A graduate of Princeton College in 1773, Thaddeus Dodd was a pioneer, preacher, and educator who founded and served as first pastor of the Upper and Lower Ten Mile Presbyterian Churches from 1779 to 1793. In 1782 he established the first classical school west of the Allegheny Mountains. He was also a trustee and the first principal of Washington Academy, chartered in 1787, a forerunner of Washington College and Washington and Jefferson College.