G. W. Wood Jr. (born in 1844 in Turkey, died January 21, 1924, in Fairhope, Alabama) served Presbyterian missions in Charlevoix, Michigan (1870s), the Montana Territory (1880s), and the Michilimackinaw area (1890s) before retiring to Alabama in 1901 to help start the Fairhope Single Tax Corporation.
G. W. Wood Jr. was born in 1844[1] in Turkey [2] as his father was a missionary there. After graduating from Hamilton College in Upstate New York in 1865,[3] he taught and pursued advanced studies at the college of the City of New York.[4] He graduated from Union Theological Seminary in New York City in 1869.[5]
Rev. Wood, Jr became ordained as a Presbyterian pastor in the Saginaw Presbytery[6] and domestic missionary for the Presbyterian Board of Home Missions in Au Sable and Oscoda in January 1872.[7] He married Harriet Snyder in May 1872 in Iosco County[8] and then arrived in Charlevoix, Michigan in late November 1872[9] to be appointed a Home Missionary in that place in 1873.[10][11] Wood, Jr. ministered in Charlevoix, Michigan, and Bear River, Michigan, from January 1874[12] to 1879.[13][4] During 1877–1879, he worked as a colporteur in the same region (reaching mainly homesteaders throughout Emmet County and Charlevoix County)[14] for the American Bible Society rather than for the Presbyterian Board of Home Missions.[15] Wood, Jr. had been a lifetime member of the ABS since at least 1873.[16]
He was a missionary at the Dakota Mission (Fort Peck/Wolf Point)[17][18] from 1879[19]-1889.[1][20] The first Presbyterian presence on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation began when Wood worked with the Native American (primarily Assiniboine and Sioux) population in 1881 and established a mission day school for children in 1883 on the north bank of the Missouri River, about three-quarters of a mile from present-day Wolf Point.[21] During Wood's tenure in Montana, the natives grappled with the establishment of Camp Poplar River by the 11th Infantry, construction of the Montana Central Railway (later known as the Great Northern Railway), arrival of white settlers, US bans on the Sun Dance and other cultural practices, extinction of the Buffalo in northeast Montana, and starvation during extremely harsh winters. In 1884, Wood oversaw a mission that was suffering from extreme poverty and starvation, and the Indian Rights Association convinced Congress to make a special appropriation.[22] From 1885 to Montana Statehood in 1889, the tribes associated with Wood in the Dakota Mission participated in agreements with the US government to re-drawing the boundaries of the Fort Peck reservation in exchange for federal subsidies.[23] The Presbyterian community he started there became "Union Church" in 1914 and celebrated its centennial in 2014 as "First Presbyterian Church" in Wolf Point.
In 1892, Wood, Jr. was in Boyne, Michigan, publishing a newspaper called "The Ensign"[24] From 1892 to 1893 Wood, Jr. was a home missionary in Lakefield, Michigan, in the upper peninsula of Michigan.[1] Starting in 1892,[25] Wood was the editor and publisher of a weekly newspaper at Mackinaw City called the "Mackinaw Witness.
In 1894, Wood hosted Alabama native and missionary, Dr. George A. Weaver, as a fundraiser for the American Sunday School Union in the Mackinaw area.[26]
In 1894 Wood's Witness was listed as the sole newspaper published in Mackinaw City,[27] and continued to be published by him in 1897. "[28] In October 1897, the Cheboygan Democrat profiled the struggling Mackinaw Witness news operation and remarked that Rev Wood and his son George H. Wood were editor and manager respectively. The review noted that the Witness contained much "curious information" including railroad timetables, "cats and dogs", minor news, Sabbath Readings, New Earth columns, and "snide advertising" for questionable gold mining companies, single tax theory, crank books, and the Scientific American.[29] In November 1897, Wood wrote a letter in the Witness regarding his new colony on Mobile Bay in Alabama called the Fairhope Industrial Association.[30]
During the Progressive Era, Wood, Jr. moved to Fairhope, Alabama, around 1900[31] (as early as 1897[32] or 1898[33]). His daughter Sarah Louise Wood married Fairhope pioneer[34] Clement LeFavre Coleman in 1902,[35] and in 1903, George Wood became a charter member [36] of the Fairhope Single Tax Corporation. He was Secretary of the FSTC in 1905,[37] and was its treasurer from 1908 to at least 1912.[1] In 1912, Wood, Jr.'s biography was listed in Herringshaw's American blue book of biography. As part of the FSTC, Wood became a member of the Fairhope Wharf Company in December 1912[38] and became president of the wharf company in January 1913.[39] Wood, Jr. lived in Fairhope as late as 1919, where he complained to the National Voters' League about extortion by the railway companies.[40] His wife Harriet Snyder Wood, after bearing Wood, Jr. two sons and five daughters,[41] died in Mount Pleasant, Washington, D.C. in 1922.[42] George Warren Wood Jr. died in 1924.[31]
George Warren Wood married.
