Cheatham, William Lee, Sr. (1899–1991)

W. L. Cheatham was a pastor-evangelist in Maryland and Delaware who served as president of the Allegheny Conference for thirteen years and facilitated division of the conference’s territory to create two conferences, Allegheny East and Allegheny West, in 1967.

Early Life

William Lee Cheatham was born to William and Lydia Dixon Cheatham on August 25, 1899, in Belzoni, Mississippi. He was the oldest of three sons. The Gospel Herald reported in its November 1907 issue that 8-year-old Willie Cheatham was attending the Seventh-day Adventist school in Greenville, Mississippi, and noted his feat of selling seventy-five cents’ worth of the Watchman magazine in a single day. It was an early beginning to his success as a colporteur. After the death of his parents while he was still in his teens, William, at the encouragement of an aunt, Alice Murphy, went to Huntsville, Alabama, where he completed his secondary education at Oakwood Academy and continued his studies at Oakwood Junior College (later Oakwood University).¹

During the Week of Prayer at Oakwood, December 6-13, 1919, Cheatham was “led to give [himself] up wholly without reserve to [God].”² He continued to work as a colporteur, and assisted in training new colporteurs by role-playing as a field hand “busily engaged under a hot sun in very grassy cotton” to whom inductees would practice their solicitations.³

After college, Cheatham moved to Baltimore, Maryland, where he married Laura E. Muir in 1922. They would have eight children—six sons and two daughters: William, Jr., Anna (Timpson), Oliver, Donald, Merle (Ford), Charles, William Augustus and William Wendell.⁴

Cheatham was employed in a variety of ways during his first few years in Baltimore. He worked as a carpenter and as a tailor, and on a ship that made trips from Baltimore to New York City and to the Hawaiian Islands. Then, for 15 years he was a butler and general manager for a wealthy banking family prominent in politics.⁵

During these years, Cheatham felt a conviction that God wanted him to serve the gospel cause more fully. He devoted nonworking hours to courses taken by mail from the Fireside Correspondence School (later Griggs University) located at the General Conference and took further college work at Delaware State College. At the same time he was a lay leader in the large Baltimore Third Seventh-day Adventist church (renamed Berea Temple in 1940), serving as first elder for 15 years.⁶

The Delaware District (1937-1945)

Taking note of his dedication and spiritual gifts, the leaders of the Chesapeake Conference called Cheatham to full-time ministry in 1937, assigning him a district in Delaware with four churches: Cheswold, Dover, Millsboro, and Wilmington. During his first two years he baptized 54 new members and eventually a fifth church, Milford, was added to the Delaware district.⁷

In April 1944, Cheatham added his voice to a movement for change in the racial policies and practices of denominational institutions, triggered by the Washington Sanitarium’s refusal to treat a Black Seventh-Adventist, Lucy Byard, and her death soon afterwards.⁸ In a letter to General Conference president J. L. McElhany, Cheatham pointed out that such discriminatory practices had put Black Adventist ministers such as himself “on the defensive” for a long time, especially since they compared poorly to standard practices in society at large in the mid-Atlantic region: “I doubt whether our white brethren really know how hard it has been for us to defend the policy of the present organization and the institutions of our denomination in view of the [racially] mixed schools and hospital systems in the nearby states,” he wrote.⁹

The General Conference that year approved a plan for separate Black conferences, not to enforce segregation but to enable Black Adventists with greater opportunity to develop schools and other institutions and the authority to administer churches and evangelistic endeavors. But Cheatham, alarmed about an apparent unwillingness to implement the plan in the Columbia Union, wrote McElhany again on November 26. Because it had been made clear that “equality in the present set-up . . . in offices, sanitariums, publishing houses, and the like” was not an option, creating the Black conferences, Cheatham observed, was “the next best plan.” Now, however, the Columbia Union leadership seemed determined to kill even this partial step toward a fairer system, and in some places people who spoke out for it were being branded “race agitators.”¹⁰

Baltimore and Berea Temple (1945-1953)

