Ohio History Journal

FUNERAL OF ADAM WILLIS WAGNALLS

September 24, 1843, Adam Willis Wagnalls first

opened his eyes to the light in the village of Lithopolis,

Fairfield County, Ohio. On Wednesday evening, Sep-

tember 3, 1924, at the close of a life rich in good works

and meritorious achievements, Adam Willis Wagnalls

closed his eyes for the last time on earthly scenes at

"Doremi Manor," Northport, Long Island, New York,

the home of his daughter, Mrs. Mabel Wagnalls Jones.

Lithopolis, the little village in which he was born,

has grown little in the past eighty-one years. Mr. Wag-

nalls was called to the metropolis of the United States

where in business achievement, philanthropy and the

promotion of education and literary enterprises he grew

much in the same period.

He never forgot, however, the modest village and the

humble home of his childhood days. His desire that

his own obsequies might be conducted in the little church

of the village and that there he might find his final rest-

ing place was fully realized in the funeral services at-

tending his return to his native village. It was also

his desire to build here a memorial that might testify

to the good people of Lithopolis and their children

through the years to come his never-failing interest in

their welfare and his desire to afford to others op-

portunities for education and culture that he did not

have in his boyhood days. This memorial was approach-

ing completion at the time of his death. In this work

he has had the cordial sympathy and devoted aid of

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his daughter, Mrs. Mabel Wagnalls Jones, a cultured

woman who has made an enviable reputation for her-

self in literature and music.

In a future issue of the QUARTERLY we hope to

give a fuller description of the memorial to Mr. Wag-

nalls that is now approaching completion. It is to be

dedicated on Memorial Day, 1925. Edwin Markham,

the dean of American poets, is to deliver the dedicatory

address. The memorial may be briefly described here

as a building of pure Tudor-Gothic type, made of

native stone. It will contain a large library room, with

shelving space for about twenty thousand volumes, a

large auditorium, with a capacity for seating about five

hundred people. This auditorium will be equipped with

a large Welte Philharmonic reproducing pipe organ,

a Welte-Mignon reproducing piano, moving picture

machines and other equipment.

In the basement there will be a large social room,

equipped with tables, chairs, dishes, kitchen and ac-

cessories for the holding of community social meetings.

The tower will contain two trophy rooms for paintings,

valuable manuscripts and autograph letters from men

and women eminent in fields of activity. The famous

collection of O. Henry letters, reproduced in Letters

to Lithopolis, from O. Henry to Mabel Wagnalls, the

well known volume from the pen of Mrs. Mabel Wag-

nalls Jones, will be permanently preserved there. The

manuscript collection left by Mr. Wagnalls must be a

remarkable one and it will be a matter of interest, not

only to Ohioans but to literary men and women every-

where, to know that this collection is to be permanently

preserved in the memorial building at Lithopolis.

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This building and its contents will be dedicated to

the perpetual use of the people of Lithopolis and Bloom

Township, Fairfield County. It will be free from all

encumbrances. An ample endowment will be provided

for its perpetual maintenance. It imposes no financial

obligation upon the local community or the state. It

is in truth a free gift to Lithopolis and Bloom Township

for all time. It will of course be open for inspection and

reference purposes under proper regulations to a much

wider patronage.

Reserving a fuller description of the memorial for

the future, we here record the very impressive obsequies

of this distinguished Ohioan in his native village, Sep-

tember 6, 1924. The funeral was characteristic of the

man as he lived, without pomp and show, and was as

he would have wished it. The address was delivered

by Edwin Markham, dean of American poets, who

came from his home at West New Brighton, New York,

to pay tribute to his friend in the little church at Lithop-

olis. This eminent man of letters gave expression of

his appreciation of the departed and his message of

comfort to the living as follows:

ADDRESS OF EDWIN MARKHAM

MY DEAR FRIENDS: Adam Wagnalls honored me with his

friendship for twenty-five years.

