Samuel A. Eliot (minister)

Samuel A. Eliot
Born	August 24, 1862 Cambridge, Massachusetts
Died	October 15, 1950
Alma mater	Harvard University
Spouse(s)	Frances Hopkinson
Children	Samuel Atkins Eliot, Jr.
Parent(s)	Charles William Eliot Ellen Derby Peabody
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Samuel Atkins Eliot II (August 24, 1862 – October 15, 1950) was an American Unitarian minister. In 1898 the American Unitarian Association elected him secretary (a position effectively the chief executive officer) but in 1900 the position was redesignated as president and Eliot served in that office from inception to 1927, significantly expanding the association's activities and consolidating denominational power in its administration.

A member of the wealthy Eliot family, he was he son of Harvard President Charles W. Eliot and grandson of Boston politician Samuel Atkins Eliot. His fourth cousin, Frederick May Eliot, also served as President of the American Unitarian Association (1937–1958).

Samuel Atkins Eliot was born in Cambridge, Mass. in 1862. His father, Charles W. Eliot, a chemist, became President of Harvard University when his son was four. His mother, Ellen Derby Peabody, daughter of Unitarian minister Ephraim Peabody, died the same year. Samuel graduated from Harvard College in 1884. He enrolled at Harvard Divinity School the following year, and after briefly serving as a missionary in Seattle, Washington, graduated in 1889. He held pastorates at Unity Church in Denver, Colo. (1889–92) and the Church of the Saviour in Brooklyn, N. Y. (1892–98).

Eliot left congregational ministry to serve as Secretary of the American Unitarian Association (AUA) in 1898. At Eliot's urging, his position was re-titled President in 1900, a title which he retained until 1927 and transformed from a presiding to an executive office. Eliot's efforts to consolidate the National Council of Unitarian Churches under the American Unitarian Association established the denomination's modern associational governance. Where the pre-Eliot AUA had been an organization for individual membership, the merger created a structure of congregational membership and governance, an early incarnation of the Unitarian Universalist Association's General Assembly. Eliot also attracted wealth Unitarians to serve on the AUA's board, who presided over a major expansion of the AUA's operations into public advocacy, Sunday School curriculum, and ministerial credentialing.

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