<\/p>\n
From the beginning this program has been called “Little Talks on Common\u00a0Things”. Surely no subject is rrore common than that of given or Christian\u00a0names. Every one of us has such a name. As readers of the Bi b Ie very we II\u00a0know, given names are much older than fami Iy names. Fami Iy names were added\u00a0when communities grew large enough to have too many Johns or Toms or Harrys.\u00a0Even in Bible times, distinctions became necessary.\u00a0Christian times going around with the name Judas.\u00a0ca lied one such poor fe I low trJ udas not I scari ot”.<\/p>\n
Imagine a man of early\u00a0A New Testament writer\u00a0Now Christian names go by waves of fashion. So I was much interested in\u00a0a survey made recent Iy in Eng I and by the Manchester Guardi an to di scover the\u00a0most common Christian names given to babies born in Manchester during 1955. The\u00a0paper found that for boys Stephen came first, leadi ng John by a sma II margi n.<\/p>\n
David was fourth, but Anthony, the name of Britain’s prime minister, s~d\u00a0twelfth.<\/p>\n
For the girls, Susan led second place Ann by nearly double. In third place\u00a0was Chri sti ne. Fourth was a name Ii tt Ie used in Ameri ca — Gi I I i an or Jill.<\/p>\n
Carol stood fifth, whi Ie our common American Jean was not even in the first\u00a0twenty.<\/p>\n
It would be interesting to learn what given names have led the list of\u00a0Watervi lie babies during the past five years.<\/p>\n
The patron saint of Colby College is Elijah Parish Lovejoy of the class of\u00a01826, an Albion born man who was ki I led by a mob in Alton, Illinois in 1837\u00a0because he persisted in printing articles against slavery in his Alton news-\u00a0paper. As many of you know, Colby mennrializes that event each November by the\u00a0now nationally known Lovejoy Convocation, when the col lege honors some newspaper\u00a0editor or publisher for fearless defense of freedom of the press. On the hundredth\u00a0anniversary of Lovejoy’s martyrdom in 1937, the speaker at the memorial\u00a0convocat ion here in Watervi lie was former pres i dent Herbert Hoover. I n I II i noi s\u00a0a similar annual convocation honors the editors of weekly newspapers who uphold\u00a0freedom of the press.<\/p>\n
Through the years Colby Col lege has accumulated a fine collection of material\u00a0about Lovejoy, but unti I recently nothing has been known about a matter\u00a0that has long puzzled investigators. What became of Elijah Lovejoy’s wife and\u00a0child? At last, thanks to Frank Dugan, a history teacher in the high school\u00a0at Edinburg, Texas, we know the answer.<\/p>\n
Long interested in Lovejoy, and now worki ng ,on a biography of the martyr, Mr. Dugan went through the Colby collection during an extended visit to Maine\u00a0in the summer of 1954. After his return to Texas he sent me a copy of a letter\u00a0written on March 4, 1890, but which only recently had come to light. Another\u00a0copy of that precious letter is nOli <\/em>in the Colby archives.<\/p>\n That letter was wri tte,n at Wabuska, Nevada, and was addressed to Rev. H. L.\u00a0Hammond, who had married Mrs. Lovejoy’s sister Elizabeth. The writer was Edward\u00a0P. Lovejoy~ who had been just 20 months old when his father was ki I led by AIton’s\u00a0angry mob. We had long known that Lovejoy’s death left his wife with a\u00a0small chi Id, but we did not know whether that chi Id lived to manhood. Nor did\u00a0we have any clue as to where Mrs. Lovejoy went after that tragi c experi ence in\u00a0Alton.This letter explains why we have known so little. In it, Edward Lovejoy\u00a0said to his uncle Henry Hammond: f!Aside from the companionship of my sainted\u00a0mother, I have never had the slightest personal acquaintance with any blood relative\u00a0since my childhood. My lot has been cast entirely annng strangers.”<\/p>\n Edward goes on to pay tribute to that mother who was left alone with a baby\u00a0boy inA I ton. “S i ng Ie handed she batt led with pove rty to rear and educate her\u00a0boy, and whatever of good rema ins in him he owes to her teach i ng and exalT1lle.”<\/p>\n Then, to our amazement, we leam that neither the Lovejoy fami Iy nor Mrs.\u00a0Lovejoy’s own relatives gave her any help in her time of trouble. Is it possible\u00a0that the Lovejoys thought the widow would return to her own people at st.\u00a0Charles, Missouri? We know that in later years Elijah’s Congressman brother,\u00a0Owen, who was a close fr i end of Abraham Li nco In, remembered we II the death of\u00a0his brother in Alton and, in his book dealing with the event, he shows clearly\u00a0his knowledge and appreciation of the widow’s plight. It is probable that the\u00a0relatives back in Albion had never seen Elijah’s wife. It is even possible that\u00a0they wanted to help her, but could find no trace of her, so quickly did she\u00a0I eave Alton.