Dawley, Powel Mills

(Mar. 1, 1907-July 10, 1985). Church historian. He was born in Newport, Rhode Island. Dawley received his Ph.B. in 1929 and his M.A. in 1931 from Brown University. He received his B.D. in 1936 from the Episcopal Theological School and remained there for two additional years as Phillips Brooks Fellow. Dawley received his Ph.D. from Cambridge University in 1938. He was ordained deacon on June 27, 1935, and priest on May 21, 1936. Dawley began his ministry as curate and then as associate rector of St. David's Church, Baltimore, Maryland. From 1942 until 1945, he was dean of St. Luke's Cathedral, Portland, Maine. In 1945 he became the St. Mark's-in-the-Bowery Professor of Ecclesiastical History at the General Theological Seminary. He remained there until his retirement in 1971. From 1954 until 1971, he was sub-dean of the Seminary. Upon his retirement, he became canon to the Bishop of Maine. Dawley was active in the ecumenical movement. He lectured at numerous American and English colleges. Among his many publications are John Whitgift and the English Reformation (1953); Chapters in Church History (1950), Vol. 2 of the first “Church's Teaching Series”; The Episcopal Church and Its Work (1955), Vol. 6 of the first “Church's Teaching Series”; The Religion of the Prayer Book (1943); and The Story of the General Theological Seminary: A Sesquicentennial History, 1817-1967 (1969). He edited Report of the Anglican Congress 1954 (1954). Dawley died in Brunswick, Maine. There is a bibliography of his published writings in Anglican and Episcopal History 54 (Sept. 1987).