Samuel Furguson
On this date in 1885, Samuel David Ferguson was consecrated as bishop (Saint John the Baptist's Feast Day) at Grace Church, New York, becoming the first Black member of the House of Bishops in the Episcopal Church.
He was born in 1842 in Charleston, S.C., and immigrated with his family to Liberia in 1848. As Missionary Bishop of Liberia, he founded what is now Cuttington University College and established the Bromley Mission School. He served until his death in Monrovia on August 2, 1916.