John Rowan Claypool, IV, was a white man born in Franklin, Kentucky, reared in Nashville, Tennessee, and educated at Mars Hill College and Baylor University before moving to the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, where he completed the Bachelor of Divinity and Doctor of Theology degrees. He was associate pastor at First Baptist Church, Decatur, Georgia, then pastor of Crescent Hill Baptist Church, Louisville, Kentucky; Broadway Baptist Church, Fort Worth, Texas; and Northminster Baptist Church, Jackson Mississippi. He was Co-Pastor at Second Baptist Church, Lubbock, Texas, before being ordained as an Episcopal priest. After completing further studies at the Episcopal Theological Seminary of the Southwest in Austin, Texas, John served as Rector of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Birmingham, Alabama, until his retirement from full-time parish ministry in 2000. He then served as theologian-in-residence at Trinity Episcopal Church in New Orleans and associate priest at All Saints Episcopal Church in Atlanta. From 2001 to 2005, he was professor of preaching at the McAfee School of Theology at Mercer University in Atlanta. Claypool was married to Ann Wilkinson Scheyd, and the couple had one son, John Rowan Claypool, V. (From Claypool’s obituary)