Westminster College - Blue Jay Yearbook (Fulton, MO)

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Ill. JI. FISIIER, D. Il 20

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rffmhmwmz fy. . s ix 3 logical author, the impressive and inspiring professor, and preeminently the preacher of the blessed gospel, With a simplicity and sweetness of method, a transparency of analysis, a force of logic, and a pathos of persuasion, scarcely equaled and never excelled. And the doctrines of grace which he so luminously expounded and so ably defended with tongue and pen, found more striking illustration in the admirable consistency and almost childlike simplicity of his long and laborious life. I9

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MICHAEL MONTGOMERY FISHER, D. D., LL. D. PRESIDENT, 1866-1870. IN PARKR county, Indiana, Qctober 8, 1834, of Scotch-Irish ancestry, Michael Montgomery Fisher was born. Reared on a farm, he attended district school and academies and Hanover College, from which, in 1855, he was graduated with the degree of B. L, and first honor. Designed by his father for the profession of law, Providence overruled this decision and made him an educator alike in the pulpit and from the teacher's desk. Accepting, in 1855, the offer of a professorship in VVestminster College, he began his life work with an enthusiasm for humanity that only grew and deepened with the coming years. 1-Ie was elected,. the following year, to the professorship of Latin and Greek. VVhile teaching he pursued a theological course, and, in 1859, was licensed to preach by the Presby- terian church and the following year ordained. Through the dark days of the Civil Weir' he labored at his post, on meagre salary and amid many trials, to prevent even a temporary suspension of college work. From 1866 to IS7O he served as chairman of the faculty and acting president of Westminstei' College. From 1870 to 1874 he was president of a college for young women at Independence, Missouri, and pastor of the Presbyterian church in that city. From 1874 to 1877 he was again professor in Westminste1', and from 1877 until his death, which took place February zo, 1891, he was professor of Latin in the University of Missouri, at Columbia. Part of this time he was pastor of the Columbia Presbyterian church, afterward he was chairman of the faculty and acting president of the University, filling all these positions with acceptability to curators, faculty, and students. Dr. Fisher was three times married: In 1856 to Miss Anna Atwood, of St. Louis, who died in 1864, in 1866 to Mrs. Bettie P. Cochran, who died in IS7ZQ in December, 1874, to Miss Eliza Gamble, daughter of.Iudge John XV. Gamble, of Audrain county, who. with Hve children, four of the last marriage, survives him. Few gentler, more lovable men have lived and labored than Dr. Fisher. A distinguished author, an effective preacher, an able educator, an ardent student, he was more than all, and, best of all, a lover of humanity. His friends were coextensive with his acquaintanceship, and in his death all who knew him felt deep, personal loss. YVhere he went he carried sunshine, and the good his busy, noble life has wrought will be known in its rich fullness only when the leaves of the Judgment Book unroll. 2I