The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1925-03-09
The Myth Of
Mary Hubert Peck
And
Woodrow Wilson
An Interesting Chapter
from the Story of Will
sons Life, as Told
by Williem Allen
White.

: States, had in his veins no
blood of our Revolutionary
stock. His grandparents left
Ireland and Scotland nearly
J half a century after the
Americans had declared their
independence.
His fathers father, James
Wilson, an Irish emigrant from
Londonderry, Ireland, married
q Presbyterian Irish girl, a
shipmate, the day after their
American landing, and their
child, Joseph Ruggles Wilson,
the father of the President,
born in 1922, grew up to be
a Presbyterian college profess
sOr and preacher, who married
Janet Woodrow, a Scotch girl.
Lineage Of. Teachers.
Janet Woodrow, mother Of
President Wilson, was the daugh-
ter and granddaughter. on both
sides of her family, of Presby-
terrain college professors and
preachers. It matters little that
the Wilson blood was new to the
American wilderness Of q century
ago; spiritually Woodrow Wilson
was the inheritor of the race that
opened the Bible and demanded
freedom for the conscience of
man.
Joseph Ruggles Wilson, father
Of the President, was tall and
handsome. He showed his Irish
blood by a certain dashing cut Of
his jib.
He was graduated from Jeffer-
son College in 1874, next went to
the Western Theological Seminary
at Allegheny, and then on to
Princeton. He came home Il
eensed to preachs but not ordained,
and waiting for pulpit. taught
two years in the Male Academy"
Of Stenbknville, which also sup
ported a aFenaIe Acadehay.
To this academy came Janet
Woodrow, q pretty Scotch gil4
with curls and a sweet engaging
smile. who first saw through a
paling fence the meticulous young
theologue, home from college. rak-
ing the parental yard in gloves.
The gloves caught her eye.
Whereat she smiled over the pal
ing fence.
Three years later, after hes'
graduation, Joseph r. Wilson,
Presbyterian minister of Chilli
cothe, Ohio, and Janet Woodrow,
were married.
Thus, President Wilson's father
was a Presbyterian preacher, his
maternal grandfather and rwo of
his great-grandfathers were Pres
byterian preachers, and in his
youth Woodrow Wilson himself
married a Presbyterian minister's
daughter.
If ever a man was called and
elected, foreordained and pre-
destined to Presbyterianism, that
man was Woodrow Wilson.
Woodrow Enters.
The wilson's went to Staunton,
Virginia, in 1855. where the hus-
hand had is first pastors;e.
Preaching, not teaching. was his
forte. He adorned the pulpit well
IA tall young man with a flash
ing eye, with deep, resonant
bass voice. and with a fine shocky
head of hair.
He entered StauntOn as a prince
into his realm. There he was IN
aris,oc-at by the divine right of his
cloth and the royIl grant of his
Irish blood.
II was three days after Christ
mas-December, IS56-that Jau2t
Woodrow Wilson tied UP her pretty
curIs and went down into the shadow
and brought lack = son whom they
name4 Thomas Woodrow Wilson
for h-r father.
Much more than the Woodrow
mann. went INTO that child. In his
hear, where his will lay, he was
a Woodrow all his life.
The Woodrows, children and
grandchildren of Scotch Pres5v
terrain scholars AMI ministers. wed
in the world Of the spirit. From
them came the things of the
mind" which so greatly interes. p
our twenty-eighth President.
In 1858, when the baby, Thomas
Woodrow was two years old, the
Wilson family moved to Augusta
Ga. where the Reverend JOS apil
Ruggies Wilson had a call TO preach
IN the First Presbyterian Church.
Tommy" was a fTa1 child, anC
was not sent TO school or ever
taught his letters at home unit
ne WIS nine. Moe than that, ht
was tut into spectacles, which linn
tied his gang life. VIII oh teaches
boys so many vital things tha
men must know.
Much Reading Aloud.
Doctor Wilson spent his LIES