John C. Booth

John C. Booth (1903 - 1996) was one of the members of the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses.

As a young man back in 1921, John Booth was searching for purpose in life. He taught Sunday school at the Dutch Reformed Church, but he resisted the idea of training to become a minister because he felt that clergymen led selfish lives. When he saw a flier for a talk entitled “Millions Now Living Will Never Die,” he wasted no time in sending away for the literature it advertised. Captivated by what he had read, he was soon bicycling 15 miles [24 km] to meetings of the Bible Students, as Jehovah’s Witnesses were then known. He was baptized in 1923 and began preaching from door to door in the region of Wallkill, New York, where his family had a dairy farm.

Booth entered the full-time ministry in April 1928. He preached in his home territory and in the rural South, trading Bible literature for food and lodging. He had to brave such hazards as gun-brandishing owners of illegal alcohol stills, one of whom shot and wounded John Booth’s partner. In 1935, Booth was appointed a traveling overseer and began visiting congregations and smaller groups around the country. He organized assemblies and helped the local witnesses to persevere despite opposition.

In 1941, Joseph F. Rutherford, then president of the Watch Tower Society, assigned Booth to work at Kingdom Farm, near Ithaca, New York. He served there for 28 years. In 1970, Booth was asked to serve at Watchtower Farms in Wallkill, New York, and so found himself in the same area where he had begun his ministry some 45 years earlier.

In 1974, he was appointed a member of the Governing Body in Brooklyn, New York. He served in that capacity until his death at 93 years of age.

References

* "Watchtower" June 15 ,1996, p. 32, Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc.
* "Jehovah's Witnesses-Proclaimers of God's Kingdom", 1993, p. 112, 116, Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc.