
  13. ^ Jacobs 1937, pp. 111–112.
  14. ^ Lynn 1924, p. 28.
  15. ^ Waugh, Barry (November 11, 2019). "Zelotes L. Holmes, 1815-1885". Presbyterians of the Past. Retrieved November 25, 2024.
  16. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 115.
  17. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 126.
  18. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 127.
  19. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 128.
  20. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 142.
  21. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 130.
  22. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 144.
  23. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 150.
  24. ^ Jacobs 1937, pp. 150–151.
  25. ^ Lynn 1924, p. 18.
  26. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 151.
  27. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 152.
  28. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 162.
  29. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 167.
  30. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 171.
  31. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 173.
  32. ^ "About Thornwell: History". Thornwell Orphanage. Retrieved November 24, 2024.
  33. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 190.
  34. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 189.
  35. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 239.
  36. ^ a b Jacobs 1937, p. 170.
  37. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 175.
  38. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 183.
  39. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 227.
  40. ^ a b c "William States Lee, 1880-1885". Presbyterian College James H. Thomason Library. Presbyterian College. Retrieved November 25, 2024.
  41. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 237.
  42. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 241.
  43. ^ Jacobs 1937, pp. 251–252.
  44. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 252.
  45. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 278.
  46. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 282.
  47. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 291.
  48. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 293.
  49. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 114.
  50. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 119.
  51. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 212.
  52. ^ Jacobs 1937, pp. 202–212.
  53. ^ Fleishman, Glenn (October 24, 2018). "A racist message buried for thousands of years in the future". The Atlantic. Retrieved November 22, 2024.
  54. ^ "William Plumer Jacobs II, 1935-1945". Blue Notes. Presbyterian College. Retrieved November 18, 2024.
  55. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 224.
  56. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 186.
  57. ^ Jacobs 1937, p. 204.

Bibliography

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Category:1842 births Category:1917 deaths Category:19th-century American educators Category:19th-century American Presbyterian ministers Category:20th-century American educators Category:20th-century American Presbyterian ministers Category:Child welfare in the United States Category:College of Charleston alumni Category:Columbia Theological Seminary alumni Category:Founders of American schools and colleges Category:Presbyterians from South Carolina Category:People from Clinton, South Carolina Category:People from York County, South Carolina Category:Temperance activists from South Carolina Category:University and college founders

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