Jan­u­a­ry 3, 1876, Na­po­le­on­ville, Lou­i­si­a­na.

March 28, 1931.

Fern­wood Cem­e­tery, Hen­der­son, Ken­tucky.

Son of Her­man and Em­ma Wink­ler Kock­ritz, Ewald was one of 10 childr­en. He grew up in Hen­der­son, Kentucky, and as a young man, worked for a grain com­pa­ny, and as a jour­nal­ist and tel­e­graph op­er­at­or. At age 16, he be­came pri­vate sec­re­ta­ry to Gov­er­nor John Young of Ken­tuc­ky, a post he held three years. He then at­tend­ed Eden The­o­lo­gi­cal Sem­in­a­ry (grad­u­at­ed 1901), and Lane The­o­lo­gi­cal Sem­in­a­ry, Cin­cin­na­ti, Ohio (grad­u­at­ed 1908).

Kockritz served pas­tor­ates in Clar­ington, Ohio (1901-05); St. Luke’s, Cin­cin­na­ti (1905-10); Sa­lem, New Or­leans (1910-17); and Beth­el, Ev­ans­ville (1917-31). He be­came a lead­er in the Lu­ther­an Evan­gel­i­cal Syn­od of North Amer­i­ca: He ed­it­ed sev­er­al of the de­nom­in­a­tion’s Sun­day school pub­li­ca­tions (1907-15), served on the Sun­day School Board, and on the Board of Re­li­gious Ed­ucation (1913-29, chair­man for eight years). He also served on the War Wel­fare Com­mis­sion in World War I, was his de­nom­in­a­tion’s mod­er­at­or in 1929, and was the syn­od’s gen­er­al sec­re­ta­ry the last years of his life.

• Haeussler, pp. 749-50

1. As Fades the Day­light Splen­dor
2. In Thy Ser­vice, Lord of Mer­cy
3. Lord, I Would Praise Thee