August 26

1498 In Rome Italian artist Michelangelo (1475–1564) was commissioned by Pope Alexander VI to carve the Pieta.

1722 John Albert Weygand, early Lutheran pastor in New Jersey and New York, was born in Hanau (d. March 1770).

1748 The Pennsylvania Ministerium, the first Lutheran synod in America, was organized at Philadelphia at Saint Michael's Church under the leadership of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg.

1816 The Basel Mission Institute was opened.

1827 Beale Melanchthon Schmucker, son of Samuel Simon Schmucker and a Pennsylvania Ministerium pastor, was born in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania (d. 15 October 1888).

1832 Adam Clarke (b. 1760 or 1762), English Methodist theologian, died.

1857 The Evangelical Lutheran District Synod of Ohio was organized, severing connection with the Ohio Synod.

1861 Ole Gulbrand Belsheim, pastor in Wisconsin, Minnesota and North Dakota and hymn translator, was born at Vang Valdres, Norway (d. 13 February 1925).

1862 Samuel William Herman Daib was born in Sugar Grove, Ohio (d. 29 September 1941, Merrill, Wisconsin). He graduated from Concordia Seminary (Saint Louis) in 1884 and served as pastor in Wittenberg, Antigo and Merrill, Wisconsin. He was president of the Missouri Synod's Wisconsin District from 1906 to 1916 and of the North Wisconsin District from 1918 to 1936. In 1898 he organized the Wisconsin Church Mutual Fire Insurance Association and served as its president from 1909 until his death. He pioneered in encouraging the practice of giving memorial gifts to support the mission of the church in honor of friends and family members who have died.

1873 William Martin Czamanske, hymnist and hymn translator, was born at Granville, Wisconsin (d. 7 January 1964, Oconomowoc, Wisconsin). He graduated from Concordia Seminary (Saint Louis) in 1898 and served parishes at Town Fieldon, Minnesota; West Henrietta and Rochester, New York; and Saint Mark Lutehran Church, Sheboygan, Wisconsin, the last from 1910 to 1951. He contributed poetry to several Lutheran periodicals and was a member of an Intersynodical Committee on Hymnology and Liturgics subcommittee.

1878 Daniel Dole, missionary to Hawaii, died (b. 9 September 1808, Bloomfield, Maine).

1901 The American Standard Version (A.S.V.) of the New Testament was first published by Thomas Nelson and Sons.

1930 Frederick William Herzberger, pioneer Saint Louis city missionary, devotional writer and hymn translator, died in St. Louis (b. 23 October 1859, Baltimore, Maryland).

1949 Henry W. Horst, one of the co-founders of the Lutheran Laymen's League, died (b. 3 May 1864, Rendsburg, Germany).

1958 Ralph Vaughan Williams, English composer, died (b. 12 October 1872).

1965 Carl Elof Lund-Quist, executive secretary of the Lutheran World Federation, died (b. 19 September 1908, Lindsborg, Kansas).