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Graebner, Theodore Conrad (23 November 1876–14 November 1950), pastor, editor, and author, was born in Watertown, Wisconsin, the son of August L. Graebner, a professor at Northwestern College, and Anna Schaller. After prepatory training at Martin Luther College in New Ulm, Minnesota, he graduated from Concordia College in Ft. Wayne, Indiana, in 1894. He studied for the Lutheran ministry at Concordia Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri, graduating in 1897. After teaching German and history at Walther College in St. Louis from 1897 to 1900, he accepted a position as instructor of biology and English at the Lutheran Ladies’ Seminary in Red Wing, Minnesota. He married Selma Brohm in 1900; they had five children. He taught at the seminary from 1900 to 1906 and was ordained there on 25 May 1902 in the Norwegian Lutheran church....

Kurtz, Benjamin (28 February 1795–29 December 1865), Lutheran pastor, editor, and church leader, was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, the son of Benjamin Kurtz and Elizabeth Gardner. Kurtz studied theology with John George Lochman and in 1815 was licensed to preach by the Ministerium of Pennsylvania, joining his uncle, John Daniel Kurtz, in his congregation as assistant pastor for a short term. He then served as a pastor in Hagerstown, Maryland, from 1815 to 1831, and in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, from 1831 to 1833. In 1820 he helped to form the Synod of Maryland and Virginia and later that year helped ...

Loy, Matthias (17 March 1828–26 January 1915), Lutheran church leader and editor, was born in rural Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, the son of Matthias Loy, a farmer and shopkeeper, and Christina Reaver. An impoverished childhood prevented Loy from attending school regularly, and in 1847 he was apprenticed to a printing firm in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. While employed there, he learned to read and write German and English and attended the Harrisburg Academy. During his youth Loy was exposed to “American Lutheranism,” a movement within the Lutheran church that promoted revivalism and urged a revision of the sixteenth-century Lutheran confessions, and he was converted at a revival in a Lutheran church in Harrisburg in 1843. Although a local pastor urged him to enroll at Gettysburg Seminary and prepare for the ministry, Loy’s poor health and finances would not allow this, and instead in 1847 he left for Ohio. However, he was still interested in the ministry, and the Lutheran Joint Synod of Ohio gave him a small scholarship to attend the seminary in Columbus, Ohio, where he studied from 1847 to 1849....

Norelius, Eric (26 October 1833–15 March 1916), Lutheran pastor, editor, and church president, was born Erik Pehrson in Hassela, Hälsingland, Sweden, the son of Anders Pehrson and Elizabeth Jonsdotter, tenant farmers. Strongly influenced as a youth by the religious awakening in Sweden, he sought to become a pastor but lacked financial resources to pursue necessary basic studies. After two years of high school in Sweden, he emigrated to the United States at the age of seventeen, having chosen a new, Latinized name for himself. He was invited to enroll at Capital University in Columbus, Ohio, where he spent several years but did not graduate. Following preparatory and theological study at Capital (1851–1853 and 1854–1855), he was ordained by the Lutheran Synod of Northern Illinois in 1856. In 1855 he married Inga Charlotta Peterson; they had five children. Having visited Swedish settlements in Minnesota during the summer of 1854 while still a student, young Norelius welcomed the opportunity to return as a missionary pastor. He established his first congregations at Red Wing and Vasa (1856–1858). After a brief interlude in Attica, Indiana, he returned to Minnesota for the rest of his ministry, serving the parish in Vasa during three separate periods (1861–1881, 1884–1890, 1901–1905). He held a brief pastorate at Spring Garden (1882–1884) and maintained a continuous pastoral relationship with a small congregation in Goodhue, Minnesota, from 1869 to 1915....