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Oren B. Cheney
NOTABLE HOLDERNESS
NATIVE |
Oren Burbank Cheney (1816-1903) was
the founder of Bates College and a Free Will Baptist
clergyman.
He was born in Holderness, New Hampshire,
to prominent abolitionist parents. Cheney was educated
at the Parsonsfield Seminary (a Free Will Baptist
school), Brown University, and Dartmouth College,
graduating with the Class of 1839. Cheney had transferred
from Brown to Dartmouth because he felt Dartmouth
was more tolerant of abolitionism. Cheney later
attended the Free Will Baptist Bible School in Whitestown,
New York (later called Cobb Divinity School). |
Influenced particularly
by his mother, Cheney developed core beliefs in
the causes of abolitionism and temperance, and these
were unswerving values throughout his life as an
abolitionist, teacher, Freewill Baptist minister,
state legislator, editor of The Morning Star abolitionist
paper and founder and president of Bates College.
Cheney's father, Moses Cheney, was the original
printer for the Morning Star newspaper. Cheney's
brother, Person C. Cheney was a U.S. Senator from
New Hampshire. Oren Cheney founded the Lebanon Academy
in Lebanon, Maine in 1850. In 1851 Cheney was elected
to the Maine legislature, where he was a strong
supporter of the Maine law (in favor of prohibition).
He had been elected as a Free Soil Party candidate.
In 1855, Cheney founded the Maine
State Seminary, the school that would become Bates
College. The school reflected his personal values:
it was open to all students regardless of race,
gender, wealth or religion. In 1863, Cheney petitioned
the Maine Legislature for a change in the charter
to permit a collegiate course of study. He changed
the school's name to Bates College in honor of Benjamin
E. Bates, the industrialist and philanthropist who
made substantial early gifts to Cheney's school.
Cheney also played a major role in
founding several other Free Baptist institutions
such as Storer College, a school for freed slaves
in West Virginia founded in 1867, and the Maine
Central Institute (MCI), founded in 1866.
Cheney served as Bates' president
for 39 years, retiring at age 79 in 1894. Cheney
died in 1903, and his third wife, Emeline, wrote
a biography of his life in 1907 using his diaries.
Cheney's house became part of the Bates campus and
is currently used as a dormitory. |