William Lee Hunton

Background

William Lee was born at Morrisburg, Ontario, Canada in 1864. He was the son of Rev. John H. and Lavinia (Baker) Hunton.

Education

He attended Thiel College, Greenville, Pa. , from which he received the degree of A. B. in 1886, and graduated from the Lutheran Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa. , in 1889.

Career

In 1889 he was ordained to the ministry of the Lutheran Church by the District Synod of Ohio, and became pastor of the church at Amanda, Ohio, where he remained until 1891. Subsequently he served Grace Church, Rochester, N. Y. (1891 - 94), the Church of the Atonement, Buffalo (1894 - 98), St. John's, Wilkes-Barre, Pa. (1898 - 1901), and Holy Trinity, Chicago, Ill. (1901 - 06). During the last four years of this pastorate he was also instructor in the Lutheran Theological Seminary of Chicago.

After 1906 he lived in Philadelphia and his energies were directed to editorial work and general denominational activities. When the office of literary secretary of the General Council Lutheran Publication Board was established in 1906, he became the first incumbent, serving until 1917. He then assumed the management of the Council's publication house. His leadership was helpful in the period of transition preceding and following the merger of the General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the United States of America, the General Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in North America, and the United Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the South into the United Lutheran Church in America, and from 1919 to 1930 he was literature manager of that body's publication house. His duties included the editing of manuscripts and publications, and the preparation of pamphlets, hymnals, and other denominational literature. He was associate editor of the Lutheran (1907 - 19) and of various Sunday-school publications, and editor of the Lutheran Messenger (1908 - 18), and of Lutheran Young Folks (1908 - 30).

Achievements

• He is remembered as the author of Favorite Hymns (1917), I Believe (1922), and Facts of Our Faith (1925), books which had a large circulation among Lutherans. His versatile gifts enabled him to accomplish an extraordinary amount of work involving an enormous number of details. In all his writing he was guided by consistent fidelity to his comprehensive acquaintance with Lutheran theology.

Connections

On July 3, 1894, he married Emma M. Hoppe, who with a son and a daughter survived him.

Father:

Rev. John H. Hunton

Mother:

Lavinia (Baker) Hunton

Spouse:

Emma M. Hoppe