In the end, the Columbia Union did proceed with creation of a Black conference. Cheatham’s Delaware churches, along with the other predominantly-black churches in the conferences comprising the union were transferred to the new Allegheny Conference when it began operation on January 1, 1945.¹¹ Cheatham was called back to Baltimore as pastor of the Berea Temple church, the largest congregation in the new Allegheny Conference. In 1946, soon after his arrival, he led the church in upgrading the facilities of Baltimore Junior Academy with acquisition and renovation of a three-story, eleven-room building. His wife, Laura, supervised provision of hot lunches at the school, and their daughter, Anna B. Cheatham, was one of its four teachers.¹²

Cheatham also carried on a strong evangelism program that kept the church moving forward, with membership reaching 700 by 1949.¹³ In 1951, to accommodate the continued growth, Cheatham oversaw purchase of a large synagogue from the Baltimore Hebrew congregation to serve as Berea Temple’s house of worship. The building was designated a national historic landmark in 1976.¹⁴

Allegheny Conference President (1954-1966)

In 1954, Cheatham was elected as the second president of the Allegheny Conference. Laura Cheatham served alongside her husband as a secretary in the conference office.¹⁵ In addition to his duties as conference president, he was also a consulting editor for the North American Informant and a member of the General Conference Human Relations Committee, chaired by Harold D. Singleton. Created in 1961, the Human Relations Committee was influential in bringing an end to racial segregation in Seventh-day Adventist organizations, including Southern Missionary College (now Southern Adventist University) and academies and churches in the South.¹⁶

As conference president, Cheatham placed high priority on the progress of Pine Forge Institute (now Pine Forge Academy), the boarding school for Black young people established by the Allegheny Conference in 1946. A new dormitory for girls completed in 1963 is one example of enhancements during Cheatham’s administration.¹⁷

During the thirteen years of Cheatham’s presidency, Allegheny Conference grew from 33 churches and approximately 7,000 members to 71 churches and a membership approaching 12,000. Covering a vast amount of territory from the start, Allegheny had become a large conference for its time in membership, with a pattern of strong growth. In 1966 the conference constituency voted in favor of splitting the conference into two: Allegheny East and Allegheny West. Cheatham retired as president, and new presidents, W. A. Thompson in Allegheny East and W. M. Starks in Allegheny West were elected. Both men had served under Cheatham, as secretary-treasurer, and stewardship secretary, respectively.¹⁸

After his retirement from the position of conference president, Cheatham continued his ministry in the Allegheny East Conference, serving churches in Chester and Coatesville, Pennsylvania, and in Wilmington, Delaware. Known for his wisdom and foresight, he continued in later years to be a source of encouragement and guidance as an elder statesman.

W. L. Cheatham, Sr., passed away on September 19, 1991 at Washington Adventist Hospital in Takoma Park, Maryland, and was funeralized at the Pine Forge Seventh-day Adventist church in Pine Forge, Pennsylvania. He was survived by his eight children, and his wife of 68 years, Laura, who died in 2008 at age 105.¹⁹

Sources

Brock, Bettye. “Historic Allegheny East Church Grows with Youthful Vitality.” Columbia Union Visitor, October 1, 1989.

Buchanan, J. T. “Progress of the Berea Temple Church.” Columbia Union Visitor, June 20, 1940.

Burk, Mary L. “Baltimore Tent Effort.” Columbia Union Visitor, October 4, 1945.

Cheatham, W.L. “Allegheny Advances.” North American Informant, November-December 1962.

Cheatham, W. L. W. L. Cheatham to J. L. McElhany. April 28 and November 26, 1944, General Conference Archives (hereafter GCA).

“Colporteurs’ Report.” Southern Union Worker, September 5, 1918.

“Colporteurs’ Report for Southern Union Conference.” Southern Union Worker, October 21, 1920.

“Conference President’s Mother Dies.” Visitor, February 2009.

“Elder and Mrs. W.L. Cheatham Honored at Testimonial Banquet.” North American Informant, March-April 1967.

“Further General Conference Actions.” Oakwood University Goldmine. Accessed January 24, 2021. http://www.oakwood.edu/additional_sites/goldmine/hdoc/blacksda/gprr/gprr5.htm.

Murphy, M. A. “Report from Greenville, Mississippi.” Gospel Herald, November 1907.

Moffett, W. C. “New Notes.” Columbia Union Visitor, August 10, 1939.

“Oakwood News.” Gospel Herald, June 1, 1921.

