The History and Special Collections of Andover Newton Theological School
Notable Alumni
Andover Newton Theological School and Yale Divinity School have a shared history of alumni. We celebrate the students, faculty, and staff who contributed to the history of these institutions.
Hiram Bingham II
August 16, 1831 – October 25, 1908
Yale University (B.A. 1853)
Andover Theological Seminary (B.D. 1856)
Bingham was an author, minister, missionary and translator. He married Minerva Clarissa Brewster Bingham and both served as missionaries to the Gilbert Islands. Bingham was the first person to translate the Bible into the Gilbertese language and published several dictionaries, hymnbooks and biblical commentaries.
Martin Copenhaver
Yale Divinity School (M.Div. 1980)
Andover Newton Seminary (2003-present)
President and Board of Trustees
Copenhaver is an author, editor, minister and higher education administrator. He is ordained in the United Church of Christ and has served churches in Arizona, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont. He is currently the Senior Pastor of Village Church United Church of Christ in Wellesley, Massachusetts. Copenhaver is President of Andover Newton Seminary and is on the Dean’s Advisory Council for Yale Divinity School. He is an Editor-at-Large and contributor for The Christian Century.
Jedidiah Morse
August 23, 1761 – June 9, 1826
Andover Theological Seminary
Co-founder
Yale University (M.A. 1786)
Morse was an author, editor, geographer and minister. He is considered a forerunner in the study of geography in the United States. Samuel F.B. Morse, the son of Jedidiah and Elizabeth Ann Finley Breese, invented the single-wire telegraph. In 1783, Morse established a school for young women in New Haven and served as a tutor at Yale University. He was appointed minister at the Charlestown, Boston Congregational Church for over thirty years (1789-1820) and spent much of his ministry attempting to protect Congregationalism from Unitarianism. In 1805, Morse established The Panoplist (later The Missionary Herald) and authored several books including Geography Made Easy (1784) and American Geography (1789). Morse was active in missionary work with Native Americans and was involved in the Illuminati conspiracy theory from 1798 to 1800.
Chauncey Booth
March 15, 1783 – May 24, 1851
Yale University (B.A. 1810)
Andover Theological Seminary (B.D. 1813)
Booth was a missionary and minister. He served for a brief time as a missionary in Bridgewater, New Hampshire and was later appointed minister of the Congregational Church in South Coventry, Connecticut. He worked and preached at the church from 1815 to 1844. The Chauncey Booth Papers include his original handwritten class notes during his time as a student at Yale and Andover Theological Seminary. His original manuscript writings provide rich examples of nineteenth century sermons.
Harvey Gallagher Cox Jr.
Yale Divinity School (B.D. 1955)
Andover Newton Theological School
Professor, 1957 to 1965
Cox is an author, ordained Baptist minister, professor and theologian of liberation theology and Christianity in Latin America. In 2009, Cox retired as a Professor at Harvard Divinity School. He has authored several books including The Secular City: Secularization and Urbanization in Theological Perspective (1965) and Religion in the Secular City: Toward a Post-Modern Theology (1984).
Sarah B. Drummond
Yale University (B.A. 1993)
Andover Newton Seminary (2005-present)
Dean of the Faculty and Vice President for Academic Affairs
Professor of Ministerial Leadership
Drummond is an author, higher education administrator, minister and professor. She is currently Dean of the Faculty and Vice President for Academic Affairs for Andover Newton Seminary. Drummond is also Professor of Ministerial leadership and holds an M.Div. from Harvard Divinity School and a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She is an ordained minister with the United Church of Christ. Drummond served as Campus Minister and Executive Director of University Christian Ministries at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and as an Affiliated Minister with the Memorial Church in Harvard Yard at Harvard University.
Timothy Dwight
May 14, 1752 – January 11, 1817
Yale University (B.A. 1769)
Andover Theological Seminary, Co-founder
Dwight was an author, higher education administrator, minister, and theologian. His mother Mary was the daughter of minister Jonathan Edwards. Dwight was a tutor at Yale and worked as a chaplain during the Revolutionary War. He served as minister of Greenfield Hill Congregational Church in Fairfield, Connecticut, and was a leading figure in the New Divinity movement within Congregationalism. He was appointed to two terms in the Massachusetts legislature and was President of Yale University from 1795 to 1817. Dwight was a co-founder of Andover Theological Seminary and a co-founder of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.
Sylvia Ferrell-Jones
Yale University (J.D. 1982)
Andover Newton Seminary at Yale (2006-2017)
Board of Trustees
Ferrell-Jones received degrees from Cornell and Yale. Her former appointments included President and Chief Executive Officer of YM Boston, Director of AEW Capital Management and Director of Agency Development for Big Brothers and Big Sisters of America. Ferrell-Jones served on the Board for United Church Funds, the Wellesley Center for Women and the Corporate Advisory Board for the Women of ALPFA (Association of Latino Professionals in Finance and Accounting).