<\/p>\n At any rate, here is what Eli jah Lovejoy’s son wrote his Unc Ie Henry 53\u00a0years afterward in 1890. “My father’s kindred and her own ought and might have\u00a0stretched forth a helping, affectionate hand and greatly alleviated Mother’s\u00a0lot, but instead they left her to struggle alone against poverty. You ask what\u00a0I remember about my ch i I dhood. I can remember bei ng in Ci nci nnat i when I was\u00a0three or four years old. Just after I was four, we went to Oberlin. think we\u00a0went to Canada the next year and lived there for two years. In the spring of\u00a01843 we went to New York State and lived consecuti ve Iy at Fow lervi lie, Rochester\u00a0and Buffalo. In the spring of 1845 we went from Buffalo by way of the lakes\u00a0to Chicago, then on to Chesterfield, Illinois. The spring of 1846 found us in\u00a0Iowa. In the fall we returned to the vicinity of my father’s death and stayed\u00a0that winter at Middle Alton. Next year we were at Hunterstown, then to MissionInstitute, seven mi les from Quincy. In the fall of 1849 we were at Upper Alton\u00a0so that I could attend Shurtleff College.”<\/p>\n Here let us break into Edward Lovejoy’s letter for a comment. Early in\u00a0this letter the writer had told his uncle that he had been born on March 12,\u00a01836. That would make him 13t years old in the fal I of 1849. Pretty young to\u00a0be going to college. Probably the explanation is that in those days Shurtleff\u00a0Col lege was a kind of academy with a year or two of collegiate work, and that\u00a0goi ng to Shurt leff in 1849 was a good dea I like a Watervi lie boy’s goi ng to\u00a0Coburn in the same year.<\/p>\n Ed Lovejoy says that in 1851, because of an ep i demi c of cholera in I II inoi\u00a0s, he and his mother, as he puts it, up i cked up and ran off to Keosauqua,\u00a0Iowa”. How Mrs. Lovejoy had earned a I i vi ng for herse I f and her son in the\u00a0fourteen years between 1837 and 1851 we have no inkling, but the son, in this\u00a0lette r, makes it pia in how she di d it after 1851. He says: “Mother kept a\u00a0boardi ng house in Iowa unti I the fa II of 1853, when we went four mi les into\u00a0the country to a farmhouse where Mother did the housework and we kept a sort of\u00a0wayside inn. All this time Mother insisted on doing everything. She would not\u00a0even I et me mi I k the COlIS.”<\/p>\n The reader of the Lovejoy letter learns that in 1855, when Edward was 19,\u00a0he di d take matters in hand. He rented a farm. He says, “We had hard Iy any\u00a0money, but I found some good friends who helped me buy a team and tools on credit. We sti II kept up a ki nd of tavern, entertai ni ng whatever trave lers stopped\u00a0to inqui re about meals or lodgings.”<\/p>\n Then in 1857 Edward Lovejoy made the big break. Just as boys from many\u00a0Maine towns had been doing since 1849, including boys from his father’s birthplace\u00a0of Albion, this Illinois-born Lovejoy, who had never been east of upstate\u00a0New York, decided to cast his lot in far away California. He said to his uncle\u00a0in th is letter we are ta Iki ng about: “I never had the s lightest idea of comi ng\u00a0to the coast unti I two days before I started. It was one of the most foolhardy\u00a0undertakings anyone ever engaged in. I had one Iowa neighbor well along in\u00a0years who took a liking to me and was like a father to me. He had one daughter,\u00a0the apple of his eye, who grievously disappointed him by running off with a\u00a0gambling, drinking man against her father’s wishes and commands. Her husband\u00a0took the girl to California, where he soon began to beat and abuse her in his\u00a0spe II s of drunkenness. She wrote to her father, aski ng his forgi veness and\u00a0begging him to aid her to escape from her husband. The business was complicated\u00a0by her having a little boy whom she had named for me. The old gentleman came\u00a0to me with tears in his eyes and begged me to go to California and bring back\u00a0his daughter and grandchild. Being young and reckless, and genuinely sorry\u00a0for the old man, I agreed to go. Behold me going into the mountains of California\u00a033 years ago, among a lawless people, and for what? — to steal away from\u00a0a man his wife and chi Id. Arriving in California on January 5, 1857, two\u00a0months before reaching a man’s estate of 21, I proceeded cautiously to execute\u00a0my mission. Probably it was lucky for me that the husband had just a few weeks\u00a0earl ier been ki lied in a drunken braw I, and the wi fe and ch i Id were al ready on\u00a0a STeamer bound for her father’s Iowa hone by way of the Isthmus of Panama to\u00a0New Orleans and then by river boat up the Mississippi. So I escaped The danger\u00a0of being shot by an angry, drunken husband, and I never again saw the gi rl.”