Philip Frederick Mayer (1 April 1781, in

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– 16 April 1858, in

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

) was a

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Lutheran Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...

clergyman. He was graduated at Columbia in 1799. He then studied theology under

John Christopher Kunze John Christopher Kunze (August 4, 1744 – July 24, 1807) was an American Lutheran minister, educator, author and theologian. Life Kunze was born in Artern, a town in the Kyffhäuserkreis district of the Electorate of Saxony, to Jahn Godfried K ...

at the newly formed

Hartwick Seminary Hartwick College is a private liberal arts college in Oneonta, New York. The institution's origin is rooted in the founding of Hartwick Seminary in 1797 through the will of John Christopher Hartwick. In 1927, the Seminary moved to expand into a ...

, and is believed to be the seminary's first graduate. Mayer was licensed to preach, 1 September 1802, and ordained to the Lutheran ministry in the following year. In 1803 he became pastor at

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. In 1806 he accepted the pastorate of St. John's English Lutheran Church in Philadelphia, the first exclusively English Lutheran congregation in the United States. He remained in this position until his death. He received the degree of

D.D. A Doctor of Divinity (D.D. or DDiv; la, Doctor Divinitatis) is the holder of an advanced academic degree in divinity. In the United Kingdom, it is considered an advanced doctoral degree. At the University of Oxford, doctors of divinity are ra ...

from the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

in 1823 and from Columbia in 1837. In 1804 he had refused to accept the same honor from

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on the ground that he was too young, and he also declined the provostship of the University of Pennsylvania in 1823. Mayer was active in benevolent enterprises in Philadelphia. In 1808 he was associated in the formation of the

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, the first institution of the kind in the United States, of which he was for many years an active manager and at the time of his death its presiding officer. He was for many years a trustee of the University of Pennsylvania. In 1817 he did much to establish the system of public education in Pennsylvania. For many years before his death he was president of the board of managers of the Institution for the Deaf and Dumb. In 1812 the ministerium of Pennsylvania appointed a committee to prepare a suitable collection of English hymns for public worship, to which was to be appended a liturgy, and Mayer was entrusted with this work. In 1833 a new and enlarged edition was issued, of which he again had charge. He published the sermon that he delivered at the 50th anniversary of his pastorate in Philadelphia.

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Mayer, Philip Frederick 1781 births 1858 deaths 19th-century American Lutheran clergy Columbia College (New York) alumni Clergy from Philadelphia University of Pennsylvania alumni