John Frances Cook Sr. (1810–1855)
was an American pastor and educator. He was the first
African-American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...
Presbyterian
Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their nam ...
minister in
Washington D.C
)
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. and the head of the District's
Smothers School.
in Washington, D.C., was named in his honor.
Biography
Cook was born in Washington, D.C. He was
enslaved until age 16 when his aunt,
Alethia Tanner
Alethia Tanner, née Alethia "Lethe" Browning, (1781–1864) was an American educator and a leader in the African American community of Washington, D.C. in the early nineteenth century. She purchased the freedom of 18 enslaved people and was invol ...
, purchased his freedom.
Cook apprenticed as a shoemaker and became an assistant messenger for the United States Land Commissioner.
Cook attended the Smothers School in Washington D.C. In 1834, he succeeded
John Prout as head of the Smothers School and renamed it Union Seminary.
In 1835, Cook served as secretary for the fifth Convention for the Improvement of the Free People of Colour in the United States. He left the Seminary for one year and opened a school in
Columbia, Pennsylvania. He returned to the Seminary in 1836 and remained there for two decades.
In 1841, Cook was licensed as a preacher by the
Presbytery of the District of Columbia. That same year, he co-founded the First Colored Presbyterian Church of Washington, D.C. He was ordained as a pastor in 1843 and served at his congregation until his death in 1855.
Legacy
His son,
John F. Cook, Jr., founded a Washington, D.C., school and named it in his honor.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cook, John F. Sr.
1810 births
1855 deaths
19th-century African-American educators
19th-century American educators
American Christian religious leaders
African-American Christian clergy
Educators from Washington, D.C.
Free Negroes