Theodore Dwight Weld Popular Books

Theodore Dwight Weld Biography & Facts

Theodore Dwight Weld (November 23, 1803 – February 3, 1895) was one of the architects of the American abolitionist movement during its formative years from 1830 to 1844, playing a role as writer, editor, speaker, and organizer. He is best known for his co-authorship of the authoritative compendium American Slavery as It Is: Testimony of a Thousand Witnesses, published in 1839. Harriet Beecher Stowe partly based Uncle Tom’s Cabin on Weld's text; the latter is regarded as second only to the former in its influence on the antislavery movement. Weld remained dedicated to the abolitionist movement until slavery was ended by the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1865. According to Lyman Beecher, the father of Harriet Beecher Stowe, Weld was "as eloquent as an angel, and as powerful as thunder.": 323  His words were "logic on fire". In 1950, Weld was described as being "totally unknown to most Americans".: v  His obscurity was of his own choosing. Weld would never accept an office of authority or honor in any antislavery organization. He refused to speak at antislavery conventions or anniversaries, or even to attend them if he could avoid it. He shunned the cities, and chose to labor in the country districts, where newspapers were few, and his activities were seldom reported except by abolition journals. His writings were published anonymously, and he would seldom allow the content of his speeches or his letters from the field to appear in print at all.: vi  Early life Weld was born in Hampton, Connecticut, the son and grandson of Congregational ministers. He was descended from Thomas Welde, one of the original trustees of Harvard College.: 91  His mother owned slaves. At age 14 Weld took over his father's hundred-acre (forty-hectare) farm near Hartford, Connecticut, to earn money to study at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, attending from 1820 to 1822, when failing eyesight caused him to leave. After a doctor urged him to travel, he started an itinerant lecture series on mnemonics, traveling for three years throughout the United States, including the South, where he saw slavery first-hand. In 1825 Weld moved with his family to Fabius, in upstate New York.: 10  At the time of the Weld-Grimké marriage they were living in Manlius, New York. College education Weld then (1825) attended classes at Hamilton College in Clinton, Oneida County, New York,: 10 : 31  though he did not enroll as a student and does not appear in the College's published lists of students. About 1825 he stayed at the College in the suite of tutor William Kirkland, and not only attended classes but was "something of a leader among the students".: 31  The famous evangelist Charles Grandison Finney was based in Oneida County, and according to him, Weld "held a very prominent place among the students of Hamilton College, and had a very great influence." He described himself as "educated at Hamilton College." However, Hamilton turned down his proposal of a manual labor program.: 96  While a student Weld attended some of Finney's many revivals, for he became Finney's disciple.: 93  In Utica, intellectual capital of western New York, center of abolitionism, and county seat of Oneida County, he met and became a good friend of Charles Stuart, an early abolitionist, who at that time (1822–1829) was head of the Utica Academy. They spent several years as members of Finney's "holy band". In the winter of 1827, he and his brother Charles worked on a whaling vessel in Labrador.: 16  Later in 1827, abandoning Hamilton on Stuart's recommendation, he enrolled in the new Oneida Institute of Science and Industry in nearby Whitesboro, New York, the most abolitionist school in the country, his fees paid for him by Stuart,: 56  after first participating in a pilot program, staying at the farmhouse of founder George Washington Gale in Western, New York, working in exchange for instruction. While at the Oneida Institute, where he was in charge of the cow-milking operation,: 63  he would spend two weeks at a time traveling about, lecturing on the virtues of manual labor, temperance, and moral reform. "Weld...had both the stamina and charisma to hold listeners spellbound for three hours.": 29  As a result, by 1831 he had become a "well known citizen" of Oneida County, according to a letter of Joseph Swan published in the Utica Elucidator. Weld was described thus by James Fairchild, who knew him from when they were students together at Oberlin (of which Fairchild would later be President): Among these students was Theodore D. Weld, a young man of surpassing eloquence and logical powers, and of a personal influence even more fascinating than his eloquence. I state the impression which I had of him as a boy, and it may seem extravagant, but I have seen crowds of bearded men held spell-bound by his power for hours together, and for twenty evenings in succession.: 321  In an editorial comment in The Liberator, presumably by its editor Garrison, "Weld is destined to be one of the great men not of America merely, but of the world. His mind is full of strength, proportion, beauty, and majesty. ...[In his writing] there is indubitable evidence of intellectual grandeur and moral power." In his reminiscences of that period Dr. Beecher observed: Weld was a genius. ...In the estimation of the class, he was president. He took the lead of the whole institution. The young men had, many of them, been under his care, and they thought he was a god. We never quarreled, however.: 321  In a completely different forum, William Garrison said that in a convention of antislavery "agents", who travelled from town to town giving abolitionist lectures and setting up new local anti-slavery societies, "Weld was the central luminary around which they all revolved".: 23  His future wife Angelina Grimké said in 1836, when she first laid eyes on him and heard him speak for two hours on "What is slavery?", that "I never heard so grand & beautiful an exposition of the dignity & nobility of man in my life".: 83  Manual labor and education agent His reputation as a speaker had reached New York, and in 1831, at the age of 28, Weld was called there by the philanthropists Lewis and Arthur Tappan. He declined their offer of a ministerial position, saying he felt himself unprepared. Since he was "a living, breathing, and eloquently-speaking exhibit of the results of manual-labor-with-study,": 42  the brothers then created, so as to employ Weld, the Society for Promoting Manual Labor in Literary Institutions [non-religious schools], which promptly hired him as its "general agent" and sent him on a factfinding and speaking tour.: 25  (The Society never carried out any activities except hiring Weld, hosting some of his lectures, and publishing his report.) Weld carried out this commission during the calendar year 1832. His 100-page report on his activities, accompanied by 20 pages of letters received, is dated January 10, 183.... Discover the Theodore Dwight Weld popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Theodore Dwight Weld books.