We are gathered here today to pay honor to this great hus-

band, great father, great business man, great citizen -- a man that

we mourn, a man that America mourns. He was an honor to

American business and he was an honor to American manhood.

I am here that I may gratify the noble pleasure of praising.

What nobler and higher and finer emotion than to, be able to, praise

those we have known for years, those who have stood steadfast

in their places and who have been an honor to life.

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Adam Wagnalls was born in Lithopolis in 1843. We bring

him back to his birthplace. He lived well here, he will sleep well

here.

Adam Wagnalls was a religious man. He believed in the un-

seen; he believed that there are powers higher than man. He

believed that there is a world back of this world, that there is a

soul of this world, which we may call the spiritual world, the

world that receives all souls at death.

This good man was typical of the mid-west. He was strong,

rugged, honest, frank, confiding. He had faith in man; and in a

certain sense there is no greater faith than faith in man; because,

in general, those who have faith in man, have faith in God, and

those who have no faith in man have no faith in God. The last,

and perhaps saddest of all infidelity, is the utter disbelief of man

in man.

Mr. Wagnalls was educated at the Wittenberg Theological

college. He acquired wide knowledge on many serious questions.

He became a student and a scholar. Later he organized the

Lutheran Church in Kansas where 'he served the people for a

season, and about this time his aunt appears upon the scene.

She was romantic, and she asked him a romantic question:

"Adam, are you looking for a wife? What is your ideal?"

Adam answered that his ideal was a poor girl working her way

through college. "I know her," shouted his aunt very gayly, "I

know her; she is in Xenia Female College."

After a few preliminaries, these two young persons were

made acquainted. Adam. went to see her graduate, this young,

energetic, intellectual woman; and a little later their fortunes

were linked together in marriage.

Adam Wagnalls married the right woman. I remember her

well. She was one of the noblest and finest women I have ever

known -- a woman of charm, a woman of brains, strong, coura-

geous, a Roman matron, intelligent, alert, devoted. She helped

her husband in every imaginable way. She was the pulse of the

home; she was the fire that warmed the house. She helped also

in all of Mr. Wagnalls' business ventures. She was a counselor

and a guide, a woman of seasoned character, a woman of ideas

and ideals.

Next we hear of Adam Wagnalls as a lawyer. His darling

wife was on hand, even in this new venture, and studied law with

him. They moved together like swan and shadow.

Now, in 1876, with $5,000, the savings of years, they moved

to New York City. There Mr. Wagnalls met Isaac Funk, an old

college friend whom Adam had known in Wittenberg. He found

Mr. Funk engaged in editing a magazine called The Complete

Funeral of Adam Willis Wagnalls          507

Preacher. It was just beginning, it was struggling in its first in-

fancy. Only two or three numbers had been issued.

Mr. Funk invited Mr. Wagnalls to join in the fortunes of the

new magazine; and at that time the great partnership was formed,

the partnership that finally developed into what is known as the

Funk and Wagnalls Company, now in existence in New York

City, and one of the most powerful and formidable companies in

America, perhaps in the world.

Adam Wagnalls put his little all, his $5,000, into that maga-

zine. This was the foundation-stone of the great publishing

house, the greatest of its kind in America.

In the beginning the two men began humbly. They had only

a small desk in the corner of an office. They had only money

enough to pay for this one little desk, one sitting on one side of

the desk and the other on the other side. From that small be-

ginning grew the great house now known all over the world.

That $5,000 was the acorn that produced the great oak.

Funk and Wagnalls were a fine combination. Mr. Funk was a

dreamer, an adventurer, a man of imagination. Mr. Wagnalls

was the stabilizer, the pathfinder, the man who furnished founda-

tions for dreams, furnished a ballast for the imagination. Mr.

Funk called him "the genius of caution". Moreover, Mr. Wag-

nalls was an encyclopaedia of facts. He was crammed to the

brim with information about life, facts that were important in

this business into which they had entered. Thus he was invalu-

able; a man who could be appealed to on all occasions. He

had wide information, and yet there was in him no boasting, no

assumption of universal knowledge.

