Dr. Rebecca Cantor, the 17th President of Austin College, will be in Washington, DC on Tuesday, October 27th. She will attend a “Meet the President” event hosted by Caryn Schenewerk (’99) and the Austin College Alumni Board, a board of which Roo Tale Marc is a member. Dr. Cantor’s visit to DC comes during yet another ugly American political election season, one perhaps as ugly as the political election season of 1824.
Oh dear lord is this another Marc Roo Tale? I’m afraid so.
The election of 1824 descended into factionalism, corruption, and name calling. After the votes were counted (of the tiny minority of eligible white male property owners), none of the three main candidates for the Presidency had achieved an Electoral College majority. The three candidates were John Quincy Adams (Massachusetts), Andrew Jackson (Tennessee), and William Crawford (Georgia).
All three men despised each other. Adams viewed Jackson as a “barbarian who could hardly spell his own name.” Jackson saw Adams as corrupt, a view cemented after Adams won the 1824 election by way of the infamous “corrupt bargain.” Both had few positive words to say about Crawford, a proponent of America’s original sin of slavery and “a worm preying upon the vitals” of American government.
And yet, despite their shared animosity during the Election of 1824, all three religiously attended the same church down the street from the White House. They were all in agreement that it was worthwhile to quietly sit in the pews and listen to a preacher they admired and respected: Daniel Baker, the 1st President of Austin College.
New York Avenue Presbyterian Church, established in 1820, is located just two blocks from the White House. Its first Minister was future Austin College founder Daniel Baker, whose energetic sermons made the church the place to be for Washington’s politically powerful. These titans of American history may have hated each other, but that hatred was temporarily shelved when a future Kangaroo was in the pulpit.
From the 1999 book “Austin College, A Sesquicentennial History,” by Dr. Light Cummins and the 1858 book “The Life and Labors of the Daniel Baker,” by [son] William Baker:
“While holding services one Sunday at his Washington church, Baker noted that John Quincy Adams took his seat near the pulpit.” Adams later became a trustee and, according to Baker, “one of the best friends I ever had.” After the arrival of Adams, “Mr. Crawford, [then] Secretary of the Treasury, took a pew. So did General [Andrew] Jackson, then a Senator.” Jackson noted his attraction to Baker’s “piety and zeal” while Adams later offered Baker a personal loan. We can probably assume that none of the three Presidential candidates engaged in friendly chit chat in the pews.
Andrew Jackson won an electoral college plurality in 1824. However, that plurality was due to the grotesque “Three-Fifths Compromise,” which awarded votes to Jackson from enslaved Americans enduring Crawford’s original sin. The lack of a majority threw the election to the House of Representatives, who sided with Adams after an endorsement from 4th place finisher Henry Clay. Adams, the anti-slavery Secretary of State, then appointed Clay as his own Secretary of State in what Jackson called a “corrupt bargain.”
By 1830, Baker had soured on DC and its ugly politics. He made his way south, and then west after Texas independence. After arriving in Galveston in 1840, Baker began work on establishing the first Presbyterian college in Texas. His life’s work, Austin College, became a reality in 1849. Baker became the 1st President of Austin College; the 17th President, Dr. Rebecca Cantor, visits Baker’s Washington DC this week.
Here’s some fun geography for Dr. Cantor. The AC Alumni Board will host Dr. Cantor at the Ocean Prime restaurant in the Colorado building, located near the corner of 14th Street and New York Avenue. DC Roos will be meeting the 17th President of Austin College across the street from New York Presbyterian, where the 1st President of Austin College preached to the three top Presidential Candidates in the Election of 1824.
And here’s some fun geography for Marc. After retiring from the Presidency of Austin College, Daniel Baker moved in the 1850s to support his son William Baker, the Minister of First Presbyterian Church in Austin, TX. Located at the corner of 7th and Colorado, the property of First Presbyterian was purchased 100 years later by Marc’s employer: The University of Texas System. Which means that William Baker’s 1858 book and this Marc 2026 Roo Tale were likely written on the same block.
Yes indeed, DC politics can be an ugly thing. But that’s even more reason to tell a fun story about America, elections, and Austin College. I suspect that Daniel Baker would be thrilled to learn during this ugly political election season of 2026 that the 17th President of Austin College is attending an AC Alumni Board reception right next door to his old pulpit, where he once preached to titans of American history.
John Quincy Adams – “Best Friend” of an Austin College President
The 1824 & 2026 Washington DC of Daniel Baker & Rebecca Cantor
Marc’s UT System Building in Austin, site of the 1858 First Presbyterian Church of Daniel & William Baker