NEWS FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE LTSG13-08
Gettysburg Seminary Ridge Museum presents special program on Daniel Alexander Payne for Black History Month
New Biography by Nelson Strobert Featured in Feb 26th Event
GETTYSBURG (February 11, 2013)—The Gettysburg Seminary Ridge Museum will present “In the Footsteps of Daniel Alexander Payne,” on Tuesday, February, 26, at 7 p.m. in honor of Black History Month. The program is free and open to the public and will take place in Valentine Auditorium on the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg campus (61 Seminary Ridge).
The Rev. Dr. Nelson T. Strobert, author of Daniel Alexander Payne—The Venerable Preceptor of the African American Methodist Episcopal Church will examine Payne’s life and influence. Payne was born a free African American in South Carolina and studied at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg from 1835 to 1837. Elected as Bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church in 1852, Payne was later a founder and President of Wilberforce University in Ohio.
Rev. Dr. Strobert is recently retired as Professor of Christian Education in the 
Paulssen-Hale Chair of Church and Society and Director of Multicultural Programs at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg. He has been a pastor in St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, and Cleveland, Ohio. His research interests include Payne, church-related education in the United States, Lutheran education in the United States and global Christian education. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Akron, an M.A. from John Carroll University, a M. Div. from the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg and a B.A. from Hunter College.
Books will be available for purchase at the event. The program is co-sponsored by the Gettysburg Black History Museum, the Adams County Historical Society and the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg.
The new Gettysburg Seminary Ridge Museum will open July 1, 2013, and will feature 20,000 square feet of interactive exhibit galleries and educational programming to interpret three major areas of emphasis—none of which are the focus of any other museum in Gettysburg: the pivotal first day of the Battle of Gettysburg on Seminary Ridge; the care of the wounded and human suffering within the museum building during its use as a Civil War field hospital; and the moral, civic, and spiritual debates of the Civil War era. A one-mile outdoor trail will complement a museum visit with wayside markers. Special exhibits, programs and events will be offered throughout the year.
The project is a joint venture of the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg, the Adams County Historical Society and the Seminary Ridge Historic Preservation Foundation. For more information, visit www.seminaryridgemuseum.org.