Charles Taze Russell

Charles Taze Russell was born February 16, 1852, and became an Adventist minister in Pittsburgh. In July 1879 he launched Zion's Watch Tower and Herald of Christ's Presence, a monthly magazine, then co-founded and eventually led the Watch Tower Tract Society starting in 1881. Between 1886 and 1904 he published his six-volume Millennial Dawn series — later retitled Studies in the Scriptures — which sold nearly 20 million copies worldwide during his lifetime. After Russell died on October 31, 1916, his successor Joseph Rutherford's leadership triggered a crisis: by 1931, as many as three-quarter…