History of East Northfield, (Franklin County) Massachusetts United States of America

Our database does not include an historic photo for East Northfield, (Franklin County) Massachusetts, do you have one you would like to contribute? Contact Us!

Dwight Lyman Ryther Moody, evangelist, was born in Northfield, Mass., Oct. 5, 1837; son of Edwin and Betsey (Holton) Moody. The Moodys came to America in 1627, and the Holtons in 1630. On the death of his father in 1840 his mother was left with the care of her nine children, and, Dwight worked at a neighbor's farm for his board, and attended school. He was later employed in a printing office at Clinton, Mass., and again as a farm hand at Northfield. In 1851 he went to Boston and was employed by his uncle, Samuel Holton, in his shoeshop and later as traveling salesman, 1851-54. He was connected with Wiswall's boot and shoe house in Chicago, 1854-60, earning over $5000 the first year and retiring with a capital of $7000. Meantime, he joined the Plymouth church, where he hired a pew in the church agreeing to fill it with young men every Sunday. He visited on the men at their rooms, stopped them on the street and even called them out of saloons, and in a short time he rented six pews for the accommodation of his guests. He taught a class in a Sunday-school mission in North Wells street; gathered in his pupils from the street, and soon the school had a larger attendance than could he accommodated. In 1858 he opened a Sunday school on North Market Hill, where, with the assistance of John V. Farwell, then the largest dry-goods merchant in Chicago, and Isaac H. Binch, president of a Chicago bank, he began the work that eventually developed into the Chicago branch of the Young Men's Christian Association, in which he was an officer, and the Chicago Avenue church with an attendance of fifteen hundred, of which he became the unordained pastor. In retiring from business in 1860, he devoted himself and his capital to religious work. He was a member of the Christian commission during the civil war. The Chicago Avenue church, the Y.M.C.A. buildings, and Mr. Moody's house were destroyed by the fire of 1871, and he at once succeeded in raising money to rebuild them. With Ira D. Sankey he visited Europe in 1873 and instituted a series of daily religious services in London and the larger cities of England. They returned to America in 1875 and organized similar meetings all over the United States. In 1883 they again engaged in evangelistic work in Great Britain. On one of his visits to England Mr. Moody preached to an audience of seventeen thousand people. He was the founder, in 1879, of the Northfield seminary for girls, and in 1881 he organized the Mt. Hermon school for boys. In 1897, on his sixtieth birthday, his friends presented him with $30,000, with which he erected a chapel for the Mr. Hermon school. He was married, in July, 1862, to Emma, daughter of F. H. Revell, of Chicago, Ill. His son William Revell Moody, editor of the Record of Christian Work, succeeded him as head of the Northfield schools, and wrote a life of his father, published in 1900, by F. H. Revell Co., N.Y. Mr. Moody's published works include: Best Thoughts and Discourses (1876); Glad Tidings (1876); The Second Coming of Christ (1877); The Way and the Word (1877); Great Joy (1877); Arrows and Anecdotes (1877); Secret Power (1881); The Way to God and How to Find It (1884); Heaven; Weighed and Wanting; Men of the Bible; The Overcoming Life; Thoughts for the Quiet Hour; Pleasure and Profit of Bible Study; Sowing and Reaping; Sovereign Grace; Prevailing Prayer; and collections of stories, anecdotes, and sermons. He died at East Northfield, Mass., Dec. 22, 1899.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

History of East Northfield, (Franklin County) Massachusetts

Biographies: