"Daniel Coker"(1780-1846)

Born Isaac Wright.He was a writer,activists,and founder,of the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church who eventually emigrated from the United States to Sierra Leone as a missionary and colonist.Daniel was born in either Baltimore County or Frederick County,Maryland to Susan Coker,a white indentured servant,and Edward Wright,a slave father.He was raised in a household with his white half-brothers from his mother's previous marriage and was allowed to attend the local school as their valet.While still in school he fled to New York where he changed his name to Daniel Coker and ordained a Methodist minister.Upon secretly returning to Maryland,Daniel's friend helped him purchase his freedom which gave him the rare opportunity to boldly speak out against the institution of slavery as well as participate in activities not usually open African-Americans at the time.He began both teaching and preaching in the Baltimore area.Responding to racial discrimination in the Methodist church,Daniel called upon African-American Methodists to withdraw from white-dominated church and establish their own organization.Unable to recruit enough parishioners from the Sharp Street Church where he worked,he and others who advocated his separatist ideals broke from the congregation to form the African Bethel Church,which later became Bethel A.M.E. Church.In 1816 Daniel and his supporters were invited to attend the Philadelphia Conference,from which the national organization of the African Methodist Episcopal Church was formed.The new Church denomination was the first in the United States founded by African-Americans.Daniel became the  church first secretary and was nominated to be the first bishop of the new denomination,a position he declined,possibly due to controversy surrounding his light-skin toned.Daniel was expelled from the church from 1818  for reasons unknown but was then allowed to return to his ministerial role one year later.Daniel,his wife,and his children settled in Hastings,Sierra Leone a newly established village for Sierra Leone Liberated Africans.He became the patriarch of a Krio family the coker's son.Daniel Coker Jr.was a prominent man in the town of Freetown and the Cokers and their descendants still reside inside Freetown as one of the prominent Krio families.Henry McNeal Turner elaborated on this when he said "It would seem,from all i can learn,that Daniel played a prominent part in the early settlement of Liberia.The first Methodist Church established here was was the African M.E. Church; but by whom established i cannot say.Tradition says it was afterward sold out to the M.E. Church.Besides the probability of Rev.Daniel Coker's having established our church here,he also played a mighty part among the early settlers of Sierra Leone.His children and grandchildren are found there to-day.