The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1891-07-03
BEECHER IN BRONZE.
Unwilling OF the Statue Of Henry
Ward Beecher I'm Brooklyn.
An Immense Concourse OF People wit
ness the Ceremonies-The Grafton
Delivered by Dr. Seth Low,
Ex-Mayor Of Brooklyn.

of great public interest. The speakers
platform was at the westerly end of the
city hall steps, directly opposite the
statue. Back of this, on the city hall
steps, was a platform filed with the
committee in charge of the matter,
mem bers of Mr.. Beecher's family. the
city and county officials, judges of the
courts and prominent public men. A
large space on the Court street
side of the city hall park
was reserved for subscribers to
the statue fund The members
of the Thirteenth regiment, of which
Mr.. Beecher was chaplain, and the vet
erans of the Sixty-Seventh New York
volunteers, in which Mr. Beecher's son,
Col Henry B. Beecher. went to the
war, were grouped in the park back of
the statue with band. and at the left
of the statue were 500 Sunday-school
children of Plymouth church, and its
missions, selected to sing. The greater
part of the city hall steps and the Full
ton street side of the square was open
to the public. : The city hall was elab-
orately decorated.
The exercises opened with prayer
by Rev. S. r. Halliday, long Mr..
Beecher's assistant in Plymouth church.
DIR. Charles III. Hall, chairman of the
Beecher memorial committee, intro
duced Mayor Chaplin as the presiding
officer. Before the speeches the statue
was unveiled by a grandchild of Mr..
Beecher, Gertrude Roxana Beecher,
five years old, daughter of William c.
Beecher. The sculptor, j. Q. A. Ward,
led her TO the statue and placed the
lines in her hand. While the unveiling
took place the Sunday-school children
sang "Beecher," led by the band.
Dr. Hall made the formal presenta-
ton of the statue TO the city, and it
was accepted by Mayor Chaplin, who
turned it over to the care of the park
department, represented by President
George v. Brewer. The band then
played the adagio from Beethoven's
fifth symphony, and DIR. Seth Low, ex-
mayor of Brooklyn, and president of
Columbia college, delivered the Grafton.
He said:
brooklyn has poured forth her multitudes
to- day to unTCil The familiar form and feat
urcs of Henry Ward Beecher. Every man
must have his home i'm some one place, but
the great men of the earth overleap all
boundaries and become the fellow citizens
of all men. such a man was Henry Ward
Beecher. From this city he swayed the
minds and hearts of men in vast multitudes
for forty years. From this center his words
traversed land and sea, carrying inspiration,
comfort, courage and something of the ex-
filtration which freedom brings wherever
they were borne on the four winds.
After an interesting review of Mr..
Bcecher's career, the orator continued:
Mr. Beecher was great orator, but he was
able TO be the great orator he was because,
first of all, he was a great man. He pro-
claimed truth as he saw IL with the coa-
vincing earnestness of "A great and unseldsh
nature. He had gift of utterance such as
is granted to few; he had a playful
humor and tender pathos that
enabled him to draw at will the
smile or the tear; he had an intellect
capable of high thinking and sustained ef-
fort, but not any nor all of these made him
the orator he was 1t was the brave, true
spirit of the man, using all of these faculties
I'm turn, that made him the greatest popular
orator of his day. No characteristic was
more prominent than his abounding and de-
lightful humor. He used his humor both as
n weapon of offense and q shelter from
the storm. Like Abraham Lincoln he
took refuge behind il in times
of anxiety and trouble. With it
he dealt some of his most effect
i've strokes in the heat of the conflict. Men
complained sometimes that he used it mop
poetically expressed in one of his own say
ings:
Every bell which God has hung in my bell
fry shall ring"
In later life he added to the active suscep-
tibilities of his nature the experience of a
bitter and searching trouble. In the midst
of his trouble no man ever heard him speak
unkindly of another. He came through IL,
developed and purified by suffering, into a
larger sympathy than ever with his fellow
men. When he died, not alone his own
church, but five other churches in thi
city were filled with those who gathered to
express their sense OF loss in his death and
TO do honor 20 his memory. The legislature
of the state adjourned for the first time In
its history in honor of private citizen. The
tribute was as unique as the man. It was
the spontaneous xpression of the popular
feeling, and the recognition on the part OF
the community and the state that great
and good man had gone from among them
What then shall this statue mean +! To
those who shall come after us, 10
whom the name of Henry Ward Beecher
viii be only historic name, let 1t
signify that the people enshrine in their
hearts those who are sincerely and truly
their friends; that courage I'm a good cause,
however il may provoke antagonism, Is cer-
tain at last to be commended of all men, Let
Il signify that man who would be infiuen
tial with his fellows must enter into the
living sympathy with them: that this does
only smooth things, but that it means Ssrv
ing the people, through good report and
through evil report, with every power that
one has. The sculptor has preserved for us
the form and figure OF Mr.. Beecher i'm i'm
perishable bronze. It remains for you and
me TO transmute into life those principles
which he demonstrated could make char
acter 30 noble
After this America" was sung, and
Rabbi Gustav Gottheil, of Temple
Emanuel. New York, pronounced the
benedictiOn.
The statue is of bronze, of heroic
size, and stands upon a Quincy granite
pedestal. suitably inscribed 1t repre-
sents Mr.. Beecher with his head bare
and his hat in his hand, wearing
a cape overcoat and an ordinary
suit Of clothing, and standing in
a firm. erect position. The pose was
chosen from a photograph which the
family regard as the best ever taken of
him. The face is somewhat idealized,
Int much Of the characteristic express
sion Of Mr.. Beecher has been preserved
There are three auxiliary figures placed
about the pedestal On the right is the
life-size figure of young woman, rep
resenting a victim of African slavery,
lavipr palm branch at the feet of the
man Who did so much TO secure
emancipation. On the other side are
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