Day, David A.

David A. Day was born February 17, 1851, near Bendersville (Adams County), Pennsylvania, to an indentured farmer and his wife. As a young boy, David himself was sold and served as a stable boy. At fourteen he joined the Union Army. After only eight months of active duty he was honorably discharged.

In 1869, Day entered the Missionary Institute of the General Synod (later to become Susquehanna University) at Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania, where he received a Bachelor's Degree in 1874. Day had received financial assistance to attend school from the Franckean Synod (in New York State), and was therefore ordained by that synod on April 26, 1874 at St. James English Evangelical Lutheran Church, New York City. Just prior to his ordination, Day had married Emily Virginia Winegardner Bowers.

During the Day's twenty-one year marriage, they had three children. The first two, a boy and girl born in Liberia, both died as infants at ages six and eight months respectively. Their third child, Leila, was born in Wisconsin on February 25, 1881. They returned to Liberia in 1889, however, Leila died shortly after their arrival, on April 17, 1889. Emily Day, herself, became sick with "African fever" and returned to the United States in 1894. She died in Muffinburg, Pennsylvania, August 10, 1895.

David Day remarried on December 6, 1896, to Canadian missionary, Anna E. Whitfield. Less than a year later, while enroute to the United States, Day died one day out of the harbor of New York, on December 17, 1897. Day was buried next to his first wife Emily, at Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania.

Day's service in Africa was at the General Synod's Muhlenberg Mission, Monrovia, Liberia. He wrote hundreds of letters to lay people and clergy, describing the daily activities at the Mission, as well as his impressions of the people and their country. Because his letters were vivid, humorous, and adventuresome in nature, many were published as the "Life in Africa" series in two of the General Synod's publications, The Lutheran Observer and The Lutheran Missionary Journal.

During his twenty-three years of service in Monrovia, he designed and constructed several steam engines which were used for hulling coffee and cocoa nuts, both of which were grown for the subsistence of the Mission. He also manufactured several steam boats for the use of the natives. His anthropological research into the language and customs of the people is also noteworthy.

From the description of David A. Day Papers 1874-1897. (Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Library). WorldCat record id: 50076642