G. Ashton Oldham

George Ashton Oldham (August 15, 1877 – April 7, 1963 ) was the third bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Albany in the United States from 1929 to 1950, during the turbulent times of the Great Depression and World War II. He was also notable as the primary author of the catechism used in the American Episcopal Church for decades until 1979. Now largely forgotten, He served as a chaplain at Columbia University while in seminary in 1906.

Marriage Oldham was married to Emily Pierrepont Gould (March 24, 1884 – October 31, 1969), from a very old and wealthy family. She was noted in the Social Register of New York of 1914, among other years. She was the daughter of Mary Pierrepont Perry and James Henry Gould (1844-1896), and a direct descendant of James Pierpont, the founder of Yale University. Their society wedding was announced in the New York Tribune, which was set for January 14, 1915, to be celebrated by Bishop Greer at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Emily Pierrepont Gould was a distant cousin of Aaron Burr through James Pierpont.

At the time of his marriage, Oldham was rector of St. Luke's Episcopal Church at Convent Avenue and West 141st Street in Manhattan,

Work as bishop Oldham was elected Bishop Coadjutor of Albany in 1922, to prepare for replacing Richard Henry Nelson.

In 1924, Oldham made a major sermon, entitled "America First", at the Washington National Cathedral. His message was a more compassionate one, a call to transform ourselves into a nation that is first in "things of spirit", rather than "treading again the old, worn, bloody pathway which ends inevitably in chaos and disaster".|David Walsh, Independence Day Blog. He was a keynote speaker at the 1931 dedication of the War Memorial in Ithaca, New York, place of his alma mater, Cornell. He also wrote a book entitled The Fighting Church.

He was very active in Episcopal Church activities, from at least 1932. In 1937, he was a serious candidate for election as presiding bishop. By the end of the war in 1945, he was acknowledged as a church leader. In 1947, Bishop and Mrs. Oldham attended a conference in Sydney, Australia, and on their way home from New Zealand, the seaplane pilot, in order "to avoid disaster was [forced] to jettison cargo and passengers' luggage to lighten the load." Lost in "the Oldham luggage [was] ... the cope the bishop had worn at his consecration". The deanery of the Cathedral of All Saints is named Oldham House in his honor.

He retired as bishop in 1950 and died in 1963.