Description
Beecher Memorial: Contemporaneous Tributes to the Memory of Henry Ward Beecher, the “most famous preacher in the nation,” published shortly after his death in 1887. Includes a laid-in letter from First Lady Lucretia Garfield, thanking the editor for a copy of the book and allowing her to contribute an article.
Octavo, viii, 110pp. Brown cloth, title in gilt on front cover. Silk endpapers. Frontispiece portrait and an illustrated plate by William H. Beard. Rubbing to spine and along edges, solid text block. Letter to the editor written on Lucretia Garfield’s mourning stationery. Full text reads: “Mentor, O. / June 26th 1887 / Mr. Edward Bok / Dear Sir / Pray accept my thanks for a copy of the Beecher Memorial just received, and allow me to say that you have honored the contributors in making the book so worthy. As a tribute to the memory of Mr. Beecher, I trust it may be acceptable to his family. Very Truly Yours / Lucretia R. Garfield.”
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) was an American social reformer, abolitionist, and influential clergyman. His sister, Harriet Beecher Stowe, achieved worldwide acclaim for her abolitionist novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin. During Beecher’s lifetime, his sermons focused on God’s love, a notable departure from his Calvinist upbringing. He was a religious guide to multiple Republican presidents, including Abraham Lincoln, who said that no one in history had “so productive a mind.” A recent work on his life by Debby Applegate, titled “The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher,” won the Pulitzer Prize for Biography in 2007.