Finally, the company become book publishers. Their idea

was to print good books at a small cost. I have many of their

great little books on my library shelves at home on Staten Island.

They also began to print great works, colossal productions.

The Jewish Encyclopaedia was one; The Standard Dictionary was

another. This dictionary cost a million dollars merely to pre-

pare the manuscript. Altogether, I consider this the most useful

dictionary I know of, because I can find many out-of-the-way

words in it, words that do not appear in the other dictionaries I

possess.

It was these two men who established The Literary Digest, a

most valuable weekly, perhaps the most widely distributed and

read literary journal in the world. I could not get on without it

as a weekly peep-hole into world affairs.

It was Adam Wagnalls who laid the plans for financing all

these great undertakings.

But the greatest achievement of Adam Wagnalls remains to

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be spoken of -- I refer to his distinguished daughter, Mabel

Wagnalls, now Mrs. Mabel Wagnalls Jones; for she is married

to Mr. Richard Jones, a genial and powerful personality, a man

who takes a deep and intelligent interest in all of her many lines

of literary work. And she has many lines, for she is a novelist, a

playwright, a musician, as well as a great-hearted and most lova-

ble woman. She has won, and is still winning, honors in all these

artistic lines of activity. Her finest work the world will not

willingly let die.

I scarcely need to tell you that the remarkable Library and

Social Center now being erected in your town of Lithopolis is the

work of her hand. This work was conceived in love. It rose out

of her love for her parents of blessed memory, and also out of

her love for her people. She desires that others shall have the

cultural opportunities that were denied to her parents in those

early days in the Mid-West.

Now, let me say that Adam Wagnalls was more than a busi-

ness man. He was a spiritual prince among men. He was a gen-

tleman of the old order. One of the old dramatists, back in the

time of Queen Elizabeth, called Jesus "the first true gentleman

that ever lived." It is enough then to say that Adam Wagnalls

was a true gentleman.

His character was an epitome of well-nigh all the virtues--

sobriety and earnestness, unobtrusive generosity, simplicity in

manners. Finally, let me say that he nursed no grudges; he had no

rancor; he carried no ill-feeling against people. He might be

somewhat on the lookout for rogues, but all honest people had

his whole-hearted confidence.

Adam Wagnalls was the flower of geniality. It is a feeling

of mine that no one has a right to be morose or gloomy, always

throwing out dark clouds upon those around him. It is our duty

to be genial as far as possible, and to save others from the burden

of our gloomy moods. Adam radiated good cheer.

This man was also humble. Perhaps his humility was his

greatest characteristic. And let me say, in passing, that humility

seems to me to be the greatest power in the character. And by

humility I do not mean servility; I do not mean the continual

statement that we are worms of the dust. Humility is far more

dignified than that. Humility is the greatest force in character.

Humility is self-effacement in the presence of the truth. If you

have reached a point where you are willing to efface yourself,

your ego, your self-importance, when you come into the presence

of any truth, and say, "I will put all my self-interest behind me;

I will look this squarely in the eye and see if it is true; and, if I

find it true, I will accept it and live by it -- then you are a humble

Funeral of Adam Willis Wagnalls          509

man. It takes power to do this. It takes character, to do this.

If the acceptance of a truth causes us to lose something, still the

true man, the humble man, will accept it and live by it in spite of

all the worldly losses. Such strong souls are sons of the Christ,

children of the Kingdom. And because he was humble, he had the

power to listen. Only a few persons have the power to listen.

Frequently, when two persons are talking--and especially when

they get the least bit excited, and both want to talk at once,--

neither listens. A doesn't want to listen to B, because he is wait-

ing for B to get through so he can talk. I takes power to be able

to listen.

Adam Wagnalls was a prince of courtesy. And this courtesy

extended into his home. It was not kept merely for public oc-

casion; for he was as courteous to his wife and daughter as

though they had been distinguished visitors, and that is quite

remarkable, to be as courteous to your wife and daughter as to

visitors. That is quite notable. That is as it ought to be.

