Talk:William R. Rathvon

Long lost audio recollections of an actual eyewitness

I was suprised that Rathvon's audio recollections were not already noted in this article. But, actually, NPR only has "part of the story" on Rathvon. William R. Rathvon is the only known eyewitness of both Lincoln's arrival at Gettysburg and his address itself to have left an audio recording of his recollections.

I actually had heard of the audio recording before NPR and have cassette tape copy from a friend who used to sell them on the internet. On one side is a lecture on the subject of Christian Science and on the other side, almost incidentaly, is his recollections of Lincoln.

Who was William R. Rathvon? He was successful Colorado businessman and an accomplished public lecturer. He ended up, of all places, as treasurer, in 1918 of the Christian Science Church in Boston Massachussets in 1918 and a member of its Board of Directors. He and his wife, Ella S. Rathvon, had served on the staff of the founder of that religion, Mary Baker Eddy. By the 1930s that Church had radio broadcasts of its religious services and religious radio shows. As a public lecturer and one of the five top people in that church, Rathvon would have had execellent access to the top quality recording devices of his time. In fact, Mr. Rathvon's reminiscences were recorded on February 12, 1938 at the Boston studios of radio station WRUL. Hence the quality of the 78rpm record. The term "long lost," really doesn't apply, as the Rathvon audio recollections have been known by an extremely small circle of individuals ever since he made them in 1938. To Rathvon, they were actually incidental to what he felt were his more important church-work responsibilities. I suspect that he made them simply for historical posterity as he, himself never promoted them, or even promoted the idea that he had made them nor sold them per my source. This kind of ties into the fact that he died the following year, 1939. Since he was a church-authorized teacher of Christian Science, he had an association of students to whom he gave an annual address. As is the case of these teachers, their association usually survives them. Indeed, after Rathvon died in 1939, his association made and distributed copies of this recording for many years. I doubt very much that he even realized that they were unique a he, as an adult, saw men such as Lincoln's personal secretary, John Hay, a Secretary of State under McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt. IN order that all this information not be lost, I'll write an article on him ASAP. For more information on him, there are three sources, The Longyear Historical Society in Boston, Massachusetts, which was started by Mary Beecher Longyear, noted philanthropist, who helped finance the extension of the Braille system and the publication of the first Braille Bible. She founded her society in 1923 to preserve historical information on the founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy and her students and her church as well. That institution has archives opened to the public and an entire section devoted to such people as Rathvon and others who were instrumental in the early years of the Christian Science church. See http://www.longyear.org for more info. The second source would be the Mary Baker Eddy Library for the Betterment of Humanity in Boston MA. It has extensive archives, but unlike Longyear holds the "keys" the the actual archives of Mary Baker Eddy's church which is third source for materials on Rathvon. The majority of those archival materials are also shared with the Library except materials deemed to not be open to the public such as private church correspondence between Mary Baker Eddy and her Board of Directors, which she specifically excluded from publication. More than anyone wanted to know, but now you know. Bottom line, Rathvon was some totally unknown garden variety swindler who either imagined or concocted some tall tale about having seen ole honest Abe at Gettsburg. The whole story is fairly transparent but has been buried until NPR got a copy of the recording and aired it in the 1990s.

As a Christian Scientist and a amateur church historian, I had known about Rathvon for more than 30 years. But I didn't hear about this recording until the early 1990s. David Keyston, the founder of the web site http://www.christianscience.org first put the tape on line on his web site. If anyone would like a copy in MP3 format they can email me at SimonATL@yahoo.com as Keyston said I could share it with whomever I liked. I no longer see the recording at that site.

As I added to the article, Rathvon, was a nine year old boy when he saw Lincoln at Gettsburg became a gifted public lecturer and director of the Christian Science church. He made an excellent quality 78rpm disk recording in 1938 including his reading the address, itself. A copy wound up at National Public Radio during a their "Quest for Sound" project in the late 90s. Thet often air them around Linclon's birthday. To listen, click here [1]. Even after move than half a century, Rathvon's audio recollections remain a moving testimony to Lincoln's transcending effect on his fellow countrymen and the love which so many ardent unionists held for him. SimonATL 23:08, 11 April 2006 (UTC)