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Biography of Jabez Lamar Monroe CurryName: Jabez Lamar Monroe CurryBirth Date: June 5, 1815 Death Date: February 12, 1903 Place of Birth: Lincoln County, Georgia, United States Nationality: American Gender: Male Occupations: politician, agency director Jabez Lamar Monroe Curry The American politician Jabez Lamar Monroe Curry (1815-1903) was the main force behind improved education in the South in the latter half of the 19th century.Born on June 5, 1815, in Lincoln County, Ga., J. L. M. Curry was the son of a slaveholding family that ultimately moved to Alabama. He graduated from the University of Georgia and the Harvard University Law School. While at Harvard, Curry heard a lecture by Horace Mann that awakened his zealous interest in universal education.In 1845 Curry was admitted to the Alabama bar, and he quickly gained prominence as a lawyer. Three terms in the Alabama Legislature preceded 4 years as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives. During the Civil War he served first in the Confederate Congress and then as a colonel on the staffs of generals Joseph E. Johnston and Joseph Wheeler.Shortly after his 1866 ordination as a Baptist minister, Curry accepted …showed first 150 words…
…showed last 150 words…served as special minister to Spain, president of the Board of Foreign Missions of the Southern Baptist Convention, and president of the Southern Historical Association. He died on Feb. 12, 1903, in Asheville, N.C., and is buried in Richmond, Va. His statue is one of two memorials placed by Alabama in the U.S. Capitol's "Hall of Statuary."Curry's writings included Constitutional Government in Spain (1889), William Ewart Gladstone (1891), The Southern States of the American Union (1895), The Civil History of the Government of the Confederate States (1901), and a number of religious tracts. Further Reading The best work on Curry is Jessie P. Rice, J. L. M. Curry: Southerner, Statesman and Educator (1949). An older study, still reliable and based in great part on Curry's writings, is Edwin A. Alderman and Armistead C. Gordon, J. L. M. Curry: A Biography (1911). Curry's Civil History of the Government of the Confederate States (1901) contains many personal reminiscences. |