Rankin, Melinda (1811-1888)

American independent missionary in Mexico and probably the first Protestant woman missionary in Latin America

Born in New England, Rankin began her work among Catholics in the Mississippi Valley. Encouraged by reports she received from North American soldiers who were returning to the United States after the war with Mexico, she moved to the Mexican border at Brownsville, Texas, in 1852. There, supported by the Presbyterian Board of Education, she developed a school for Mexican children in 1854. In 1857, when religious liberty was secured in Mexico, she moved to Matamoros, and later made her way to Monterrey, where she established a school and began distributing Bibles. She purchased property and subsidized converts to do missionary work. During those years she was associated with the small congregations gathered around James Hickey, a Baptist clergyman from Texas, and Thomas Martin Westrup, and Englishman of Anglican background. This independent movement did considerable evangelism among the mestizo population in the vicinity of Monterrey. In January 1864 the group was established as the first Baptist Church in Monterrey (the first organized evangelical church in Mexico.) Later controversy between Rankin and Westrup, the pastor of the congregation, resulted in the division of the congregation. In 1869 Rankin invited a pastor of the Presbyterian Church, U.S.A., A.J. Park from Brownsville, to take the leadership of her small work. He developed a Presbyterian church which was the foundation of Presbyterian work in Mexico, while Westrup and his followers remained Baptists. In 1872 Ranked returned to the United States because of health problems. As a result of her work in organizing and mobilizing Mexican nationals to evangelize their country, fourteen congregations had been established, which were later incorporated into the Presbyterian Church.

Pablo A. Deiros, “Rankin, Melinda,” in Biographical Dictionary of Christian Missions, ed. Gerald H. Anderson (New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 1998), 558.

This article is reprinted from Biographical Dictionary of Christian Missions, Macmillan Reference USA, copyright © 1998 Gerald H. Anderson, by permission of Macmillan Reference USA, New York, NY. All rights reserved.

Bibliography

Digital Primary

Rankin, Melinda. Twenty Years Among the Mexicans. Cincinnati: Chase & Hall, 1875.

Digital Secondary

Clark, Francis E., and Harriet E. Clark. The Gospel in Latin Lands; Outline Studies of Protestant Work in the Latin Countries of Europe and America. New York: Macmillan, 1909.

Goslin, Tomás S. Los evangélicos en la América Latina siglo XIX, los comienzos. México: Unida de Publicaciones, 1956.

Wheeler, W. Reginald, Dwight Huntington Day, and James B. Rodgers. Modern Missions in Mexico. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1925.

Links

Texas State Historical Association has a brief article about Rankin’s time in Texas.