Young, Samuel Hall, 1847-1927

Samuel Hall Young was born in Pennsylvania in 1847, educated at the University of Wooster and Princeton Theological Seminary and graduated from Western Theological Seminary in 1878. Ordained a Presbyterian minister in June 1878, he came to Wrangell, Alaska, where he married Fannie E. Kellogg and organized the first Presbyterian Church in Alaska. He traveled with John Muir in Southeast Alaska and recounted the experiences in "Alaska Days with John Muir" (1915). Young established missions at Haines, Hoonah, Howkan, Kasaan, and Tongass. He left Alaska in 1888 but returned to Dawson in 1897, and established the city's first library and a Presbyterian Church. During the next three years, he organized missions at Eagle, Rampart, Nome, and Teller. In 1901, Young was appointed superintendent of all Alaska Presbyterian missions. He lived at Skagway, Council, Fairbanks, Teller, Cordova and Iditarod and became known as "the mushing parson" because of his many journeys on foot. Young was named general missionary for Alaska in 1922 and superintendent of Alaska missions in 1924. He died Sept. 2, 1927, from injuries sustained in an automobile accident and was buried beside Mrs. Young at Syracuse, New York, who died in 1915. [From: Robert N. DeArmond.].