Sarah Lue Bostick

Born: 

1868

Died: 

1948
Sarah Bostick

Sarah Lue Bostick was among the first African American women ordained to the Christian ministry in the late 19th century. She labored as a field worker for the Christian Woman’s Board of Missions and the National Christian Missionary Society among African American congregations in Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee, Kansas, Texas, and Oklahoma. She carried on her successful work for over 40 years, until her retirement in 1938.

A devoted worker for the Christian Woman’s Board of Missions, Sarah Lue Bostick worked tirelessly on behalf of African-American ministers and congregations. She made bonnets by hand and donated the proceeds to a host of missions: the CWBM, Southern Christian Institute, Disciple missions to Jamaica and to Jacob Kenoly in Liberia.

As she worked to established CWBM auxiliaries across Arkansas she amassed a spectacular collection of missions literature, which, upon her death in 1948 were preserved and donated to Disciples of Christ Historical Society. Her materials open an unparalleled window into women’s and African-American studies in the Stone-Campbell movement from the close of the nineteenth to the middle of the twentieth centuries.

Bostick and her husband, Mancil Mathis Bostick (1864-1939) founded the Mount Sinai Christian Church in North Little Rock and guided it through successful growth and stability. She was a member of the congregation until her death on May 1, 1948.