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Katherine Lorena Kelly (1903-?), American missionary, was born at Mt. Mourne, North Carolina on May 17, 1903. She received a B. A. from the University of North Carolina and an M.A. from Scarritt College (Tennessee). Kelly was a Methodist Episcopal, Methodist and United Methodist Church missionary in the Central Zaire Conference for thirty-three years. In 1936, she arrived in what was then The Belgian Congo, after spending a short time in Belgium for French language instruction. Kelly served as an education worker directing primary schools, organized a junior high school for women, and taught in various institutions. During her tenure, Kelly served in Tunda, Wembo Nyama, Lubondai and Lodja. She witnessed the transfers of powers from the Colonial Committee of Fourteen in Belgium to the eventual rule of Joseph Mobutu, later known as Mobuto Sese Seko. In 1960, the Congo civil war ended with independence for the former colony which was now known as the Republic of the Congo. Kelly, along with other missionaries in the area, fled to what is now Kitwe, Zambia, during the war and did not return full-time until early 1965. Upon her return she served as dean of the Congo Polytechnique Institute. In 1969, Kelly retired from active missionary work and returned to the United States of America.

Bishop Leontine Turpeau Current Kelly (1920-2012) was born on March 5, 1920 in Washington, D.C., to the Reverend David DeWitt Turpeau and Ila Mashall Turpeau.

The Washington Annual Conference elected Matthew Clair a bishop, the second African American to be elected bishop. Bishop Clair baptized Leontine Turpeau that day.

According to family narratives, Bishop Clair stated on this day, "Oh, how I wish you were a boy so that my mantle might fall upon you." Sixty years later, it did.

Leontine Kelly's life is rooted in Methodism. Her father and brother were both Methodist ministers. Kelly attended West Virginia State College for three years, but left to marry Gloster Bryant Current in 194l after her junior year. They had three children together before their divorce in the early 1950s.

In 1956,Leontine Kelly married Methodist minister James Kelly. She returned to college and completed her B.A. in 1960 at Virginia Union University, and took a position as a social studies teacher. Though Kelly was a certified lay speaker, she did not become a pastor until the death of her husband in 1969, when she accepted an invitation from Galilee Church to be his successor. In 1976 she obtained her master's of divinity degree from Wesley Theological Seminary, thus becoming an ordained minister.

From 1977 to 1983, Kelly was pastor of Asbury-Church Hill United Methodist Church in Richmond, Virginia. In 1983 she became the assistant general secretary of evangelism for the United Methodist General Board of Discipleship in Nashville.

Kelly received her doctor of divinity degree in 1984 from the Garrett Evangelical Seminary in Evanston, Illinois. In July 1984, Kelly and the Methodist Church made history when 64-year-old clergywomen was elected bishop of the California-Nevada Conference. Kelly thus became the first African American woman to be elected bishop, not only in the Methodist Church, but in any major denomination.

She also became the first woman to preach on the National Radio Pulpit, the first woman to serve as assistant general secretary of the Board of Discipleship's Evangelical Unit, and the only woman bishop to participate and be arrested in the Good Friday Livermore Weapons Laboratory protest in 1985. In 1956, Kelly became the first African American female bishop to address an international meeting of Methodists - the World Methodist Council in Nairobi.

Kelly retired in 1988 at the age of 68. She continued her work as a preacher, teacher, and social activist. Some of her numerous post- retirement activities include, serving as visiting professor of evangelism and witness for two years at Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, California, and serving as adjunct professor at Pacific School of Religion and Hartford Seminary.

Continuing her social activism, Kelly became the president of the AIDS National Interfaith Network (ANIN) and president of the Interreligious Health Care ACCESS Campaign. On top of these numerous responsibilities Kelly maintained a full speaking and preaching schedule. Due to her active and historic service Kelly received more than ten honorary degrees, the Martin Luther King Drum Major for Justice award, the Grass Roots Leadership Award for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and Ebony Magazine's Black Achievement Award in the area of religion. She was featured in Brian Lanker's book I Dream A World: Portraits of Black Women who have Changed America, as well as in Diana Hayes' book , And Still We Rise. Kelly was her inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in Seneca Falls, New York in October 2000.

Cyrus Jeffries Kephart (1852-1932), American Bishop was born in Decatur, Pennsylvania on February 23, 1852 to Reverend Henry and Sarah Kephart. He attended Western College from 1869 to 1874 where he graduated the valedictorian. During his time at Western he entered the ministry in 1871 and married, Sarah Perry, in 1873. He began his ministry in Toledo, Iowa but quickly moved to Dayton, Ohio where he entered Union Biblical Seminary. During this period of his ministry he served as pastor of the Ludlow Street United Brethren Church in Dayton. He graduated Union Biblical Seminary in 1878 and was ordained by Bishop Milton Wright the following year.

Following his completion of training at Union Biblical Seminary he became the principal, and later president, of Avalon Academy (College) in Avalon, Missouri. He remained here until 1885, when after a sabbatical, he and his family returned to Toledo, where he became employed by Western College. For the next twenty years Cyrus Kephart moved back and forth between the clergy and academe. During this time he served as pastor of the East Side United Brethren Church, Summit Park United Brethren Church, in Des Moines, Iowa and in Lisbon, Iowa. He also served as the General Secretary of the Pennsylvania State Sabbath School Association from 1894 to 1897. In academe, Kephart for a second time was president of Avalon College and Western College, which during his time became Leander Clark College in 1905.

In 1908, Cyrus Kephart became the pastor of the First United Brethren Church in Dayton, Ohio. Serving with distinction, he was elected to the office of Bishop in 1913 by the United Brethren General Conference, held in Decatur, Illinois. Afterward he was supervisor of the Southwest District from 1913 to 1925. He retired from active ministry in 1825 and continued to live in Kansas City, Missouri until his death on July 20, 1932.

His published works include: Jesus the Nazarene (1894), The Life of Jesus for Children, The Public Life of Christ, What is a Christian? (1910), Jesus Lord and Teacher (1913), Christianity and the Social Weal (1914), with Dr. W.R. Funk, The Life of Isaiah L. Kephart (1909), and numerous other articles.

*Biographical Information from:

Koontz, Paul Rodes and Roush, Walter Edwin. The Bishops: Church of the United Brethren in Christ. Dayton: Otterbein Press, 1950.