He was courteous even to servants. He assumed no supe-

riority over any one because he was a mere helper. He remem-

bered perhaps that Jesus said, "I am a servant," remembered

also that no greater thing ever fell from these Divine lips than the

words: "He that would be the greatest among you, let him be the

servant of all."

Love ruled the life of Adam Wagnalls, love based on justice.

What is wrong with the world, my friends? There isn't any-

thing wrong with the world, except that it has only a very little

love and justice in it. You can have no love without justice,

because upon justice stand the beautiful feet of love.

This man had the power to love; this great and benign soul

was a lover. So I am happy to say, what you all know and be-

lieve, that those who love here on earth go on to join those who

love in the world of immortal spirits. The drama of life does not

end here on earth; the drama only begins here; life is only the

beginning. The few little years we spend on earth are only the

first scene in a Divine Drama that extends on into eternity.

Death is not a catastrophe, is not a final collapse of all the

forces. It is only an incident in the long journey of the soul, in

the long career of the spirit.

And this is an appropriate moment to speak briefly of the

great and anxious question of survival. It concerns us all. Does

man survive the grave? Does he pass onward to some wonderful

existence beyond the Shadow of the Valley? If he does, we ought

to know something about it, for that fact would have a great deal

to do with our daily life. For it is a beautiful thing to look far

ahead--to take the short step with a long look. I believe there

are more revelations of life to come. I believe that God is a

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Divine Dramatist; that He has created a great drama with many

exits and many entrances; that life is only one scene in this Ro-

mance of the Infinite.

Now it looks as though the footsteps die out at the grave.

We see no footstep going beyond.

But the wise know that seemings are often deceptive. We

see the stars set; but no star goes down, but it climbs another

sky. So I believe that, when the soul disappears from one world,

it disappears only to enter upon another scene in the wondrous

Romance of Eternity.

So I bear witness to my faith in another existence. That we

should survive death is not to me incredible. The thing that is

incredible is life itself. Why should there be any life at all? Why

should this world of stars have ever come into existence? Why

should you be here, why should I be here this afternoon? Why

should we be here in this sun-illumined universe? Why should

there be green earth under our feet? How did all this happen?

This wonder that we know, this is the incredible thing. What

power projected it all into existence? This challenges my faith,

excites my astonishment, lifts me to the ineffable.

Well, but we are here. Some Power has called us here out

of the unknown. We did not come of our own wills. Some

Higher Power has evolved it all. And the power that has caused

this revelation of wonder and mystery can easily have prepared

for us another surprise beyond the shadow of death. And I be-

lieve that this stupendous power we call God has created a world

beyond this world, a world of spirit for the spirit of man.

And there is a philosophy of spirit that supports this view,

and Saint Paul gives us the key to it in that great statement that

--there are bodies natural and there are bodies spiritual;-- that

is to say, there are two kinds of substances. There is a natural

or physical substance and there is a spiritual substance. In other

words, we must keep in mind that physical things do not repre-

sent all the kinds of substance in our world.

We know something of material substance: we see the forms

of matter all around us. But these forms of matter in themselves,

are not living forms. They take on the appearance of life -- these

plants and animals and men -- because there are living spiritual

forms within them. Matter is dead; and whenever a material

form seems alive, it is because a spiritual form from the Spiritual

world is living and functioning within that material form.

Why am I here speaking to you today? Not because I am a

form of physical substance; not because I am a form of dust; not

because I am a form of matter, because matter cannot speak.

Matter has no life in itself. Matter cannot talk; matter cannot

Funeral of Adam Willis Wagnalls          511

think; matter cannot see. If you want to know what matter can

do, pick up a handful of dust on the road. It does not think. You

think! Therefore, back of the human body there is a thinker--

something that is spirit, something that is substance, something

that is deathless, something that has the higher God-stuff in it.

What is this that is talking to you today ? It is a spirit: I am

a spirit, My soul is talking to your soul.

