He entered State University, Louisville, Ky., September, 1880, with Dr. William J. Simmons as president, and graduated May, 1886, at the head of his class with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. In 1886 he became pastor of the Calvary Baptist Church, where he still remains greatly beloved by a large membership, and enjoys the respect and confidence of all who know him as being an efficient minister and a Christian gentleman who loves truth for its own sake and pursues it faithfully regardless of everything. Many honors have come to him as delegate to State, Educational and National Conventions--holding offices of trust in many. At this time he is President of the State Teachers' Association, and Chairman of the Executive Board of the General Association of Colored Baptists. He stands at the head of the Eckstein Norton University, an institution devoted to the training of the head, heart and hand, and therefore gives to the Negro youth the kind of education best adapted to his development. He has traveled extensively in the interest of the school, and by his strict attention to business he has made the work a success. [Illustration: CHAS. H. PARRISH, A. B., A. M.] Though Rev. Parrish leads a busy life, he finds time to look after race interests. He is author of "What We Believe," a hand-book for Baptist Churches. So highly was this work prized that the American Baptist Publication Society compiled it with works by Dr. John A. Broadus, Dr. Alvah Hovey, Dr. J. L. Burrows and others. Rev. Parrish ranks high as an educator, pulpit orator, president and author. He is clear, comprehensive and convincing in the presentation of his views upon all subjects, and adds to this fact a beauty of language, grace of rhetoric, and forceful logic, which stamps him at once as extraordinary in his gifts and acquirements. MISS MARY V. COOK, A. B., A. M. The subject of this sketch is a native of Bowling Green, Ky. Her life was uneventful till she reached school age, when her ability for learning asserted itself. By her persistent efforts and her insatiable desire for knowledge, she soon outgrew the educational facilities of the place, and was chafing for better advantages, when Dr. Wm. J. Simmons made it possible for her to enter the State University at Louisville, Ky. After her graduation she was elected permanent teacher and made principal of the Normal Department, and professor of Latin and Mathematics in the State University, which position she held until a few years ago, when she was called to a like position in the Eckstein Norton University. Miss Cook has appeared on the programmes of some of the most noted bodies of the race, read a paper on Afro-American women at the Educational Congress in Chicago, 1893, and has addressed crowded houses throughout the New England States under the auspices of the Baptist Women's Home Mission Society. [Illustration: MISS MARY V. COOK, A. B., A. M.]