W. H. Jernagin

Reverend D.D. William Henry Jernagin (1869–1958) was an African-American Baptist pastor, an important figure in the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1896–1954), and Pan-African activist.

The National Race Congress selected Jernagin to attend the Paris Peace Conference and the First Pan-African Congress in 1919.

William Henry Jernagin was born in Mashulaville, Mississippi on October 13th, 1869 to Allen Fletcher Jernagin and Julia Ruth Walker. While his parents were mostly illiterate, they managed to obtain a small 40-acre farm upon which they grew a variety of fruits and vegetables. His family worked primarily harvesting apples and peaches for Juke Jernagin, a former slave owner. In the breaks between the sowing and reaping seasons, William attended a number of public schools in the Noxubee and Lauderdale Counties, among them Meridian Academy, Alcorn A&M College, and Jackson College. In addition, he attended American Correspondence School located in Danville, N.Y..

After working in a school in Lauderdale County for roughly five years, Jernagin was licensed to preach by the Bush Fork Baptist Church of Mississippi. In 1892, two years after his pastoral licensing, the 23 year old Jernagin was called to preach at a number of Mississippi Baptist Churches including: New Prospect Baptist Church in Meridian, Mississippi, Mount Moriah Baptist Church, and Scooba Baptist Church in Okolona, Mississippi. The year of 1896 was a busy one for Jernagin who worked to unite a number of churches, among them: Missionary Union Baptist Church, First Baptist Church in Winona, Mississippi, Second Baptist Church, First Baptist Church in Mound Bayou, Mississippi, First Baptist Church in Brandon, Mississippi, and Tabernacle Baptist Church in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma During this year, he founded Mississippi's Meridian Baptist Seminary, which was among the first educational institutions for African Americans east of the Mississippi River and helped establish an educational standard for African American Baptist pastors. In addition, he became the president of the Oklahoma General Baptist Convention, aided in the establishment of the Winona-Granada Baptist College, and organized the Young People's Christian Educational Congress of Mississippi. In 1905, following his rapid string of accomplishments for the church and well-received pastorates all across the state of Mississippi, Jernagin was appointed to the Tabernacle Baptist Church, which led him to move to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. In an article run by the Oklahoma Safeguard on July 6th, 1905 entitled, "The Baptists of Oklahoma are getting together. That is right. In union there is strength. United we stand and divided we fall." stated of the young pastor, “The installation of Reverend W.H. Jernagin as pastor of the Tabernacle Baptist Church, of Oklahoma City was pulled off last Sunday in good shape. Rev. Jernagin, seated away back in that fine church, confronted with an audience of from five hundred to eight hundred, surrounded by all the big preachers, lawyers, doctors, teachers and big men of that great city, looked as though he was old Pope Leo. ”

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