The Mulkey family sustained a multigenerational tradition of church service that began on the East Coast in the Episcopal Church and spread across the country, with later generations converting to Baptist and Christian faiths as the family moved west. Philip Mulkey, born in 1732, was raised Episcopalian, experienced a conversion under Separate Baptist preacher Shubal Stearns in 1756, was ordained the next year, and became a leader in establishing and expanding the Baptist faith in South Carolina, helping found a dozen or more churches. His son Jonathan Mulkey, born in 1752, is credited as Tennessee's first Baptist preacher; he served in the Virginia Militia with his father and brother Philip Jr. under Col. William Christian in an expedition against the Cherokees and then pastored at Buffalo Ridge in Tennessee for more than 40 years, continuing to preach from a specially made pulpit chair when age made standing difficult. John Mulkey, born in 1773, became a popular circuit preacher and active participant in several Kentucky Baptist associations, remembered for his graceful horsemanship, musical voice, easy flow of language, and natural eloquence. In the fourth generation, Philip Mulkey, born in 1802, left Kentucky for Missouri, preached there for several years, then led a wagon train to Oregon in 1853 and became one of the earliest settlers in Eugene, where he preached for 40 years; Dr. Isaac Mulkey, born in 1804, combined medicine and preaching, moved to Illinois, served as physician to the family of Adlai Stevenson, and founded the Disciples Church in Carbondale; John Newton Mulkey, born in 1806, became a popular evangelist in Kentucky, Tennessee, and southern Illinois, immersing 105 people in five days at a meeting in nearby Celina, Tennessee, in 1855, and later focused his work on the Warren County Cooperation and the Kentucky Christian Missionary Board; and James Mulkey, born in 1809, was listed in the 1850 Census as a minister of the Christian Church in Dade County, Missouri. In the fifth generation, Barton Warren Stone Mulkey, the son of John Newton Mulkey, was named for Barton Warren Stone, homesteaded near Norton, Kansas, and in failing eyesight relied on his daughter Lydia to accompany him into the pulpit and read the scriptures, while John F. Mulkey, the son of James Mulkey, went to Oregon in 1853, served in Company A of the Oregon Volunteers during the Yakima Indian wars, and was later identified in his pension report as a miner, farmer, preacher, and teacher.