The Frankfort roundabout., 1904-01-09
I BY n. F. Smith, Louisville, KY. !
REVEREND JOHN GANO.
Died and Buried at Frankfort, KY,
One Hundred Years Ago.

| A fanOuS flOneer BdpllSI MINIS
ter; the Fighting Chaplain of
Washington $ Army; Founder
of First Baptist Churches in
New York City in Yadkin Val
ley. n. c.; in Frankfort, KY,
aud other places: the First
Chaplain of the First Legisla-
ture of Kentucky, under Cover
nor Shelby.
In some primitive, perhaps un-
known and forgotten, burial ground
at Frankfort, lies the dust of the
once venerated pioneers, Reverend
John Gano and his sainted wife.
Sarah Sites GanO, a dim memory
of one hundred years ago.
| These were the grandparents of
Rev. John Allen Gano and DR..
Stephen Gano, so well known in
Central Kentucky in the century
| lust gone, and ancestors of numer-
Gus families in the Mississippi val
ley and throug hout the Great West.
| John Gano was a great man
great as busy toiler in the build
ing of our Nation, in the building
of our Commonwealth, in the build
ing of our civilization, in the build
ing of religion, the better life of it
all. His life was one of consecra-
tion and heroism, and few men did
as much tu improve his generation
as did he.
Recently the writer of this came
| into possession of a rare little book
Of one hundred and fifty pages, now
deposited in the historical library
of Col. r. Il. Durrett, of Louisville,
which contains the Memoirs of
Rev. John Gano. edited by his son,
and published soon after his death.
From this we learn that John Gano
was born in 1925. His ancestors OH
his fathers side we're Protestant
refugees to America, who fled from
France during the fierce persecu-
ton of the Huguenots in the latter
part of the 18th century. His an
cestor on the maternal side were
English. His parents were relig-
ious people, and from them he in
herited an intense religious nature,
which was fostered by precept and
example in the home life. At the
time Of his birth, his parents, who
had moved from Staten Island, n.
Y, were residing at Hopewell. n.
j., not a great way from New York
City. He was given in youth the
advantages of the best schools of
the country, with training in the
classics by private teachers. or
his late education, he is quoted in
his Memoirs as saying: Princeton
College was at this time kept in
Newark, n. j., and governed by
President Burr" the father of
Aaron Burr. With tile President
he was great favorite, and under
these auspices he completed his
college course.
Having determined to devote his
| life to the ministry in the Baptist
Church, on leaving college he
| Joined three other ministers Of the
same church on a tour of evangel-
| ization in Northern Virginia, from
the Potomac Valley to the Blue
Ridge.
His first experience in itinerant
preaching of the gospel seems to
have given him taste for field
work, which he often sought to in
dulge in subsequent life, and of
which he was enthusiastically
fond. The country was new, and
the equipment most in use was
crude and simple. A horse and
saddle. with saddle-bags and over
coat thrown across, a change OF
linen and pocket Bible, made the
pioneer outfit complete. Thus
armored and provisiOned, during
half a century of his ministerial
career, he repeatedly toured the
country of the Atlantic slope, from
New York to Charleston, sowing in
almost virgin soil the seeds OF the
gospel, planting churches, ordain-
! inc ministers, and converting sim
ners. throughout the Carolinas,
Virginia, and tile colonies north Of
the Potomac to New England.
Bearing in mind that this was the
early era of the plaut-life OF the
Baptist Church and of the religion
| in America, which fOwered and
| fruited not only in the soil OF the
of the field of the sewers, but the
seed of which, born by the winds
and waves of pioneer migration
westward across the Alleghenies.
took root and fiOwered and fruited
| in Kentucky and Tennessee, and
over the entire Mississippi valley,
to the Pacific coast, no computation
can ever tell the extent and com
pass of the labOrs done in the mis-
sionary field, direct and remote, by
this old Knight-Erranto Of the CrCs',
in the pioneer age. The few thous-
ands whom he converted, the scores
of churches he planted and Of min
listers he ordained, are represented
to-day by hundreds Of thousands of
members, and thousands of
churches and ministers Of the great
Baptist body extending from the
Atlantic to the Pacific waters.
Within this realm Of field-preach-
ing, there dwelt such men as George
Washington, the Lees, John Ran