Maddry, Charles Edward, 1876-1962

Maddry of Chapel Hill, N.C., was a Baptist minister and executive secretary of the Foreign Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, 1933-1945.

Charles Edward Maddry was born in Chapel Hill in 1876, the son of W.A. and Julia R. Sugg Maddry, and grew up in Hillsborough, North Carolina. He married Emma Parker (1881-1973) of Hillsborough in 1909.

Maddry attended the University of North Carolina from 1898 to 1903, during which time he served as minister of the First Baptist Church in Hillsborough. In 1892, he was superintendent of the Orange County public schools. Maddry continued his studies at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, and afterwards had pastorates in North Carolina, Kentucky, and Texas. From 1933 to 1945, he served as executive secretary of the Foreign Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Maddry wrote two books on missionary work: Day Dawn in Yoruba Land (1939), about mission work in Nigeria; and Christ's Expendables (1949), a collection of case histories of missionaries.

He received many honorary degrees and awards and was a popular speaker at university commencement exercises. Maddry died in 1962.