Ohio History Journal

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BOOK REVIEWS

BOOK REVIEWS

 

The Broken Circle. By Carl G. Doney. (New York, Fleming H.

Revell Company, 1943. 187p.)

Written as a memorial volume to a beloved son who, when

living, had exerted a wide and beneficent influence on many people,

The Broken Circle tells the story of Paul H. Doney, minister and

teacher, who died at the early age of forty-one.

Its writing was a labor of love, done by a sorrowing father

who wished to present the faith which animated his son's life

and the philosophy which underlay his teaching as well as the

"rich and joyous, unpretentious life from day to day." As such,

its stress is more on what Paul Doney was than on what he did,

and can be read by persons to whom its subject was unknown

as the life record of a man who was loved and is remembered

for his deep and radiant personality.

This unique quality of personal charm had its roots in his

family: in the closely knit circle of mother, father and brother

into which he was born. It is an endearing though not unusual

story (and therein lies perhaps its value and attraction that it

recounts activities and experiences like or similar to those one has

known in person or at close second hand). Boyhood, school days,

courtship and marriage, fatherhood, professional duties, first in

the ministry, later as a teacher, travel and other recreations,

friends and family life: these are the materials from which the

author-father fashioned his testimony to his son, of whom he

wrote, "I never knew a better, nobler man."

To become acquainted, even in a book, with such a person

(and with such a family) is a privilege.

The foreword is by Fred Pierce Corson, president of Dickin-

son College, where Paul Doney did his teaching.

Columbus, Ohio                       LOTS R. McKILEY

186