R. H. Boyd

Boyd was born into slavery at the B. A. Gray plantation in Noxubee County, Mississippi, on March 15, 1843. He was one of ten children of his mother, Indiana Dixon. He was originally named Dick Gray, having been given the surname of his slave master. As a child, he moved twice with his master's household, to Lowndes County, Mississippi, in 1848, and to Claiborne Parish, Louisiana, in 1853. In 1859, he was sold to Benoni W. Gray, who took him to a cotton plantation near Brenham in Washington County, Texas. During the American Civil War, he served Gray as a bodyservant in the Confederate Army. After Gray and his two eldest sons were killed and a third son was badly wounded in fighting near Chattanooga, Tennessee, Boyd returned to Texas with the surviving son. In Texas, he took over management of the Gray plantation, successfully producing and selling cotton. Following emancipation, he also worked as a cowboy and in a sawmill. In 1867, he changed his name to Richard Henry Boyd; Richard ("Dick") had been his grandfather's first name, but there is no record of the reasons for his choice of his new middle name and surname. After emancipation, Boyd, who did not learn the alphabet until the age of 22, began a process of self-education. He used ''Webster's Blue-Backed Speller and McGuffey's First Reader'' as texts and hired a white girl to teach him. In about 1869 or 1870, he enrolled in Bishop College in Marshall, Texas, an American Baptist Home Mission Society school for the education of freed slaves. He attended Bishop for two years, but did not graduate. Later in life, he received honorary doctoral degrees from Guadalupe College and Alabama Agricultural and Mechanical State College. In 1868, Boyd married Laura Thomas, who died less than a year later. In 1871, he married Harriett Albertine Moore. == Religious career ==

In 1869, Boyd was baptized in Hopewell Baptist Church in Navasota, Texas. Shortly thereafter, he felt called to the ministry and was ordained as a minister in 1871. Subsequently, he served as a pastor to several Texas churches, including the Nineveh Baptist Church in Grimes County, the Union Baptist Church in Palestine, and the Mount Zion Baptist Church in San Antonio, and helped to organize other churches in Palestine (including South Union Missionary Baptist Church), Waverly, Old Danville, Navasota, and Crockett. In 1870, he helped organize the first black Baptist association in Texas, the Texas Negro Baptist Convention, and served as its missionary and educational secretary from 1870 to 1874. In 1876, he represented black Texas Baptists at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. National Baptist Publishing Board Boyd did not have National Baptist Convention financial support to start the Publishing Board, so he financed its establishment himself, using real estate in Texas that he owned as collateral, and received assistance with printing from the white Southern Baptist Convention, which had its main publishing operations in Nashville. The National Baptist Publishing Board became the principal source of religious publications for black Baptists worldwide. Splitting of the National Baptist Convention In 1915, the success of the Publishing Board under Boyd's leadership led to a split within the National Baptist Convention. Pastors and other leaders within the convention were suspicious of the Publishing Board and sought greater control, while Boyd asserted that the Publishing Board was independent. Boyd, who served as the National Baptist Convention secretary of missions from 1896 to 1914 while also leading the Publishing Board, claimed that the Publishing Board regularly contributed some of its profits to the missionary work of the National Baptist Convention, but this was disputed. Following confrontations at the annual meeting of the National Baptist Convention in Chicago in 1915, Boyd and his supporters formed the National Baptist Convention of America, which became known informally as "National Baptist Convention, Unincorporated," and was sometimes derisively called the "Boyd National Convention." The leaders remaining in the original convention incorporated in 1916, adopting the name National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc. The National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc. sued unsuccessfully to obtain ownership of the Publishing Board and subsequently created its own Sunday School publishing board. ==Other business activities==

Boyd's business interests extended beyond the Publishing Board. The National Baptist Church Supply Company, which he established in 1902, sold a diverse range of supplies for churches, including pews, fans, pulpits, and pipe organs. ==Civil rights activities==

Boyd was a public advocate for African-American civil rights. As early as the 1890s he voiced his concern that whites planned to reverse the civil rights gains that African Americans had made in the years after the Civil War, and in subsequent years he worked against the Jim Crow laws enacted to enforce segregation. ==Writings==

Boyd wrote 14 books and numerous pamphlets. His books included: • Baptist Catechism and Doctrine (1899) • ''National Baptist Pastor's Guide'' (1900) • National Jubilee Melody Songbook (no date) • Plantation Melody Songs • The Separate or "Jim Crow" Car Laws (1909) • Theological Kernals • An Outline of Negro Baptist History • The Story of the Publishing Board ==Death and legacy==

Boyd died in Nashville of a cerebral hemorrhage on August 22, 1922. His funeral was held in Ryman Auditorium and was attended by several thousand people. He is buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Nashville. The corporation and the R. H. Boyd Family Endowment Fund offer fellowships in his name for African-Americans engaged in graduate study. ==References==