<\/p>\n Like many another lad who went to California on a temporary mission, thinking\u00a0soon to return east, Edward Lovejoy decided to remain in the Golden State.\u00a0He wrote to his mother back in Iowa, urging her to sell everything and join him\u00a0on The coast. She consented, and in the fa II of 1859 was the fi rst woman to\u00a0ride on the new Overland Stage to California.<\/p>\n At first Edward tried his hand at mining, as nearly everyone else in California\u00a0was doing. He had no success, but soon found another vocation that\u00a0of character witness in trials. Let’s have the story in Ed Lovejoy’s own words:<\/p>\n “In 1863 I was mining near a little town when a poor fellow was arrested for\u00a0assault with intent to commit murder. The whole community was aroused against\u00a0him, when he came to the claim where was working and begged me to go with him\u00a0before the court and say a good word for him. I went and was able to establish\u00a0that the p rosecuti on was na 1 i ci ous and wi thout foundati on. The jury acquitted\u00a0the man, who spread word around that he was my client, although I had no right\u00a0to practice law. After that, in every case in local court there would be a race\u00a0to see wh i ch party wou I d get to me fi rst. ”<\/p>\n That is the interesting explanation that Edward Lovejoy gives of how he\u00a0decided to become a lawyer. In the fall of 1864, just as the Civi I War was\u00a0nearing its end, he went to the county seat, where he got his living by odd\u00a0jobs whi Ie he studied law. The next spring he was admitted to the bar and was\u00a0made a jusTice of the peace. In 1867 he was elected district attorney, and in\u00a01871 a county judge.<\/p>\n Meanwh i Ie Edward had shown hi mse I f to be a ch i P off the 0 I d b lock. Hi s\u00a0father’s addiction to journalism was in his blood. So in 1868 he bought the\u00a0on I y newspaper in the county and conducted it for seven years.\u00a0In thi s old letter we learn when the widow of Elijah Parish Lovejoy died.\u00a0It was at The hone of her son in California, the home to which he had taken a\u00a0bride just a year earlier. As Edward told it to his Uncle Henry, “On July 10,\u00a01870 my dear Mother di ed in my arms.”<\/p>\n What memories this long suffering woman must have had! The years could\u00a0never erase the horror of that awful night in Alton 33 years before, when the\u00a0how ling mob attacked the warehouse whi ch she Itered her husband’s press and sent\u00a0a bullet inTo his heart. The long struggling years as a boarding house and\u00a0roadside tavern keeper, Ii fe on the Iowa farm, seeing her on Iy chi Id depart\u00a0for far-away California, at last their reunion in the California home, and now\u00a0in her son’s arms going finally to join the husband who a third of a century\u00a0ear lie r had p receded he r into the Great UnknOlln, and who had died so young because,\u00a0in the words inscribed on the bronze tablet memorializing him in Colby’s\u00a0Lorimer Chape I on Mayflower Hi II: “I have sworn eternal hatred to human s lavery,\u00a0and by the blessing of God” I wi II never go back.”<\/p>\n Two weeks from tonight I wi lite II you what happened to Edward Lovejoy\u00a0after his mother’s death. For tonight it is enough to know that when Elijah\u00a0Parish Lovejoy met the assassin’s bullet that November night in Alton, he left\u00a0a baby son who was to grow up an honor to the di sti ngui shed father who had\u00a0come from an Albion farm to Colby College and had received his degree from its\u00a0first president, Jeremiah Chap I in, in 1826. It is thri Iling for us who have\u00a0long been interested in Lovejoy to know that the Alton baby not only cared to\u00a0the end for his widowed mother, but hi mse I f became a lawyer, pub Ii c prosecutor\u00a0and judge in the Golden West.<\/p>\n And with that bit of satisfaction we say good-night for old times’ sake.<\/p>\n Year: 1956<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Read the script for “Little Talks” program #297, broadcast on March 18, 1956<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":405,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[790,35296],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7616"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/405"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7616"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7616\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}