My Genealogy Hound

REV. LEVI WESLEY HAINER, of Calvary Baptist church, who belongs to a family of ministers and is one of the best known and most popular pastors of Norristown, was born in Brant county, Ontario, Canada, July 1, 1863. He was the son of the Rev. Charles Hainer and Jane (MacCormick) Hainer, both natives of Canada. They had seven children, six sons and one daughter, as follows: Charles D., Edwin A., Levi W., John A., William H., Mary E. and Whitfield. All the sons are ministers and the daughter is the wife of Gilford Mann, of New Market, Ontario.

Rev. Charles Hainer (father) went from the farm into the ministry and is now one of the leading clergymen of the Baptist faith in Canada, where he is still preaching and where he has spent his life in that calling. His wife died in 1873, aged thirty-eight years. He married (second wife) Miss Grace Terry and they had two children,-Frederick, who is a Baptist minister, a graduate from Kingston University, Ontario; and Herbert, who is now studying for the ministry.

Rev. L. W. Hainer’s paternal grandfather was a farmer. He was a soldier in the war of 1812, on the British side, under the lamented General Brock, and was in the charge at Queenston Heights, in which the commander was killed. He died at an advanced age. He was of German descent and had a large family.

John MacCormick (maternal grandfather) was a native of Canada and of Scotch descent. He was a farmer and lived to a very advanced age, leaving a large family.

Rev. Levi W. Hainer left Canada when twelve years old and came to this country, locating in Michigan and later in other western states. He attended Williams College in Massachusetts, graduating in 1883, and entered the Christian Biblical Institute at Stanfordville, New York, graduating in 1886. His first pastorate was at Irvington, New Jersey, a suburb of Newark. Thence he went into the city and became pastor of the First Congregational church, which pastorate he held for nine years. Resigning he spent six months in England, where he attended lectures at the University of Oxford, and then traveled over the continent, and through Egypt and the Holy Land, his wife and son accompanying him, visiting the principal cities. Returning to the United States, he accepted a call from the Calvary Baptist church, Norristown, in April, 1898, which charge he still retains. The membership of Calvary Baptist church is four hundred and eighty, and he has taken into it over two hundred persons in that time. The congregation has recently erected one of the finest church buildings in the city, at a cost of something over forty thousand dollars.

On the 22d day of March, 1884, Mr. Hainer married Miss Celia Mann, daughter of Silas and Zilpah Mann. They had one son, Levi Merrill Hainer. Mrs. Celia Hainer died in 1894, aged thirty-two years. On September 1, 1896, Mr. Hainer married Miss Margaret Matlack, daughter of David J. and Margaret Matlack, of Philadelphia. Mr. Hainer belongs to the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and Knights of Pythias. Politically he is independent.

His son is now in his Junior year in Bucknell University at Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, studying for the ministry. Rev. Mr. Hainer has devoted himself with particular interest to Sunday-school work, in which he has been eminently successful, having received considerable mention from the press in various parts of the country, showing his marked ability as a Sunday-school worker. He has delivered numerous lectures upon the Sunday-school work, and in these lectures uses the stereoptican with good effect, by way of illustration and entertainment as well as edification. His work in Norristown, which has been of steady growth, attests his qualification as a preacher and pastor. He is an eloquent and pleasing speaker, active in pastoral work and very successful as a minister.