The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward

The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher

No one predicted success for Henry Ward Beecher at his birth in 1813. The blithe, boisterous son of the last great Puritan minister, he seemed destined to be overshadowed by his brilliant siblingsâ€”especially his sister, Harriet Beecher Stowe, who penned the centuryâ€™s bestselling book Uncle Tomâ€™s Cabin. But when pushed into the ministry, the charismatic Beecher found international fame by shedding his fatherâ€™s Old Testamentâ€“style fire-and-brimstone theology and instead preaching a New Testamentâ€“based gospel of unconditional love and healing, becoming one of the founding fathers of modern American Christianity. By the 1850s, his spectacular sermons at Plymouth Church in Brooklyn Heights had made him New Yorkâ€™s number one tourist attraction, so wildly popular that the ferries from Manhattan to Brooklyn were dubbed â€œBeecher Boats.â€
Beecher inserted himself into nearly every important drama of the eraâ€”among them the antislavery and womenâ€™s suffrage movements, the rise of the entertainment industry and tabloid press, and controversies ranging from Darwinian evolution to presidential politics. He was notorious for his irreverent humor and melodramatic gestures, such as auctioning slaves to freedom in his pulpit and shipping riflesâ€”nicknamed â€œBeecherâ€™s Biblesâ€â€”to the antislavery resistance fighters in Kansas. Thinkers such as Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman, and Twain befriendedâ€”and sometimes parodiedâ€”him.
And then it all fell apart. In 1872 Beecher was accused by feminist firebrand Victoria Woodhull of adultery with one of his most pious parishioners. Suddenly the â€œGospel of Loveâ€ seemed to rationalize a life of lust. The cuckolded husband brought charges of â€œcriminal conversationâ€ in a salacious trial that became the most widely covered event of the century, garnering more newspaper headlines than the entire Civil War. Beecher survived, but his reputation and his causesâ€”from womenâ€™s rights to progressive evangelicalismâ€”suffered devastating setbacks that echo to this day.
Featuring the page-turning suspense of a novel and dramatic new historical evidence, Debby Applegate has written the definitive biography of this captivating, mercurial, and sometimes infuriating figure. In our own time, when religion and politics are again colliding and adultery in high places still commands headlines, Beecherâ€™s story sheds new light on the culture and conflicts of contemporary America.

Country	USA
Author	Debby Applegate
Binding	Paperback
Brand	Applegate, Debby
EAN	9780385513975
Edition	Reprint
ISBN	0385513976
Label	Image
Manufacturer	Image
MPN	9780385513975
NumberOfItems	1
NumberOfPages	560
PartNumber	9780385513975
PublicationDate	2007-04-17
Publisher	Image
ReleaseDate	2007-04-17
Studio	Image

The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher

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