John Mills Kendrick (May 14, 1836 – December 16, 1911) was an Episcopal Church bishop, educator, and Civil War Officer of the United States.
Consecrated on January 18, 1889, in Trinity Church, Columbus, Ohio as Missionary Bishop of Arizona and New Mexico, an area he served from 1889 to 1910.
At the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, he left the seminary for two years, serving in the Federal Army where he was quickly promoted from private to captain.
A month after ordination on June 28, the new deacon was married, to Sarah H. Allen, at Walnut Hills, Cincinnati.
After meeting together in the school for several months, for prayer, bible study and worship, the islanders felt a church should be built and began to pursue that desire.
On October 3, the residents met at the school house and held a meeting to formally establish themselves as a religious group and decided to seek admittance in the Diocese of Ohio.
The deeds show that Mr. Cooke purchased ¾ acre of land for the church from Jose De Rivera for ten dollars in May, 1865.
Bishop McIlvane's record for Nov 4th 1864 in the Diocese of Ohio Convention Journal says "Received the canonical notice of the formation of a parish at Put-in-Bay, Lake Erie, under the care of [the] Rev.
This missionary enterprise has been greatly fostered by Mr. Jay Cooke, of Philadelphia; and a Church is now being built on the island.
Mr. Kendrick, being the only clergyman on the island, and exercising his ministry with tact, prudence and zeal, is securing a position of eminent influence.
The school is of a higher order than usual; consequently increases the attractiveness of the island as a place of summer resort, especially to Episcopal families.
It being the day when Mr. Kendrick was accustomed to visit a missionary station on the main land, I made no formal visitation; but after Morning Prayer and a short address at home on Gibraltar, arrived at the school-house at Putin-Bay, in time to take part in the closing exercises of the Sunday School, and I addressed the children.
(a Presbyterian) (Pollard p 131) June 25, 1866—J Cooke went to church at 10am and heard Mr Kendrick preach on Mark 8:36.
Sept 23rd 1866—J Cooke attended the confirmation service at St Paul's, noting Mr. Kendrick received a call to Kansas.
Jay Cooke wrote in his Journal "God will send another & a suitable & useful man -- let us not doubt -- but it is a sore trial to lose Kendrick -- He is in all respects a perfect minister & never was one more conscientious or energetic in the discharge of every duty.
Kendrick's assignment was the large district of New Mexico, Arizona, and a portion of Texas, covering about 236,313 square miles.
Bishop Kendrick initially settled in Las Vegas, New Mexico, then he moved his office to Albuquerque.
He maintained a winter residence in Phoenix and a summer home in Oceanside, California, where he died on December 16, 1911, after twenty-three years of service in the Southwest.
He is mentioned in "The Clergy and the Myth of the American West" by Ferenc M. Szasz in Church History, Vol.