The Centennial General A. M. E. Conference
The Centennial General A. M. E. Conference held its twenty-fifth quadrennial meeting in Mother Bethel Church, Philadelphia, Pa., on Sixth street below Pine, just two blocks from Old St. George Church, where Richard Allen and his followers left one hundred years ago and organized the first A. M. E. Church in a little blacksmith shop on the spot where Mother Bethel now stands.
Conference was called to order May 3rd, and was presided over by thirteen Bishops, fifty-one general officers and attended by six hundred thirty-two delegates, one hundred alternates and two hundred visiting ministers. These delegates came from all sections of the United States, Africa and other foreign lands, where the A. M. E. Churches are located.
Senior Bishop Lee presided over the first session and the following sessions were presided over by the Bishops in their turns of elevation.
It was sad to note the absence of twenty members that met with the twenty-fourth General Conference who had passed away during the past four years, three of which were Bishops of the Church and one a very prominent minister and officer in the Conference, and beloved pastor of Bethel Church, Chicago. The following were greatly lamented.
Bishop Henry McNeal Turner—Twelfth Bishop of the Church, at Windsor, Canada, May 8, 1915.
Bishop Moses Buckingham Salter—Twenty-first Bishop of the Church, at his residence Charleston, S. C., March 21, 1913.
Bishop William Derrick—Twenty-third Bishop of the Church, at his residence Flushing, N. Y., April 15, 1915.