Davidson College - Quips and Cranks Yearbook (Davidson, NC)

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John Bunyan Shearer, D. D., LL. D.

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JOHN BUNYAN SHEARER A . B v A. M., M. A., D. D., IX,. D. JB. SHEARER was born in 1832, in Appomattox County, Virginia. He was • the oldest son of John A. and Ruth A. Shearer. He was prepared for college at Union Academy, and graduated with the degree of A. B. at Hampden-Sidney College, in 1851. and the A. M. degree in 1853. In 1854 he took the degree of M. A. at the University of Virginia. He was Principal of Kempers School at Gordonsville, in 1854-55, entered Union Theological Seminary in 1855, and finished his divinity course in 1858. He was licensed in 1857 and was ordained, by Orange Presbytery, pastor of Chapel Hill Church, North Carolina, which position he held from 1858 to 1862. Then he took charge of Spring Hill Church, in Fairfax County, Virginia, where he combined teaching and preaching, founding the Cluster Springs high school in 1866. In 1870 he was made president of Stewart College (now the Southwestern Presbyterian University), occupying this position until the reorganization in 1879. He then served as professor of History and English Literature until the reorganization of the Theological department, in 1882, when he took the chair of Biblical instruction, including Hebrew and New Testament Greek, until 1888. In this year he was elected to the presidency of Davidson College, which position he held until he resigned in favor of Dr. Smith, in 1901. Since 1901 he has held the chair of Philosophy and Biblical instruction and has also been Vice-President of the College. The subject of this sketch received the degree of D. D., first from McCown ' s school in 1871, and afterwards from Hampden-Sidney College in Virginia, in 1873, and the degree of LL. D. from the Southwestern Presbyterian University, in 1889. As a preacher, Dr. Shearer is sound, able, earnest, logical and instructive, and was eminently successful in his pastorate as long as he was engaged in that work. As an educator he stands the peer of any, as has been abundantly proved by his work in the different schools with which he has been connected, especially Stuart College, the Southwestern Presbyterian University, and Davidson College, where he now conducts an indispensable course in Bible study. Indeed, he is a noble specimen of a great educator. One of the ripest scholars and ablest theologians of the age, he holds that education is insufficient without a thorough knowledge of the revealed Truth. As a friend and citizen, kind-hearted and sympathetic, just ami generous, liberal without ostentation, slow to promise but scrupulously faith- ful in performance, strong in conviction of right, but free from bigotry and fanaticism, faithful and unremitting in his attention to whatever he undertakes, ever ready to assist the poor, defend the helpless, and take the lead in all charities and good work, he is almost without a peer. In summing up the life of Dr. Shearer, it is safe to say that few men have led a more useful life to the church, society, or mankind.