T. Bronson Ray was a Southern Baptist

Southern Baptist Convention

The Southern Baptist Convention is a United States-based Christian denomination. It is the world's largest Baptist denomination and the largest Protestant body in the United States, with over 16 million members...

 minister who administered the church’s foreign mission board (now the International Mission Board

International Mission Board

The International Mission Board is a missionary sending agency affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention which operates in virtually every nation except the United States and Canada...

, eventually becoming its Executive Secretary).

Ray was born 14 August 1868 in Buckeye

Buckeye, Kentucky

Buckeye is an unincorporated community in Garrard County, Kentucky, United States. It lies along Route 39 northeast of the city of Lancaster, the county seat of Garrard County. Its elevation is 955 feet ....

, Garrard Co.

Garrard County, Kentucky

Garrard County is a county located in the U.S. state of Kentucky. It is pronounced 'Gair-ad' with the third "r" silent. It was formed in 1797 and was named for James Garrard, Governor of Kentucky from 1796 to 1804. Its county seat is Lancaster. The population was 16,912 in the 2010 Census...

, Kentucky, the son of William Ray, a physician, and his wife Nancy Jane. Ray married Maude Wayts in 1897. She died in 1901 and in 1909 Ray married Davie Bruce Jasper. They had a daughter. Ray died 1 Jan 1934.

Ray received his secondary education at the Elliott Institute, Kirksville

Kirksville, Kentucky

Kirksville is an unincorporated community in Madison County, Kentucky, United States. It lies southwest of Richmond on County Road 1295. The community is part of the Richmond–Berea Micropolitan Statistical Area....

, Kentucky, and in normal school in Lebanon

Lebanon, Ohio

The population at the 2010 census was 20,033. As of the census of 2000, there were 16,962 people residing in the city. The population density was 1,440.6 people per square mile . There were 6,218 housing units at an average density of 528.1 per square mile...

, Ohio. He earned an M.A. from Georgetown College, Georgetown

Georgetown, Kentucky

Georgetown is a city in Scott County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 29,098 at the 2010 census. The original settlement of Lebanon, founded by Rev. Elijah Craig, was renamed in 1790 in honor of President George Washington. It is the home of Georgetown College, a private liberal arts...

, Kentucky in 1895, and received the degree of Th.M. from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary , located in Louisville, Kentucky, is the oldest of the six seminaries affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention . The seminary was founded in 1859, at Greenville, South Carolina. After being closed during the Civil War, it moved in 1877 to Louisville...

 of Lousiville

Louisville, Kentucky

Louisville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Kentucky, and the county seat of Jefferson County. Since 2003, the city's borders have been coterminous with those of the county because of a city-county merger. The city's population at the 2010 census was 741,096...

, Kentucky in 1898. In 1909 his alma mater, Georgetown College, awarded him a D.D.

Ray was ordained in Georgetown, Kentucky in 1893. He was Pastor of the Clear Creek Baptist Church near Versailles

Versailles, Kentucky

As of the census of 2000, there were 7,511 people, 3,160 households, and 2,110 families residing in the city. The population density was . There were 3,330 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the city was 88.18% White, 8.67% African American, 0.15% Native American, 0.35%...

, Kentucky, and later Pastor at the Immanuel Baptist Church in Nashville

Nashville, Tennessee

Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...

, Tennessee.

In 1906 Ray became Educational Secretary of the Foreign Missions Board in Richmond, Virginia, where his duties consisted of “editing books suitable for mission classes and writing books on mission subjects.” He continued with this work for the rest of his life, eventually becoming Executive Secretary of the Foreign Missions Board in 1928. In spite of a lifelong career in the foreign missions field, Ray is known to have travelled abroad only once, in 1910, to Brazil, an experience he wrote a book about.

Works

• Highway of Mission Thought (1907)
• Southern Baptist Foreign Missions (1910)
• Brazilian Sketches (1912)

External links