1836–1918

Introduction

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Born: Feb­ru­ary 11, 1836, Potts­grove, Penn­syl­van­ia.

Died: Ju­ly 2, 1918, Co­lum­bus, Ohio.

Buried: Green Lawn Ce­me­te­ry, Co­lum­bus, Ohio.

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Biography

Gladden’s birth name is va­ri­ous­ly re­port­ed as So­lo­mon Wash­ing­ton Glad­den or George Wash­ing­ton Glad­den, but he lat­er dropped the first name. His fa­ther, a school teach­er, died when Wash­ing­ton was a young boy, and the fa­mi­ly moved to New York.

He mar­ried Eli­za­beth Shores in 1852, and en­tered the Owe­go Aca­de­my, Tio­ga Coun­ty, New York, in 1855, then Will­iams Col­lege in 1859.

After work­ing as a news­pa­per re­port­er, Glad­den be­came an or­dained min­is­ter in 1860, serv­ing pas­tor­ates in Brook­lyn, New York (1860); Mor­ris­an­ia, New York (1861–66); North Ad­ams, Mas­sa­chu­setts (1866–71); Spring­field, Mas­sa­chu­setts (1875–82); and Co­lum­bus, Ohio. In Col­um­bus, he was pas­tor of the First Con­gre­ga­tion­al Church for 32 years.

From 1871–75, he was on the edi­to­ri­al staff of the New York In­de­pend­ent, and lat­er, while pas­tor at Spring­field, he ed­it­ed the week­ly pe­ri­od­ic­al Sun­day Af­ter­noon.

In 1891, he was a de­le­gate to the in­ter­na­tion­al con­gress of Con­gre­ga­tion­al­ists in Lon­don. He was al­so mod­er­at­or of the Con­gre­ga­tion­al Church in Am­eri­ca, helped set­tle an an­thra­cite coal strike in 1902, and was known as a so­cial re­form­er.

Works

Sources

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