William Ragsdale Cannon (April 5, 1916 – May 11, 1997[1]) was the dean of Candler School of Theology (1953–1968) and an American bishop of the United Methodist Church, elected in 1968.
While attending UGA, he was a member of the Demosthenian Literary Society, where he served as an officer and had a speech regarding the value of Christianity saved for posterity by faculty advisor Albert B. Saye.
Cannon served churches in Oxford before joining the faculty of Candler School of Theology, Emory University in 1943.
In the mid-1960s Dean Cannon defended Emory's retention of Religion Professor Thomas J.J. Altizer, a proponent of the death-of-God position.
Cannon had the high honor of being a Protestant observer at the Vatican II Council of the Roman Catholic Church in Rome in 1965.
He retired to Georgia in 1984, becoming bishop-in-residence at the Northside United Methodist Church in Atlanta and professor at Candler School of Theology at Emory University.