Stephen Gill Spottswood was born on July 18, 1897, in Boston, Massachusetts, the only child of Abraham Lincoln Spottswood and Mary Elizabeth Spottswood. He attended a variety of integrated schools during his youth, including Cambridge Latin School in Massachusetts and Freeport High School in Maine. He then attended Albright College in Reading, Pennsylvania, where he earned a B.A. degree in history in 1917. Spottswood, who had been religiously inclined since he was a boy, then returned to Boston and entered the service of the AMEZ Church as an assistant pastor at Columbus Avenue African Methodist Episcopal Church. At the same time, he attended Gordon Divinity School, where he was awarded his bachelors degree in theology in 1919. That same year he married Viola Booker, with whom he would have five children. Spottswood took on the role of an itinerant pastor in the New England Conference of the AMEZ Church. He was largely responsible for the creation of First African Methodist Episcopal Church in Lowell, Massachusetts. Spottswood was ordained as a deacon in early 1920 and as an elder later that year. He served briefly at Green Memorial AMEZ Church in Portland, Maine, before assuming duties as pastor of Varick Memorial AMEZ Church in New Haven, Connecticut. While in that city, he continued his education at Yale Divinity School. Spottswood moved around a great deal during his early ministry. In 1925, he became pastor of Goler Memorial AMEZ Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. From there he moved on to Jones Tabernacle AMEZ Church in Indianapolis, Indiana, in 1928; Saint Lukes AMEZ Church in Buffalo, New York, in 1932; and then John Wesley AMEZ Church in Washington, D.C., in 1936. There, Spotts-wood finally was able to put down roots, serving that church for 16 years. During his ministry, the congregation increased its membership from 600 to more than 3,000. While in Washington, Spottswood increased his commitment to the Civil Rights movement. A member of the NAACP since 1919, he became president of the organizations Washington branch in 1947. As a result of his increasing prominence, Spottswood was elected an AMEZ bishop in 1952 and spent much of the following two decades supervising congregations throughout the nation. He also served as head of his denominations Home Missions Department. He carried a heavy load of grief, however, due to his wifes death in a fire in 1953. In 1954, Spottswood was named to the board of directors of the NAACP. He became vice president of the organization in 1959 and was elected its president on April 10, 1961. It was Spottswoods belief that the most effective protests were those involving economic issues, and he promoted a strategy of boycotts and sit-ins to combat segregation. In July 1961, he led a 22-car Freedom Train to Washington to highlight the need for more civil rights legislation. Although moderate in his positions, he was a dynamic speaker who gained particular attention in 1970 for his keynote speech at the 1970 NAACP convention in which he accused the Nixon administration of being antiblack and declared, Killing black Americans has been the 20th-century pastime of our police. Spottswood retired as bishop in 1972 and died at his home in Washington on December 2, 1974.
Posted on: Fri, 18 Jul 2014 15:50:45 +0000
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