Occom, Samson

Related Category: Protestant Christianity: Biographies

(both: ŏk´əm), 1723–92, Native American clergyman, b. near Norwich, Conn. He became one of the first pupils of Eleazer Wheelock, and in 1749 he went to Long Island, N.Y., to serve the Montauk as pastor and schoolmaster. Occom was ordained in 1759, and later he went (1766) to England to help raise the funds used to establish Dartmouth College.