Robert Kennon Hargrove was born on September 17, 1829, in
Pickens County,
Alabama. He was
converted to Christianity at the age of eleven. He graduated from the
University of Alabama in 1852. He was a
professor of Pure
Mathematics at his
alma mater, the University of Alabama, from 1853 to 1857. He entered the traveling
ministry of the Alabama
Annual Conference in 1857. Prior to his election to the
episcopacy, he served as a
pastor and a presiding elder. He was President of the
Centenary Institute in
Summerfield, Alabama, 1865–67, and of
Tennessee Female College in the 1870s. He was a member of the
Cape May Commission in 1876. He was the first to urge a bond scheme, which saved the Publishing House of the
M.E. Church, South. He originated the Women's Department of Church Extension (for the purpose of securing
parsonages in the M.E. Church, South). He was also a member of the Commission that in 1878 established fraternal relations between the
M.E. Church and the M.E. Church, South, an important step toward reunification in 1939. He was
not a member of the General Conference (1882) where he was elected bishop. He died on August 4, 1905, in
Nashville, Tennessee, and was buried there in
Mount Olivet Cemetery. ==See also==