Carole R. Fontaine
Yale Divinity School (M.A.R. 1976)
Andover Newton Theological School (1979-present)
Distinguished Taylor Professor of Biblical Theology and History
Fontaine is an author, professor and scholar. She holds degrees from Florida State, Yale Divinity School and Duke University. Fontaine is an internationally recognized feminist scholar in Hebrew Bible and has published several dozen books and articles. She has appeared on several television spots for the British Broadcasting System, C-Span and National Geographic. She serves on the Editorial Board for Catholic Biblical Association and Women in Judaism: A Multidisciplinary Journal and has been a part of several governing boards including international and interfaith Women’s Human Rights NGOs that identify how religion has impacted women’s status, rights and freedom. Fontaine has written extensively on feminist topics including disability studies.
Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet
December 10, 1787 to September 10, 1851
Yale University (B.A. 1805 and M.A. 1808)
Andover Theological Seminary (B.D. 1814)
Gallaudet was a chaplain, children’s author, educator of the deaf, and minister. His father, Peter Gallaudet, was a personal secretary to US President George Washington. Gallaudet was a pioneer with the hearing-impaired. He founded the Hartford (later American) School for the Deaf in 1817 and was instrumental in the creation of the American Sign Language system. He married Sophia Fowler, a student at the Hartford School for the Deaf, and they raised eight children. Gallaudet’s son Edward founded Gallaudet University in Washington, DC.
John Putnam Gulliver
May 12, 1819 – January 25, 1894
Yale University (B.A. 1840)
Yale Divinity School (1843-44)
Andover Theological Seminary (B.D. 1845)
Gulliver was a higher education administrator and professor. He was also an ordained Congregational minister and worked in several churches in Connecticut, Illinois and New York. Gulliver served as President of Knox College and was appointed Stone Professor of the Relations of Christianity and Science at Andover Theological Seminary from 1878 to 1894.
Leander E. Keck
Andover Newton Theological School (B.D. 1953)
Yale University (Ph.D. 1957)
Yale Divinity School (1979-1989), Dean
Keck has been a higher education administrator, professor and scholar of New Testament studies. He taught at Wellesley College, Vanderbilt Divinity School, Union Theological Seminary, Emory University and Yale Divinity School. He served as Dean of Yale Divinity School from 1979 to 1989. He is currently Winkley Professor Emeritus of Biblical Theology at Yale Divinity School and serves as Senior New Testament Editor with Abingdon Press.
Niijima Jo (Joseph Hardy Neesima)
February 12, 1843 to January 23, 1890
Andover Theological Seminary (B.D. 1874)
Neesima was a missionary and educator. In 1864, he traveled to the United States aboard the Wild Rover to study medicine and Christianity. Between 1865 and 1867, Neesima attended Phillips Academy and Amherst College. He was baptized a Christian in 1866 and graduated from Andover Theological Seminary in 1874. The following year he returned to Japan, founding Doshisha University in Kyoto. Niijima Gakuen Junior College in Takasaki, Gunma, Japan is named in his honor. He was also honored with his image on a Japanese postage stamp in 1950.
Henry Opukaha’ia (Obookiah)
ca. 1792 to February 17, 1818
Andover Theological Seminary (1810-1814)
Opukaha’ia was born in Ka’u, Hawaii. He was an author and had trained to become a missionary. In 1807, following the death of his family, he sailed for the United States aboard the Triumph. He arrived in New York and eventually traveled with the ship’s captain to his home in New Haven. Opukaha’ia took up residence with Yale’s president Timothy Dwight and was taught by student Samuel Mills to write and recite a Christian catechism. In 1810, Opukaha’ia and Mills went to Andover Theological Seminary. In 1814, Opukaha’ia returned to Connecticut to attend the Foreign Mission School in Cornwall. He spent several years working on projects including a dictionary and grammar of the Hawaiian language and a translation of the Book of Genesis. He died at Cornwall in 1818 while preparing to return to Hawaii. In 1993, his family returned his remains to Hawaii where he was laid to rest in Napo’opo’o, Kona, Hawaii.
Moses Stuart
March 26, 1780 – January 4, 1852
Yale University (B.A. 1799)
Andover Theological Seminary (1809-1848)
Professor of Sacred Literature
Stuart was an author, biblical scholar, minister and professor. He was mentored by Timothy Dwight at Yale University and worked as a tutor at Yale in 1802. He served as Minister of Center Congregational Church in New Haven (1806) and taught at Harvard University and Andover Theological Seminary. Stuart is considered an early key figure in the development of exegetical studies in the United States.
George Washington Williams
October 16, 1849 to August 1, 1891
Newton Theological Institution (B.D. 1874)
Williams was an author, lawyer, minister, politician and veteran of the Civil War. He enlisted in the U.S. Army at the age of 14 and fought in several battles for the Union Army. He attended Howard University and Newton Theological Institution. Williams was the first African American to graduate from Newton. In 1873, he married Sarah A. Sterrett and they had one child. Williams was ordained a Baptist minister and studied law in Cincinnati under Alphonso Taft, father of US President William Howard Taft. He went on to serve in the Ohio State Legislature and was later appointed Minister Resident and Consul General to Haiti. He published the first full history of African Americans titled The History of the Negro Race in America, 1619-1880. He was active in condemning the brutal treatment of the people in Congo by Europeans during the reign of King Leopold II.