In the light of this philosophy there are no forces in the

world except spiritual forces.  There are no such things as

material forces. The winds blow and the clouds move and the

waves dash and the thinker thinks, all through spiritual forces,

whose source is the spiritual world. For back of this veil of

matter there is the living, pulsing Spiritual World, living and

pulsing within all these physical forms. All this wonder we call

Nature is only the time-vesture of the Eternal.

So we are now spirits. You don't become a spirit at death:

You are now a spirit. You are now a soul, and a soul is an

organism. Hence every physical organ has a spiritual organ

within it, giving form and stability to the physical. So when the

spirit-form leaves the body at death, the body begins to crumble,

for nothing is left to maintain the tissues of the body. The soul

is the form-maker; "the soul is form and doth the body make."

So at this moment I do not look at you with my physical eye but

through it. For I have a spiritual eye--a spiritual hand, a

spiritual brain. Indeed, I am now an organic spiritual man, com-

plete for all the purposes of our human life.

Keep steadily in mind that I do not think with my physical

brain but through it; that I do not feel with my physical hand,

but feel through it; and so with all the organs.

Keep also in mind that--The soul is an organism complete

in all its parts. What was the ground of the old skeptics? They

said that the physical brain secretes thoughts: therefore, when

the physical brain crumbles the whole man crumbles. If there was

nothing but a physical brain in us, the old skeptic would be right;

because as soon as the physical brain disappeared there would be

no thinker left. But it is the spiritual brain that thinks. Hence

death has no power to destroy man.

Now, where is this Spiritual World that a man goes into after

death? It is not in some far away place. It is not in the sun,

nor in any star. The spiritual world is here, here all around us,

but invisible. It is back of this physical world, just as your soul

is back of your body. Indeed, you may think of the Spiritual

World as the soul of our globe. The Spiritual World is the world

that gives life to the physical world. This physical world is not

dead. If it were dead no tree would rise out of it, no grass would

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spring from the ground. The globe is not mere matter. There is

a Spiritual World; a world of spiritual substance living and puls-

ing within the physical world, just as the soul lives and pulses

within the body.

And at death, what happens? The spirit-man simply rises,

the real man, the only man that did any thinking or acting in life,

the real man rises out of the physical body. This is the Resur-

rection.

Where does he go? He doesn't have to go anywhere. He is

immediately in the Spiritual World, because it is behind or within

the physical world.

It is only through our physical bodies that we get knowledge

of the physical world. What then is the use of a physical body

since a man can function without a physical body. For you don't

need a physical body any more than a hand needs a glove. You

use the glove but you don't need it.

Whey then is a man given a physical body? Because the

Divine Father of the Universe wants to give us infinite kinds of

experience; and in order that we may have an experience in this

physical world, in order that we may take part in this scene in

the drama of the universe, we are given a physical body as an

actor is given a mask for his part.

While we take our part in this earthly scene, the Spiritual

World is shut off temporarily. We come in contact only with the

physical world. Our physical eye projects our spirit-sight only

into the physical world. This is the reason we do not now

see the World of Spirits that is around us.

As soon as the mist of matter is cleared away for us at death

we look at once into the next world with all its wonders. And I

believe that we are received by blessed angels, and are made to

feel at home as you feel at home here. The soul of the man has

passed into the soul of the world.

He is soon joined by those who are kindred to him in spiritual

quality. For the thing that is universal in life is spiritual affinity,

spiritual gravitation. You go to the kind of people you are your-

self. This is a terrifying fact: we go to those who are kindred

to our souls. How necessary then that we chasten and purify

our souls so that we shall have lofty and noble associates.

I am giving you my judgment based upon my study of the

Bible and upon knowledge of the nature of life. You will go to

those who are kindred to your soul, whether they be good or

whether they be evil. Millions can be gathered together by spirit-

ual affinity, by spiritual gravitation. This law is the basis of the

idea of Heaven and Hell we hear so much about. Heaven is

simply the gathering together of those good men and women,

Funeral of Adam Willis Wagnalls          513

those consecrated men and women, who believe in love and jus-

tice, who believe in subordinating private interest to the public

welfare, who believe in brotherhood.

