John Alexander Gordon, D. D

One of the greatest individual forces in the promulgation of Baptist doctrines in Canada, a man who has worked long and earnestly in the promotion and spread of Baptist principles, giving of his unusual talents, his great energy and tireless labor to the cause, is Rev. John Alexander Gordon, for fourteen years pastor of the First Baptist church in Montreal and now the incumbent of the chair of pastoral theology at Brandon Theological College, active in the work of the foreign missionary societies and in the spread of temperance doctrines throughout the Dominion.

Dr. Gordon is of Scottish ancestry and was born in Uigg, Prince Edward Island. He acquired his early education in the public and high schools of his native province and in Acadia University, graduating with the degree of B. A., and acquired his theological training in the Newton Theological Seminary in Newton, Massachusetts. He was ordained to the Baptist ministry in 1875 and has since been prominent and active in the work of the Baptist church. He received the honorary degree of M. A. from Acadia College in 1894 and the honorary degree of D. D. from the same institution in 1904. Previous to his ordination he had been engaged in the mercantile and commission business at Montague, Prince Edward Island, and his first ministerial charge was as pastor of the church in that community. He was afterward called to Milton church, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, where he remained from 1880 to 1885, after which he went to St. John, New Brunswick, serving as pastor of the Leinster Street Baptist church, and from there went to the First Baptist church, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, remaining there until 1893, when he became pastor of the Main Street Baptist church at Charlottetown. In 1899 he was called to Montreal as minister of the First Baptist church of this city, a position which he held until June, 1913, when he accepted the chair of pastoral theology at Brandon Theological College. Dr. Gordon has been found most earnest, zealous and consecrated in his work and has been carried forward by the force of his ability and the extent of his interests into important relations with religious work of many kinds, notably that of the local branch of the Lord’s Day Alliance, of which he is vice president; the Prisoners’ Aid Association, of which he is also vice president; the Grand Ligne Missionary Society, of which he is president; and the Maritime Baptist Union. No individual has done more powerful or effective work than he in the propagation of Baptist doctrines or in the promotion of the church’s interests for he was in 1906 appointed a member of the committee on Church Union and two years later was one of the promoters and a member of the committee which organized the Baptist Union. He is a governor of Acadia University and is especially interested in the work of the Foreign Mission Board of Ontario and Quebec, of the British and Foreign Bible Society and the Moral and Social Reform Council. He has written a “History of the First Baptist Church of Montreal,” published in 1906, and in August, 1908, entered a vigorous protest against the celebration of high mass on the Plains of Abraham as a part of the tercentenary celebration.

Dr. Gordon married at Kingsborough, Prince Edward Island, Margaret Ford, eldest daughter of the late John Ford, and to them were born five sons: John, a resident of Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island; Dr. Alvah H., of Montreal; Peter W., of Calgary; Herbert F., of Winnipeg; and Walter H., city editor of The Gazette of Montreal. Dr. Gordon has been a lifelong temperance worker and reformer and has accomplished a great deal of excellent work along this line, being uncompromising in his attitude toward the liquor evil and battling against it always to the extent of his great ability. In Montreal he is known as a man whose actions conform closely to his principles and whose energy, aggressiveness and untiring activity have been elements in the accomplishment of great and lasting work.