As followers of 19th-century Disciples minister George Darsie tweets know, Bro. Darsie has been sharing entries from his 1884 diary since mid-August. For the new year, he is moving ahead almost a decade to 1893. He is still the faithful minister for the Christian Church in Frankfort, Kentucky, he is still married to Coranelle, and, in many ways, life continues much as before.
But 1893 was a momentous year in America, and, though people and communities were more isolated in those days, George Darsie was a man engaged with public affairs as well as spiritual ones. 1893 brought the worst economic depression the nation was to experience until the 1930s. In addition, Chicago opened the spectacular ‘White City’ — officially the World’s Columbian Exposition, celebrating (a year late) the 500th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s voyage to the New World.
Popularly known as the Chicago World’s Fair, the Exposition played host to the annual meeting of the American Historical Association at which historian Frederick Jackson Turner presented ‘The Significanace of the Frontier in American History,’ in which he boldly set his thesis both that the frontier had shaped the American character and that the frontier era was over. Turner’s ‘frontier thesis’ is still discussed and debated in graduate seminars across the country.
The World Parliament of Religions also held its first meeting at the Chicago World’s Fair. An 18-day event, the parliament drew scholars and clergy from all over the world and from all the world’s known religious traditions in an effort to increase understanding and tolerance. Said Dr. Alexander Kohut of New York: ‘The scions of many creeds are convened at Chicago’s succoring parliament of religions, aglow with enthusiasm, imbued with the courage of expiring fear, electrified with the absorbing anticipation of dawning light. The hour has struck.’
It should be interesting to discover the extent to which these events are reflected in George Darsie’s diary. We know that his diary for 1893 will reveal the life and routines of a preacher of his day, absorbed with matters great and small, always devoted to his ministry in late 19th-century Frankfort, Kentucky.
More 1893 Milestones:
Thomas Edison opened the first motion picture studio in West Orange, New Jersey.
The Duryea brothers drove the first gasoline-powered motorcar in America in Springfield, Massachusetts.
Rudolf Diesel received a patent for the diesel engine.
Mahatma Gandhi committed his first act of civil disobedience in India.
Sara Harwell 1/28/2010