All men and women of this noble sort will naturally gravi-

tate toward God, organize themselves into society under the in-

spiration and leadership of the Divine Christ; and that is Heaven.

It is all founded upon the logic of life. What happens here gives

the key to what will happen hereafter. The next world will have

lofty realms for lofty souls. We may also be sure that in that

better land men will still be men and women, women. We may

be sure also that we will find there a great and beautiful field

for the exercise of all our powers.

Here on earth we are circumscribed. Here a few get edu-

cation, some get partial education, others get no education. We

have only a very imperfect organization of life for soul-educa-

tion. But there in that better land where the noble men and

women of this world are congregated under the inspiration and

leadership of our Christ, there everyone down to the lowest and

the least, will receive all the education that love can suggest or

that wisdom can execute.

This is worth thinking about. This shows what they have

and what we lack. The next world is not a figment. The next

world is something as practical as wood-chopping. It is the real

thing. There we will enter into our real happiness, for there we

will enter into the social joy, the joy of the holy brotherhood.

For we will enter into a life in which selfishness will be eliminated.

That is the practical purpose of religion--to help us to eliminate

our selfishness and to make us ready for the Divine society, which

is Heaven.

There, O friends, we enter the path of eternal progress.

There will be a field for the manifestations of all our dreams.

If you are an artist, there you can practice your art; if you are a

gardener there you can practice your art; if you are some great

political leader with a pure heart, you will find there opportunities

for political and social leadership in this Divine world toward

which we are.moving.

Yes, there will be opportunity for the development of all

there is in us under the direction of the Divine Man of the

Universe.

Isn't that something worth while? I tell you, friends, that

it is the only thing worth while.

Therefore, I come to tell you that it is no misfortune for the

good to die. We sorrow for the departed, but they have gone

on into a blessed land, of which the earth is but a shadow.

If we are faithful to our ideals, we will pass onward into

Vol. XXXIII--33.

514       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

that same better country, where we will meet again our lost dear

ones. They have only been called back, only called back. We

will follow them. Then there will be a glad reunion in some

blessed paradise, where life will be based at last wholly and

utterly on love, labor and loyalty.

This is not an hour therefore, for unavailing sorrow, for

hopeless longing; for we are here to celebrate the passing of a

great soul to his reward. A great career has been finished nobly.

He was faithful to his ideals to the last.

I am sure that he would say with the poet, Robert Louis

Stevenson, what Stevenson said of himself:

"Under the wide and starry sky

Dig the grave and let me lie:

Glad did I live and gladly die,

And I laid me down with a will.

This be the verse you grave for me:

'Here he lies, where he longed to be;

Home is the sailor, home from the sea,

And the hunter home from the hill'."

THE FUNK AND WAGNALLS COMPANY

It may be of general interest to recal the fact that

the builders of the great Funk and.Wagnalls publish-

ing house of New York City were both Ohioans by

birth, formative influences and education.   Brief

sketches from  Who's Who in America are here given:

Isaac Kaufman Funk, author and publisher, was born at

Clifton, Ohio, September 10, 1839. He was educated at Witten-

berg College, Springfield, Ohio, from which he was graduated in

1860 with the degree of A. B. Later he received the degree of

A. M., He was graduated from Wittenberg Theological Sem-

inary in 1861 and later received the degrees of D. D. and LL. D.

He married Eliza Thompson of Carey, Ohio, in 1864; was or-

dained to the Lutheran ministry in 1861; he served in different

pastorates from 1867-1872. He entered the publishing business

in 1876 and two years later was joined by Adam Willis Wagnalls

in the partnership that grew into the well known firm of Funk

and Wagnalls Company. He was active in the cause of prohibi-

tion and was editor-in-chief of the various periodicals of that