Jesse Truesdell Peck was born on April 4, 1811 in Middlefield Center, Otsego County, New York, United States. He was the son of Luther and Annis (Collar) Peck, brother of George Peck, and a descendant of Henry Peck, one of the founders of New Haven, Connecticut Jesse was the youngest of five brothers, all of whom became ministers. He also had six sisters.
Jesse Truesdell Peck's schooling, which was limited, included a period at Cazenovia Seminary.
Early disposed to enter the ministry, Jesse Truesdell Peck was admitted on trial to the Oneida Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, June 12, 1832, was ordained deacon in 1834, and elder, in the Black River Conference, on September 1, 1836. In the meantime he served churches at Dryden, Newark Valley, Skaneateles, and Potsdam. From 1837 to 1840 he was principal of the Gouverneur, New York, high school, which later became Gouverneur Wesleyan Seminary; and from 1841 to 1848 he was principal of the Troy Conference Academy, Poultney, Vermont. Although only thirty-three years old at the time, he was elected a delegate from the Troy Conference to the General Conference of 1844, at which session action was taken which resulted in a division of the Church over the slavery question. A speech which Peck made on this occasion brought him into wide and favorable notice in the North.
In 1848 Jesse Truesdell Peck was appointed to succeed John P. Durbin as president of Dickinson College, Carlisle, Pennsylvania, which position he held until 1852, when he became pastor of Foundry Church, Washington. Two years later, however, he was chosen to fill out the unexpired term of Abel Stevens as secretary of the Tract Society of the Methodist Church. In 1856 he took charge of Green Street Church, New York, but in 1858, on account of his wife's health, he went to California, where for the next eight years he served as pastor in San Francisco and Sacramento and as a presiding elder. Returning to the East, he supplied St. Paul's Church, Peekskill, New York, for a time. He was pastor of Hudson Street Church (now First Church), Albany, from 1867 to 1870; and from 1870 to 1872, of the Methodist church in Syracuse, being prominent among those who were instrumental in the founding of Syracuse University. At the General Conference of 1872 he was elected bishop.
During the remaining eleven years of his life, Jesse Truesdell Peck presided at eighty-three annual conferences, including those in Germany, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. He also attended the First Ecumenical Methodist Conference, held in London in 1881. Among his books are The Central Idea of Christianity (1856, revised edition, 1876), and The History of the Great Republic Considered from a Christian Standpoint (1868), an edition of which under the title of The Great Republic from the Discovery of America to the Centennial, July 4, 1876, appeared in 1876. He also wrote tracts and pamphlets and contributed to Methodist periodicals and holiness magazines. While not bigoted, he was a great lover and defender of his own church. Peck preached with much force, and as a presiding officer at ecclesiastical gatherings he displayed marked ability.
Jesse Truesdell Peck died on May 17, 1883.
Jesse Truesdell Peck was best known as bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church, elected in 1872. He also was one of the founders of Syracuse University, serving as the first Chairman of the Board of Trustees. He developed the plan for the construction of buildings on land donated by George F. Comstock, each dedicated to a different academic discipline.
Jesse Truesdell Peck was a huge man, weighing over 300 pounds, and possessed great physical strength. His body was seldom at rest and his mind was always on the alert.
On October 13, 1831, Jesse Truesdell Peck married to Persis Wing of Cortland, New York. They had no children.