Ochs, D. A. “Change in Presidents.” Columbia Union Visitor, February 4, 1954.

Pinkney, A. V. “Evangelism in Baltimore.” North American Informant, December 1949.

Pinkney, A. V. “New President.” Columbia Union Visitor, February 4, 1954.

“Progress in Baltimore.” North American Informant, October-November 1947.

Roth, D.A. “Allegheny Re-elects W.L. Cheatham.” Columbia Union Visitor, August 28, 1958.

Singleton, Harold D. “Allegheny Divides to East and West.” North American Informant, January-February 1967.

Singleton, H.D. “Human Relations Committee Meets.” North American Informant, November-December 1965.

“Symposium by Students.” Gospel Herald, January 1920.

William L. Cheatham, Sr. Funeral Program. September 24, 1991. Oakwood University Archives, Eva B. Dykes Library, Oakwood University. Catalog Number: 15-che-71. https://oakwood.pastperfectonline.com/archive/1E51AE3B-F459-46E4-A303-981296293224.

Notes

1. William L. Cheatham, Sr. Funeral Program, September 24, 1991, Oakwood University Archives, Eva B. Dykes Library, https://oakwood.pastperfectonline.com/archive/1E51AE3B-F459-46E4-A303-981296293224; Colporteurs’ Report,” Southern Union Worker, September 5, 1918, 4; M.A. Murphy, “Report from Greenville, Mississippi,” Gospel Herald, November 1907, 43.↩

2. “Symposium by Students,” Gospel Herald, January 1920, 5↩

3. “Oakwood News,” Gospel Herald, June 1921, 8↩

4. “Elder and Mrs. W.L. Cheatham Honored at Testimonial Banquet.” The North American Informant, March-April 1967, 4-5.↩

5. William L. Cheatham, Sr. Funeral Program.↩

6. Ibid.; J.T. Buchanan, “Progress of the Berea Temple Church,” Columbia Union Visitor, June 20, 1940, 5.↩

7. William L. Cheatham, Sr. Funeral Program; W.C. Moffett, “New Notes,” Columbia Union Visitor, August 10, 1939, 2-3.↩

8. Benjamin Baker, “Byard, Lucille (1877–1943),” Encyclopedia of Seventh-day Adventists, accessed May 06, 2021, https://encyclopedia.adventist.org/article?id=9CEA.↩

9. W. L. Cheatham to J.L. McElhany, April 28, 1944, GCA.↩

10. W. L. Cheatham to J.L. McElhany, November 26, 1944, GCA.↩

11. Douglas Morgan, “Allegheny Conference,” Encyclopedia of Seventh-day Adventists, accessed May 7, 2021, https://encyclopedia.adventist.org/article?id=CCDO.↩

12. “Progress in Baltimore.” North American Informant, October-November 1947, 6.↩

13. Mary L. Burke, “Baltimore Tent Effort,” Columbia Union Visitor, October 4, 1945, 5; A.V. Pinkney, “Evangelism in Baltimore,” North American Informant, December 1949, 8↩

14. Bettye Brock, “Historic Allegheny East Church Grows with Youthful Vitality,” October 1, 1989, 4-5.↩

15. D. A. Ochs, “Change in Presidents,” Columbia Union Visitor, February 4, 1954, 1; “Conference President’s Mother Dies,” Visitor, February 2009, 25.↩

16. H. D. Singleton, “Human Relations Committee Meets,” North American Informant, November-December 1965, 2; “Further General Conference Actions, ” Oakwood University Goldmine, accessed January 24, 2021. http://www.oakwood.edu/additional_sites/goldmine/hdoc/blacksda/gprr/gprr5.htm.↩

17. William L. Cheatham, Sr. Funeral Program; W.L. Cheatham, “Allegheny Advances,” North American Informant, November-December 1962, 6; “Elder and Mrs. W.L. Cheatham Honored,” 5.↩

18. William L. Cheatham, Sr. Funeral Program; Harold D. Singleton, “Allegheny Divides to East and West,” North American Informant, January-February 1967, 1; “Elder and Mrs. W.L. Cheatham Honored,” 4-5.↩

19. William L. Cheatham, Sr. Funeral Program; “Conference President’s Mother Dies.”↩