I H ANDERSON

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This information came from joelanderson.org

Isaac  H. Anderson was born and lived as a slave until slavery was abolished.  He was owned by his father, William Jackson Anderson, who we believe employed him as a clerk in his cotton business and who, upon his death, left Isaac a substantial sum of money.  Isaac was a highly successful entrepreneur, but it is his roles as minister and community leader that show his exceptional character and importance.  He was instrumental in the founding of the CME church, establishing a school for black children, and later Lane College

After getting permission to organize a church, it was in December of 1870 that Isaac Anderson and a group of about 40 other black ministers (former slaves) assembled at the General Conference in Jackson, Tennessee to formally establish the CME church.  The  report on the formal organization of the church was delivered on the third day of the conference by the chairman of the Committee on Church Organization, Isaac Harold Anderson.  Among other things, Anderson also moved that a publishing house for the organization be established (it published the Christian Index), for which Anderson would be elected to mange and serve as editor some years later

Isaac was not only prominent in the church, but as a general community leader he helped finance many operations of the church and provided financial assistance to black entrepreneurs.  He was also influential in helping freed slaves move from state to state.  The education of freed slaves was a high priority for the CME church, and Isaac was instrumental in setting up Lane College and served as its Vice President next to Isaac Lane for whom it is named.  Isaac Lane was the leading minster in the 1870 group of black minsters who established the CME Church.

Isaac became one of the most wealthy and influential blacks in Tennessee, running a number of businesses that provided jobs for blacks and especially for graduates of Lane College.  Isaac was a reconstruction era legislator in 1870 having been elected to the state senate in Georgia.  He was later a delegate to the 1872 Republican national convention*

*joelanderson.org

Located at the  south west corner of Lafayette and Shannon Jackson Tn