City: Nashville
TILLETT, Wilbur Fisk, clergyman and teacher; born Henderson, N. C., August 25, 1854; son of John and Elizabeth Jenkins (Wyche) TILLETT; father’s occupation, minister; educated Horner School, Oxford, N. C., Trinity College, N. C., Randolph-Macon College, Va., Princeton Theological Seminary and Princeton University; graduated Randolph-Macon College, A.B. degree, 1877; Princeton University, A.M., 1879, and Princeton Theological Seminary in 1880; received degree D.D., Randolph-Macon, 1886, L.L.D. Southwestern University (Tex.), 1903, S. T. D., Northwestern University, Chicago, 1907, D.D. Wesleyan University, Conn., 1909; licensed to preach at Ashland, Va., May, 1878, and preached some months same year on the Boydton Circuit, in Mecklenburg Co., Va.; joined the Virginia Annual Conference of the M. E. Church, South, in November, 1880; appointed pastor of Lynn St. Church, Danville, Va., where he remained until fall of 1882, when he moved to Nashville, Tenn., but continued to hold membership in Virginia Conference until 1898, when he was transferred to the Tenn. Conference; has been a member of three General Conferences of the M. E. Church, South, in 1902, 1906, and 1910; member of the committee that compiled the Hymn Book of the M. E. Church, South, which was published in 1889, and also of the commission that prepared the Methodist Hymnal published in 1905; in the fall of 1882 he became Chaplain and Instructor in Systematic Theology in Vanderbilt University, was Adjunct Professor of Systematic Theology 1883-4, and was elected to full professorship in 1884, and has filled that chair ever since; has served as Dean of the Theological Faculty and Vice-Chancellor of the University since 1886; author of the following books: “Our Hymns and Their Authors,” 1889; “Discussions in Theology,” 1890; “Personal Salvation – Studies in Christian Doctrine Pertaining to the Spiritual Life,” 1902; “The Doctrines and Polity of the M. E. Church, South,” 1903; “A Statement of the Faith of World-Wide Methodism,” 1906, and (jointly with C. S. NUTTER) “Hymns and Hymn Writers of the Church,” being an Annotated Edition of the Methodist Hymnal, 1911; also papers in Magazine Reviews and various church periodicals; married twice, first Kate O. SCHOOLFIELD, 1888 (d. 1889); second, Laura E. MCLOUD, 1894.
Source: Who’s Who in Tennessee: A Biographical Reference Book of Notable Tennesseans of To-Day. Memphis: Paul & Douglas Co, 1911.
