Mrs. Eddy Mentioned Them December 27, 1958 Issue

Richard S. Rust, 1815-1906

[Mentioned in Retrospection and Introspection, p. 5, and in Miscellany, p. 311]

Richard S. Rust is known as a Methodist Episcopal clergyman, an educator, and a worker for the Negro's welfare. Born in Ipswich, Massachusetts, Rust lost both his parents before he was ten. After helping an uncle with farm work, the boy started to learn cabinet making; but his desire for an education was so strong that he bought back a part of his apprenticeship so that he might enter Phillips Academy at Andover. Massachusetts.

Here occurred his first stand for the Negro, for he refused to resign his membership in an antislavery society and was consequently expelled. An academy in Canaan, New Hampshire, which admitted Negroes, was his next choice, but local opposition closed this school. From here he went to Wilbraham Academy and then on to Wesleyan University, from which he graduated. Giving antislavery lectures helped to support him while attending the university.

Probably Rust first attracted attention during his pastorate in Worcester, where he founded and edited The American Pulpit, in which he published some of his own sermons.

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