William David Walker was consecrated as the first missionary bishop of the Episcopal Church's Missionary District of North Dakota on December 20, 1883. He became the third bishop of Western New York in 1897 and held this position until his death in 1917.

Charles Henry Brent was the Episcopal Church's first Missionary Bishop of the Philippine Islands (1902–1918); Chaplain General of the American Expeditionary Forces in World War I (1917–1918); and Bishop of the Episcopal Church's Diocese of Western New York (1918–1929). The historian and Episcopal minister Frederick Ward Kates characterised him as a "gallant, daring, and consecrated soldier and servant of Christ" who was "one of modern Christendom's foremost leaders, prophets, and seers."