George W. Wood evangelist.
graduated from Union Theological seminary in 1869
The Sagniaw Presbytery reports... Geo. W. Wood has received ordination
The Presbyterian Society of this place have secured the clerical services of Rev. Geo. W. Wood, late of Au Sable, who arrived lately with his family and household effects. He will preach at the school house at 7 P.M.
Home Mission Appointments made in January 1873...Rev. Geo. W. Wood, Charlevoix ch., Mich.
The work of the Presbyterian Board of Home Missions in this field twenty or more years ago, should not be confounded with the origin of the present Congregational Society. Back almost as far as local history reaches, the Presbyterians had a mission here. The pastor in charge of the work was Rev. George W. Wood. He labored here about six years, when, for some cause unknown to the writer that denomination abandoned the work here; but, unquestionably from that early Christian movement sprang the present prosperous Congregational Church of Charlevoix.
Charlevoix and Emmet Counties... have been thoroughly explored by Rev. G.W. Wood, who was employed as a colporteur by the American Bible Society... The people are extremely impecunious at present, being mainly homesteaders...the colporteur has gone on foot... his Bible laden knapsack, in paths where no vehicle could go, and by boats on the lakes and rivers
He was under the American bible society in 1877, 78 and 79
Appendix containing ... a list of... the life ... members of the society p175: "Wood, George Warren, Jr., New York."
In 1880 George W. Wood established a Presbyterian mission at Fort Peck
Wolf Point, Montana Territory: On the Missouri river... 1883; missionaries, Rev. George W. Wood Jr., and his wife.
The 133-year Presbyterian history on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation began with Rev. George Wood working with the Native American population in 1881 and establishing a mission day school for children in 1883 on the north bank of the Missouri River, about three-quarters of a mile from present-day Wolf Point.[permanent dead link]
"When the meager crops which they bad obtained from the. soil were exhausted," says Mr. Wood, "they ate their dogs and some of their horses. Meanwhile, in the spring of 1884, Congress made a special appropriation for the relief of the Indian in this Territory, for which, I understand, we are indebted to the Indian Rights Association. In the summer the Indians built a dam on Wolf Creek, and dug ditches for the purpose of irrigation, but were too late to secure a crop for their first season".
Title:The ensign... Publisher:George Warren Wood...Frequency:Monthly
Mackinaw City, Cheboygan County"... "WITNESS: Saturdays; four pages 16x22; subscription $1.50; established 1892; Rev. G. W. Wood, editor and publisher.
The missionary, George A. Weaver, made an address, and a collection was taken for the American Sunday School Union, amounting to $3 The school has grown in about a year from fifteen to more than eighty members. He pronounces it a model school Mr. Weaver and his family were guests of P. 0, Munroe, the veteran settler after whom the t iwnskip is named, ns well as Rev. G. W. Wood of Mackinaw City.
Newspaper – Witness, Rev. G.w. Wood, editor
" has a weekly newspaper, The Mackinaw Witness" ... "George H. Wood, publr... Wood, Rev George W (Presbyterian)
One of the Democrat's Interesting exchanges Is the Mackinaw Witness, pub ■ fished at Mackinaw City, by Rev. G. W. Wood, editor, and Geo. H, Wood, manager....
I was considerably interested in a letter which you wrote The Witness and which was published in the issue of No13th, concerning the Fairhope Industrial Assn." ... "a .. colony on the east shore of Mobile Bay, where I understand your colony is located
Biographical/Historical note:Born in Constantinople to missionary parents, George W. Wood became a Presbyterian minister and missionary to the Native Americans in Michigan, the Dakotas and Minnesota. He lived in Fairhope, Alabama about 1900 and was treasurer of the Fairhope Single Tax Corporation. George W. Wood died on Jan. 21, 1924.
"this (Baldwin) county 'nature's great sanitarium.' I was here during the epidemic of yellow fever in 1897" – G. W. Wood, talking about Fairhope's healthful climate
Letter dated 1/21/1898 to Rev. G. W. Wood in Fairhope, Alabama
CLEMENT L. COLEMAN is dead at the age of eighty. He was one of Fairhope's pioneers and served for two years as member of the Fair- hope Town Council. He is survived by his wife and two children, Genevieve and Henry George Coleman. He was long a subscriber to LAND AND FREEDOM.
...Fairhope Ala., in which latter place he has made his home for the last fourteen years. He married on Sep 30, 1902 Sara L., daughter of Rev. George W. Wood of Petoskey, Mich. Their children are Henry George coleman (1903)... and Genevieve Coleman (1906)
G. W. Wood replaces the deceased J. M. Beckner.
1 column editorial entitled "Where Blanton Blundered","Fairhope, Ala, 11 July 1919.", signed by "G.W. Wood"
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
George Warren Wood 1844.
"Harriet Snyder Wood, 77, The Earlington" (The Earlington is now called Claiborne Apartments at 3033 16th St)