Elder George H. Brigham was born in Eaton, New York, on August 13, 1823. At age 27 he entered the "Shorter Course" at Colgate University in Hamilton and graduated from its Theological Department in August, 1853. This was a big year for Brother Brigham with a graduation , a marriage (to Eliza A. Perry on August 25, 1853), an ordination (December 1853), and his first Church in Scipio, New York. He remained in Scipio through 1854, 1855, and part of 1856.
Elder George Brigham was reported as pastor of the Manlius Church in the minutes of the Onondaga Baptist Association's September, 1856, meeting. Our letter to the Association tells of "the Church being much encouraged under the labor of our newly settled pastor."
Although his life work elsewhere has been well documented, our knowledge of his stay with us suffers from gaps in our record keeping as described earlier. The record keeping for the Annual Meetings was resumed on December 8, 1857; therefore, we have records for two Annual Meeting (1857 and 1858) for which Elder G.H. Brigham was Moderator. Onondaga Baptist Association meeting notes show Elder George Brigham still to be our pastor at the time of the September 1859 Association Meeting. Our condensed report to the meeting tells us that:" The past year was not one of marked prosperity but of continued peace. We have enjoyed the privilege of visiting the water several times and are still enjoying the faithful labor of our pastor. We feel that his services have been the means of uniting us more closely int the bonds of Christian love and fellowship."
Elder George Brigham was pastor when the Church bought its second parsonage and lot (February 13, 1858) on the corner of North and Pleasant Streets, home of our present Church, and he was the first pastor to live there. He moved in on April 1, 1858. The only information we have about the parsonage (except for legal papers) is found in a nostalgic and humorous history entitled "The Old Baptist Parsonage" written by Mary Avery Woodworth. In her history Mrs. Avery reported that the parsonage was purchased by the Manlius Baptist Church from Mr. and Mrs Ebenezer Marvin on February 13, 1858 for $700.00. Mrs. Hannah Macumber, widow of Elihu Macumber was instrumental in financing the purchase. Mrs. Macumber gave $400.00 and the Church raised $300.00. While Mrs. Macumber was described by Mrs. Avery as a dear old lady with two colors of hair, Mrs. Macumber has a business sense and was realistic about the future of the Church. From the legal documents it was learned that the $400.00 which she gave had some strings attached. The money was given with the provision that if the Church neglected for three successive years to support the Church and Society and maintain preaching of the Gospel, the $400.00 was to be returned to Mrs. Macumber or her representative.
Mrs Avery apparently wrote to the Reverend who had lived in the old parsonage to learn of their experiences there. Reverend G. H. Brigham, the first pastor to live in the new parsonage, told of a pleasing tradition concerning it (the house) as follows: "A former owner raised in it a large family and upon each occasion of an addition to his family, he made an addition to the house." Apparently no children were born in the Parsonage because Mrs. Avery remarked that this was a plan of procedure upon which we had no occasion to act. It also explains why Yettie Harris later described the house as being "low and rambling." (Footnote:The Church has a photograph of the house in its historical collection. Mrs. Avery's history is reproduced in full in the appendix.)
Reverend George H. Brigham wrote that "our associations with the parsonage home, as by memory recalled, were very pleasant, with its ample room,- around us many friends who often brightened it, and cheered us by their presence and kindly words and deeds of encouragement. We enjoyed it as a home, perhaps as well as anyone in which we lived, and it was not without smothered feelings of regret that we left it for a home in a much wider field of labor."
Elder George Brigham left our Church in late 1859 to become pastor of the Homer Baptist Church, known as a Church that had enjoyed a great history of prominent pastors recognized as denominational leaders. He was said to be reluctant to candidate for such a prestigious Church, so the pastor who was leaving, Dr. Harvey, arranged an exchange without indicating his purpose to Homer Baptists or Mr. Brigham. The earnest sermon of the young stranger so captivated the people that he was unanimously and heartily called to preside over the (Homer) Church. He served there for seven years.
Elder George Brigham served as the District Secretary of the American Baptist Missionary Union for Ohio after an interim of preaching. In 1873 he became the District Secretary of the Mission Union (later known as the American Baptist Foreign Mission Society) in the Central New York Area and served for 20 years. Reverend John B. Calvert remembered, "He loved the cause of foreign mission, and in the twenty years of service he did the best work of his life." Rev. Calvert also described Elder Brigham as a preacher. "Br. Brigham was eminently a preacher of the Gospel. Like poets, preachers are born, not made. By his very constitution he seemed to have been ordained for this holy and exalted calling. His broad and deep sympathy, coupled with his rare intellectual furnishings, combined to fit him in a peculiar way for the work of the Gospel ministry. I recall, as many of you do, his quiet and gentle manner, his slow and measured speech, his intense earnestness and soul enkindling enthusiasm in the pulpit discourses as he warmed to his subject, and above all, the consecrated bearing and almost holy atmosphere that always attended the man. Br. Brigham was an orator in the true sense of the term."
Reverend John B. Calvert, a young colleague of Reverend Brigham, was impressed as a youth by the way that Reverend Brigham treated his horses. "Mr. Brigham, in the exercise of his pastoral duties was in my boyhood a frequent visitor to our home. Among the many incidents which come to my mind, there is one I recall with great vividness today. My people at the time were living on a farm at the north of Homer village. On the afternoon of a blustering winter day, Mr. and Mrs. Brigham drove up to the door. Mr. Brigham loved good horses, and he was the owner of a beautiful dappled bay, of which he was more careful than of himself. After he had gotten out and helped out Mrs. Brigham and tied his horse to the hitching post, he unfastened his fur muffler and with it wiped the snow from the neck and back of the horse before covering him with a blanket. My mother, who had been watching from the window where she was sewing, called me to her and said,`I want you to see how kind Mr. Brigham is to his horse, and I hope you will always remember, from seeing his act, that a merciful man is merciful to his beast.'"
Elder George Brigham was also a poet and often expressed his love for God in poetry. From 1881 until the end of his life, he lived nearby in Cortland, New York. He and his wife Eliza celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary on August 25, 1903. Elder George Brigham died at the age of 87 on September 5, 1910. Information on Elder George Brigham's life is found in the book Rev. George H. Brigham, An Appreciation by Reverend John B. Calvert. There is a copy of this book and one of Rev. George Brigham's poetry, On the Sea of Galilee and Other Poems, in the Historical Room. In one of his poems, "The Time to Die," Elder Brigham wrote:
O let me not die in the winter time
When all is cold and drear
I would go from a bright and sunny clime
To one more bright and clear.
If September 5, 1910, was one of those beautiful days when summer lingers before the first killing frost, then Elder Brigham had his wish.
