William Emerson (minister)

The Rev. William Emerson (May 6 1769 - May 12 1811) was one of Boston's leading citizens, a liberal-minded Unitarian minister, pastor to Boston's First Church and founder of its Philosophical Society, Anthology Club, and Boston Athenaeum, and father to Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Biography

Emerson was born in Concord, Massachusetts, the fifth born and only son of William and Phoebe (Bliss) Emerson. His father was a minister who built and inhabited The Old Manse at Concord, chaplain to the Provincial Congress when it met at Concord in October 1774, and when war had begun a chaplain to the Continental Army, dying of camp fever while on campaign in 1776 when Emerson was but 7 years old. Emerson married Ruth Haskins on October 25, 1796 in Boston, and with her had 8 children: Phebe Ripley Emerson, John Clark Emerson, William Emerson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Edward Bliss Emerson, Robert Bulkeley Emerson, Charles Chauncy Emerson, and Mary Caroline Emerson.

After being ordained, Emerson became first the minister in Harvard, Massachusetts at a yearly salary of less than $600, but then in 1799, minister of Boston's First Church for a bonus of a thousand dollars. After this initial bang, his sermons appear to have roused no great enthusiasm, as George Ticknor noted in the "Christian Examiner", September, 1849: "Mr. Emerson, transplanted to the First Church in Boston six years before Mr. Buckminster's settlement, possessed, on the contrary, a graceful and dignified style of speaking, which was by no means without its attraction, but he lacked the fervor that could rouse the masses, and the original resources that could command the few."

In 1804, Emerson founded the Anthology Club, a Boston literary society, and wrote articles for the club's "The Monthly Anthology". This publication was the forerunner of the "North American Review", America's leading literary journal, and the Club's reading room led to the founding in 1807 of the Boston Athenaeum.

He is buried in the First Church, in Boston.