Posted by Communications Liaison Ellie Simpson, thanks to Archivist Jon Coss.
Donald V. Roberts was born to Weston and Blanche Roberts of Pelham in 1927. He attended the Huguenot Church, Pelham Memorial High School, and graduated from Amherst in 1949. He studied at Union Theological Seminary and was ordained at Huguenot in 1952. He was associate pastor in Buffalo, studied at the University of Geneva, and senior pastor in Tonawanda.
Don, Laura, and Jane Roberts (left) on the cover of Presbyterian Life. Informal photo.
In 1958 Don married Jane Morrow from Rochester. In 1962 the National Council of Churches appointed him to fill the newly-created post of chaplain in Moscow, where he would minister to U.S. diplomatic and press personnel and their families. His three-year pastorate was financed by the United Presbyterian Church, the Episcopal Church, and the Lutheran Church in America.
U.S. Ambassador reads the Scriptures, as Rev. Don stands on the left, during dedication of the first chapel for English-speaking Protestants in Moscow. Formal portrait (right).
In 1962 Don, Jane, and their first-born child Laura headed off to the Soviet Union in 1962. Don held the first service for 75 worshipers in the front parlor of his family apartment in a hotel. After a long wait, the Soviet Foreign Ministry found him two adjoining apartments in a new building. He had the space converted into a house chapel and named it Christ Church.
Time magazine interviewed Pastor Roberts. He said, “This is the place where we worship, where we have our friends, where I work, and where the baby plays. A church isn’t just a building. It’s a fellowship of people who come together to hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s been said that religion is an opiate, but I know of faith in God as an awakening.”
When President Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, Don and Moscow’s Roman Catholic priest conducted a memorial service at the residence of the U.S. Ambassador – held for the entire diplomatic community including members of the Soviet Presidium. The Roberts family stayed on for two more years and returned to America in 1965.
In 1966 Rev. Roberts received a call to the First Presbyterian Church of New Rochelle, where he spent the next 18 years. He brought in new members and set up a non-denominational summer day camp that served 2,000 children from Westchester County. During the 1970s, as church memberships declined and expenses rose, Don merged two diverse Presbyterian congregations in New Rochelle – the Old First Church and its offshoot, the North Avenue Presbyterian Church.
Don wrote an article for Amherst magazine in 1999 – fifty years after graduating. He gave credit to Jane: “Through it all there was Jane: pastor’s wife, helpmate, mother, diplomat, strategist, entertainer, hostess.” Don finished his nearly 40-year career with pastorates in New Jersey. He and Jane retired to Pelham in 1992, reconnecting with family and friends. He preached on a regular basis in various churches in New York City.
In 2015 Rev. Don contracted pneumonia, went to the hospital, and his heart gave out. He was 87 years old, survived by Jane, their three children, and six grandchildren.
Sources:
Feron, James. “Sale of One Church to Foster Reunion.” New York Times. 18 June 1974.
https://www.nytimes.com/1974/06/18/archives/sale-of-one-church-to-foster-reunion-a-suburban-church-sale-to.html
HMC Archives. Registers of baptisms, marriages, enrollments, ordinations, etc.
Presbyterian Life. “A Presbyterian in Moscow.” 15 Feb 1965, pp. 5-7, 31.
Roberts, Donald. Amherst magazine. Memoir. Amherst College, Amherst, MA: 1999. https://www.amherst.edu/news/magazine/in_memory/1949/donaldroberts
Time magazine. “Missionary to Moscow.” 27 July 1962. “A Church for Moscow.” 7 Feb 1964 https://time.com/archive/6623654/religion-missionary-to-moscow/ https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,870687,00.html
UPI. Religious News Photo. Presbyterian Historical Society. https://digital.history.pcusa.org/rns?display=list&page=3&solr_nav%5Bid%5D=945082f26e077d81b26c&solr_nav%5Bpage%5D=0&solr_nav%5Boffset%5D=0&f%5B0%5D=mods_subject_hierarchicalGeographic_country_ms%3A%22Russia%22
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