Item 11: Bookplate, H[enry].W[ard]. Beecher, no date
Item — Box: 20, Folder: 11
Dates
- Created: no date
Creator
- Beecher, Henry Ward, 1813-1887 (Person)
Disclaimer for Name and Subject Authorities
Some of the name and subject authority tags have been assigned by educated guessing and estimation of persons and subjects by region, age, profession, and familial relationships. They have been thoroughly researched by using primary and secondary sources available digitally, and named in each description, or in some cases linked directly to the person tag.
Access:
All series and subseries within this collection are open for research, with the exception of a few files within the Academia series that are restricted. The Academia series contains financial and sensitive institutional records from Wilkes College, and financial report records from Princeton University that will remain restricted for 80 years upon creation.
Extent
1 items
Language of Materials
From the Collection: English
Type of Material:
Bookplate
Condition Note:
Good, no issues.
Measurements:
3 ½ in. x 2 in.
Title:
H.W. Beecher
Description:
A bookplate with the signature of H.W. Beecher on it which stands for Henry Ward Beecher. Henry Ward Beecher was born on June 24, 1813 in Litchfield, Connecticut. His mother was Roxana Beecher who passed away when he was only three years old. His father was Lyman Beecher, a popular evangelist at the time who was coined “the father of more brains than any man in America.” He was engaged to Eunice Bullard on January 2, 1832 and they got married on August 3, 1837. He had twelve siblings, with some well-known names being author Harriet Beecher Stowe, teachers Katherine Beecher and Thomas K. Beecher, and activists Charles Beecher and Isabella Beecher Hooker. He’s most known for advocating for the end of slavery, joining the suffrage movement, going on trial for adultery, and promoting Christianity. He was also an educator for a short period in Whitinsville, Massachusetts. As a child, Beecher had a stammer as a kid, and fell behind his siblings. He was belittled and unfairly punished for learning at a different pace, being sent to a corner and forced to wear a “dunce” hat. In his home, he and his siblings had really strict rules to follow, being required to make religion their livelihoods. Things such as theater, dancing, the majority of fictional stories, Christmas, and birthdays were outlawed in their home. When Beecher was fourteen, he went to Mount Pleasant Classical Institute in Amherst, Massachusetts. While he was there, he met his best friend Constatine Fondoliak Newell, a Smyrma Greek. They went on to go to Amherst College together, where they signed a contract promising to be friends for life. Newell passed away after a battle with cholera after he went back to Greece and Beecher named his third child after Newell. While he was at Amherst, he got into public speaking and gave his first speech in 1831 at a school in a village formerly known as Log Town. During his sophomore year of college, he decided to become a minister and abandoned his aspirations of becoming a sailor. He started to become interested in phrenology, a pseudoscience that seems to associate a person’s personality with the way their skull is shaped. He became friends with Orson Squire Fowler who made phrenology popular. He graduated from Amherst in 1834, and started going to Lane Theological Society near Cincinnati, Ohio not long after. He graduated in 1837. After he got married, he and his wife, Eunice Bullard, moved to Lawrenceburg, Indiana. Not long after they relocated, Beecher was offered a job as a minister for the town’s church. He was noticed nationwide after he became a part of the rift between “new school” and “old school” Presbyterianism, being divided on the topics of “original sin” and slavery. His dad Lyman Beecher was heavily involved with “new school” Presbyterianism. Because Henry was so involved with “new school” the majority “old school” Presbyterians didn’t want to make him a pastor which caused the rift between Presbyterian sects. His church did end up breaking from the synod so he could stay as their pastor, but he had to look for a new job after the extreme poverty that hit after the Panic of 1837. After he went to Indianapolis in 1839 he was offered a job as a minister at the Second Presbyterian Church. As a pastor, he broke from norms, telling jokes and using slang. He was very popular as a preacher, and constructed another church in Indianapolis, becoming the biggest in the city. He held a popular “revival meeting” in Terre Haute, but increasing debt caused him to look for a new job once again in 1847. He was invited to New York by Henry Bowen to become the leader of the Plymouth Congregational Church in Brooklyn. His nationwide popularity expanded and went down the lecture path, becoming one of the most well-known speakers in the nation and made a lot of money from it. Because he preached for a different sect, he disregarded his dad’s beliefs, which entailed people’s deaths being God’s plan, relaxation distracting from Christian life, and people exclusively devoting themselves to getting rid of sin. Beecher instead focused on preaching God’s love, and questioning if Hell was real. Beecher died on March 8, 1887.
Location:
82 Columbia Street, Brooklyn, NY.
Creator
- Beecher, Henry Ward, 1813-1887 (Person)
Repository Details
Part of the Wilkes University Archives Repository
Contact:
84 W South St.
Wilkes-Barre PA 18701 US
570-408-2000
570-408-7823 (Fax)
ask.archives@wilkes.edu
84 W South St.
Wilkes-Barre PA 18701 US
570-408-2000
570-408-7823 (Fax)
ask.archives@wilkes.edu