Frederick Bohn Fisher

Frederick Bohn Fisher (14 February 1882 – 15 April 1938) was a bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church, elected in 1920. He also gained notability as a pastor, missionary, author, and official in the Methodist missionary and men's movements.

Birth and family

Fisher was born in Greencastle, Pennsylvania. He was of English ancestry, the son of James Edward and Josephine (née Shirey) Fisher. He married Edith Jackson 4 February 1903. In 1924 he married Welthy Honsinger.^[1]

Education

He graduated from Muncie, Indiana High School. He earned both B.S. and A.B. degrees from Asbury University in 1902. He studied at both Boston University and Harvard Divinity School, 1907-08.

Ordained ministry and missionary service

Rev. Fisher entered the North Indiana Annual Conference of the M.E. Church, serving as Pastor in Kokomo, Indiana (1903). He then went as a Missionary to Agra, India (the North West India Conference), serving 1904-05. He transferred his conference membership to the New England Annual Conference, serving the First M.E. Church in Boston (1907).

Rev. Fisher then became the Eastern Field Secretary for the Board of Foreign Missions of the M.E. Church (1911–12). He was then appointed the General Secretary of the Laymen's Missionary Movement of his denomination (1913–15), then the Associate General Secretary of the Laymen's Missionary Movement in the U.S. and Canada (beginning in 1916), transferring his conference membership back to the North Indiana Conference in 1913. His office was located at 1 Madison Avenue, New York City. He resided in Edgewater, New Jersey.

Rev. Fisher was a delegate to the World's Missionary Conference in Edinburgh, 1910. He was a Trustee of Asbury College, as well. In his official capacities, he organized conventions of Methodist Men in Indianapolis (1913), Boston (1914), and Columbus, Ohio (1915). The volumes Militant Methodism, New England Methodism, and The Challenge of Today were produced as a result.

Episcopal ministry

Rev. Fisher was elected to the Episcopacy in 1920 and assigned as Resident Bishop of the Calcutta Episcopal Area. He resigned the Episcopacy in 1930 and returned to the U.S. to become pastor of First United Methodist Church, Ann Arbor, Michigan.^[2][3][4] This is the only time on record that a Methodist bishop has resigned for other than health reasons, and he was the only bishop ever to return to the local pastoral work.^[5][6][7] In 1934 he accepted appointment as senior pastor of Central Methodist Church, Detroit. While there, Woodward Avenue, the main street in the city, was widened. In order not to lose the steeple and west wall, a thirty-foot section was removed and the steeple and wall moved back to meet the rest of the church thus shortening the knave. Dr. Fisher designed a new recessed chancel including the new pulpit, reredos, mural of the apostles and had the ceiling painted with religious symbols from all over the world.^[8][9][10] He died 15 April 1938, Good Friday, in Detroit. His funeral was held on Easter Sunday in Central United Methodist Church, the only Easter funeral Detroit had ever known.^{[11][12][13][14]}

Selected writings

• Editor, Militant Methodism, New York: Methodist Book Concern, 1913.
• Editor, New England Methodism, New York: Methodist Book Concern, 1914.
• Editor, The Challenge of Today, New York: Methodist Book Concern, 1915.
• The Way to Win, New York: Methodist Book Concern, 1915.
• The Man That Changed the World. Nashville, TN: Cokesbury Press. 1917.
• That Strange Little Brown Man Gandhi. New York: Ray Long and Richard R. Smith Inc. 1932.

See also

• List of Bishops of the United Methodist Church

References

• "FISHER, Rev. Frederick Bohn" in Who's Who in American Methodism, Carl F. Price, Compiler and Editor, New York: E.B. Treat & Co., 1916, p. 71.

1. http://digilib.bu.edu/mission/home/16-d2f/21-fisher-welthy-honsinger-1879-1980.html
2. Fisher, Welthy Honsinger. 1979. To Light A Candle. New Dehli: Tata McGraw-Hill. p. 210-211.
3. Swenson. Sally. 1988. Signals of a Century. Ottawa: Love Printing. p. 215-228.
4. Fisher, Welthy Honsinger. 1944. Frederick Bohn Fisher: World Citizen. New York: MacMillan.
5. Fisher, Welthy Honsinger. 1979. To Light a Candle. New Dehli: Tata McGraw-Hill. p. 210-211.
6. Hughes, D. Dale. 1967. Conscience of A City. Detroit: Official Board of Central United Methodist Church. p. 52
7. Fisher, Welthy Honsinger. 1944. Frederick Bohn Fisher: World Citizen. New York: MacMillan.
8. Fisher, Welthy Honsinger. 1979. To Light a Candle. New Dehli: Tata McGraw-Hill. p. 219-225
9. Swenson, Sally. 1988. Signals of A Century. Ottawa: Love Printing. p. 230
10. Fisher, Welthy Honsinger. 1944. Frederick Bohn Fisher: World Citizen. New York: MacMillan.
11. Fisher, Welthy Honsinger. 1977. To Light a Candle. New Dehli: Tata McGraw-Hill. p. 224-225.
12. Hughes, D. Dale. 1967. Conscience of A City. Detroit: Official Board of Central United Methodist Church. p. 60
13. Swenson, Sally. 1988. Signals of a Century. Ottawa: Love Printing. p. 242-244.
14. Fisher, Welthy Honsinger. 1944. Frederick Bohn Fisher: World Citizen. New York: MacMillan.